The Tiger Who Came To Tea: Daleks in Manhattan / Evolution of the Daleks

Jazz hands everyone!

Lol at the sad clown with the showgirls.

We meet showgirl Tallulah and stagehand Laszlo, planning for a future together...

There's some very 30s movie accents on display here.

Tallulah's called to the stage, while Laszlo tracks down some oinking in the dark.

Pig Man Attack!

The TARDIS arrives at the foot of the Statue of Liberty in Wales.

Blue suit! At this point people were theorizing there were actually two doctors knocking about.

Bit of a history lesson re: the Wall Street Crash here.

Love the sign post in Hooverville. Reminds me of M*A*S*H.

Hugh Quarshie, always a class act. One of the better Brits-doing-American-accents too.

Solomon thinks he's the 1st Doctor. But he's the 10th. Or 11th. Whatever.

The Empire State building is still under construction. The workers are giving Mr. Diagoras grief.

The shot of the Dalek in the lift is great. But the pig slaves... oh dear, the pig slaves.

Does this disappoint because it's not New York-y enough?

The Doctor's always been about the little people, the real history. Hooverville is where the people are. Or in this case, were.

Frank alerts them to Diagoras. Sure I've seen him "hanging round" New York before.

Diagoras is employing Hoovervilliansfor a dollar a day to clear rubble in the sewers.

Definitely nothing sinister going on here.

The Doctor finds a glowy green jellyfish.

Looks a bit like a Rutan.

Diagoras has his men working on a special mast to top the Empire State Building.

The mast is to be completed with a special sort of metal. The plates have some familiar looking bumps...

This Dalek is an odd character. It envies the human achievement of NYC & sounds almost melancholy.

The Black Dalek decides Diagoras is the perfect subject for the final experiment...

The Dalek laboratory is very Universal Horror. It does have a great pastiche-y atmosphere this.

The best bits in this so far are all the ones the Doctor & Martha aren't in. That's not good.

Spider-man & Holby-man discover a pig man in the sewers.

The sewers are full of pigmen. What exactly is the point of the pigmen?

The pig men capture Spider-Man as the others escape into the theatre & Tallulah pulls a gun on them.

Tallulah grates on about Laszlo Panaflex.

The Doctor waves his Rutan at her.

Tallulah has seen the way Martha looks at the Doctor.

The story's ground to a halt here.

It's lashing down in Hooverville as Holby-man rallies his hobo-troops.

"The pig slaves are primitive, the final experiment is greater by far. We need your flesh."

The rest of the cult object to Sec's plan, but are overruled.

Sec strips then seems to grow some slimy green engulfing tube to smother Diagoras' face.

I know, I know, but that's what actually happened.

Are we to assume all Dalek mutants can do that? I think it's supposed to be that this is the result of earlier experiments that Sec has done on himself.

The musical number is great and the dance routine well directed.

That tune'll be stuck in my head now.

Martha spoils the show. And the musical number. Ba-dum-tish!

The Doctor's figured out the Rutan is actually from Skaro & the pigslaves kidnap Martha.

Sec's smoking. Evolve! Evolve! No, that's really not how evolution works.

Hybridisation of the Daleks doesn't really trip off the tongue to be fair.

The Doctor & Tallulah meet the pigged-up Laszlo.

The Daleks scan people with their sucker sticks and decide Martha & Spider-man are high intelligence.

So weird that "All the Strange, Strange Creatures" is wasted as random incidental music here.

The cult believe they are the last 4 Daleks in existence.

"The children of Skaro must walk again!" Here comes Sec-sy!

The human-Dalek looks a little hokey but it's actually a fun concept.

I mean, it could never take off. You'd never replace that classic design for anything... you'd think.

It always seemed to me people came to this story determined to hate it having been so offended by the Radio Times "spoiling" them.

The Doctor sets the radio going - "Happy Days are here again." Hardly.

The cult of Skaro escaped your slaughter..." Slaughter? Really?

He didn't kill any of them did he? Just sent them to a hell dimension before they killed everyone in London. Sec's evolved into a big ole drama queen.

"Tell me how it feels..."

"Like I've got 6 cocks on my face."

The Doctor sonics the radio to give Sec tinitus, and does a runner.

What's the point of the pig slaves again? Presumably just earlier hybridisation attempts but why carry on making them? And why pigs anyway? Surely something closer to a Dalek mutant would have made a better experiment?

The pigslaves attack Hooverville and then a Dalek flies in for the kill.

Solomon pleads for peace. "What do you say?" "Exterminate!" I'm with the Dalek on this one.

The Doctor goes a bit mad.

Sec orders a stay of execution. Martha pulls confused face.

"You saved the Doctor. Why?" "He's a genius, and we can use him."

This is the forward thinking the cult were created for. Sec starts to show an interest in human qualities.

This is by far the most interesting element of the story, with its echoes of The Evil of the Daleks.

Sec shows the Doctor his frankenstein-like contraption and plans to harness Gamma radiation.

He's going to turn them all into Hulks?

Sec telling the Doctor that Davros was wrong is quite a shock. His thinking is too outside the box for the cult.

Obviously no reason for them to be there, but I'd've loved Ogrons in Fedoras with Tommy guns!

Martha's moping threatens to stop the story dead here.

"The pig slaves will take the lift!" BEST. LINE. EVER.

The Doctor doesn't have much luck with heights. Or lightning, come to that. So this is a pretty stupid plan.

Why is it gamma lightning? Why does it make the humans into Dalek zombies anyway?

And why are they saying they're Daleks? They're just brain dead humans. Nothing Dalek about them.

Now the Doctor reckons the gamma strike will have put Time-Lord DNA in the zombies.

That's not how DNA works. Or gamma radiation. Or lightning. I don't expect accurate science, but I could do without obvious bollocks.

First the Daleks tie Sec up like a dog, then exterminate him.

The "human Daleks" question orders. "Why?" This is supposed to be like Evil isn't it? Doesn't even come close.

The Daleks exterminate them all. Had to really, story-wise. Couldn't have that lot released into history.

Bad enough with Pigman Panaflex surviving.

Ah, the lovely Dalek heartbeat sound effect as the Doctor appeals to the last Dalek, Caan.

Emergency Temporal Shift!" "Caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!!!!!!!!!!!" Bet that's the last we'll see of him.

The Doctor fires up his bunsen burner. Off screen, Mike Yates' grandfather breaks out the army cocoa.

So the Doctor does some of the science and Laszlo's lifespan is extended. Whatever. He probably goes on to become Spider-man's greatest nemesis, and it's all the Doctor's fault.