EDA: War of the Daleks

[fangrrl_squees]

Alright, so I just finished War of the Daleks, the EDA which, if I recall correctly, made the entire Internet¹ melt down.

It's a clever little bit of retconning, that can't be denied.

What I don't get is what the point of it all was? Why bring Skaro back? Was there really some grand, narrative necessity for it, or was it just a bit of fan service? Judging by fan reaction, a large portion of 'em didn't appreciate it so, er, oops.

Despite the name of my online vanity plate, I could cheerfully accept the situation we're left with at the end of the old series. Skaro go boom, Davros is comprehensively fuxxored and, oh man, did the Doctor really set that up from the get-go? Harsh. Granted, the last condition remains in place...

But, srsly, I don't understand the point of going to all that trouble - an entire book's worth - to restore Skaro and (apparently) kill Davros. I say 'apparently' because, boy oh boy, does John Peel make too big a point of saying that honest, Davros is really, really dead now, for sure, guvnor. Right.

I can sympathize with the fans who had a screaming fit about the book, but I'm not that upset about it. I'm probably luckier than they are, as I'm reading the series now - after the show has returned to the telly and RTD has made it clear that he's going to cherry-pick continuity as it suits him - and, of course, I ran across all the froth-mouthed discussions of War of the Daleks back in the day, so it wasn't like the book was a surprise.

I just think it was a bit pointless, that's all. Well-written and even clever in parts - I like the notion of a Dalek civil war, and the Dalek Prime not being a moron - but pointless, because no-one has adequately explained to me why we need Skaro back.

¹ - or at least the DW Usenet newsgroup, a not-insignificant part of the 'net, at the time

Comments

[doctor-toc.livejournal.com]

Actually, I thought Peel put quite a lot of effort into making sure that Davros had an out, what with the teleporter thingy being possibly operated by a loyal spider-dalek.

Peel has gone on record as saying that restoring Skaro was his goal because Terry Nation had been mad about the BBC blowing it up - which is kind of odd because Nation had script approval and signed off on it. He's also said that he felt it contradicted the "Final End" of the Daleks, as supposedly seen in "Evil of the Daleks", a view held by almost no-one else.

I'm one of the minority that actually likes the book. Even though it's basically just a big pointless retcon, it's one of my favourite bits of non-taxing comfort fiction, alongside The Infinity Doctors. It's a fun, "Biggles In Space" style adventure, and the Daleks are written pretty well. The retcon itself is so convoluted and flimsy that the only conclusion a reader can seriously reach is that the Dalek Prime is lying through its shiney metal balls, and this is backed up by the fact that Peel shows us the "desert world" that the Daleks claim to have molded into their fake Skaro, and it's a water world, still perfectly intact (Peel says this is a mistake, but by this point he's exhausted my patience with his bullshit, so fuck him).

[fangrrl-squees.livejournal.com]

I thought Peel put quite a lot of effort into making sure that Davros had an out,

I agree. I guess my sarcasm was lost in the tubes of the interweb. :)

[doctor-toc.livejournal.com]

Put it down to my brain being fried by teh VAT :-)