Achieve your Squad goals as the final members of the DALEKS! crew join the collection
One of the great surprises of Time Lord Victorious is just how quickly it’s all sped by. After all, by the time the next couple of days are over, almost all of the core strands will be complete. Only the live experiences, Echoes of Extinction, and the final Figurine Collection issue will remain for the New Year. And issue 3 is an appropriate and significant marker along that path. Because while the Tenth Doctor was billed as the central figure of Time Lord Victorious, its real breakout star has been these new Daleks.
They’ve had their own five part animated series, three audio dramas, a comic series, an escape room and more. It’s fair to say they’ve dominated and conquered the Time Lord Victorious universe. And, of course, this issue completes own series of figurines. And there’s a wonderfully satisfying sense of completion to be able to line up all six of them.
The most cunning Dalek of them all is brought to life in superb detail
One of the final two to arrive is the Dalek Strategist. Its marvellously fun design concept is lovingly recreated here, wonky grill hoops and all. Based on the classic 1963 Daleks, this is far from the simple repaint a less dedicated team might have produced. The Strategist is ancient. Really, terribly, old. Clinging to its original casing as an sort of intimidation of its fellow Daleks (any Dalek that’s survived that long is not to be messed with) it’s battered and care worn.
The model reproduces every crack, every patch where a missing hemisphere used to be, and every spot of rust perfectly. And even that rust goes above and beyond the call of duty. They could have simply painting those areas brown. Instead Hero Collector have actually sculpted the corrosion into the model. The rust digging deeper into the Daleks’ metal hide than the smoother areas. It’s a truly impressive combination of concept and execution.
The Dalek Executioner, a Dalek so mad it literally sees red, is another sign of just how much thought has gone into these variants
Speaking of execution, the other figurine includes this issue, and the final one in the set, is the Dalek Executioner. Conceived as a Dalek so aggressively murderous even other Daleks both fear and loathe it, the tweaks to the standard Dalek design skillfully communicate that nature. The black and red highlights to its paint job ooze malice. While its claw like manipulator arm makes you feel that this is a rank which revels in its viciousness. And the revelation in the accompanying magazine that the central spike is actually a Varga thorn – there to turn its victims into zombie plants who prey on the living – emphasizes just how sadistic the Executioner is, even for a Dalek.
The only downside is that its blood red eye is depicted in the standard position. Other appearances by the Executioner have shown it can choose to narrow its eye as if scowling. But, in fairness, at this scale that effect would have been almost impossible to create.
The accompanying profiles detail these Daleks’ roles in Time Lord Victorious. So you might want to put them aside for just a few more days
As with the last two issues, the accompanying magazine again gives us profiles of our two Daleks. Though, be warned, since they cover the activities of these two specific individuals over the course of Time Lord Victorious, you may want to put it on your shelf for the few days until Mutually Assured Destruction and the end of DALEKS! come out. In the case of the Strategist in particular, it gives new insight into just how duplicitous it’s been. Told from its point of view, it reveals how many lies it’s told to get its way.
Though it also keeps the character shrouded in a certain mystery, playing coy with exactly how old it is, and what role it might have in the Doctor’s other adventures, past and future. The Executioner’s profile faces a slightly larger challenge. After all, it was born to kill, lives to kill, kills for a living, has killing as its second favourite hobby right after killing, and sees itself five years from now killing stuff. And there’s not a lot more to say about its one track mind and personality than that.
“Being shot by [a Dalek] is like being shot by a nuclear bomb!”
The related background material is also a little more tangential than before. We get a list of particularly notable exterminations for instance, like the first ever, and the first time we saw an actual skeleton in the negative image. But despite that, they’re all done with such a sense of fun, and so wittily written, that they’re well worth the read. One victim is given his full title “The Arch Traitor, the Thal Spy, Ronson!” for instance. While the article also ponders why Daleks keep toy Police Boxes on their ships, and the gentlest extermination of all when the prisoners in Destiny of the Daleks very slowly and carefully lower themselves to the floor once shot.
Meanwhile, Gavin Rymill provides another gorgeous cutaway diagram, this time of a Dalek gunstick. And with text inspired by The Dalek World book of the 1960s, it’s an over the top hoot to read. “The energy from a Dalek blast could power the Blackpool illuminations for a year!” is just one of its glorious odes to Dalek firepower.
Short story Exit Strategy focuses on the seething Strategist, as its best laid plans fall apart
In line with the sense of Time Lord Victorious already drawing to a close, the short story Exit Strategy feels like a coda to the Dalek path through the crossover. Set after Mutually Assured Destruction it sees the Dalek Strategist in reflective mood after (spoilers) the Doctor defeats the Daleks. As the Strategist considers everything that went wrong for them, its seething bad temper at the incompetence of everyone around it is a hilarious touch. While you might genuinely snort at its final judgement of the Executioner.
There’s one more issue of the Figurine Collection left, featuring the Time Lord Victorious himself and Brian the Ood. But as the final piece of this strand about the Dalek Time Squad falls into place, we can say it’s been a highlight of the event. More even than DALEKS! itself, the Figurine Collection has made the Restoration Empire an era Blogtor Who would love to see explored further.
Doctor Who: Time Lord Victorious – Figurine Collection #3
You can order Doctor Who: Time Lord Victorious – Figurine Collection #3 from the Hero Collector website. RRP £19.99. Issue #4 should also be out on the 1st of March next year.
You can keep track of everything tying into Time Lord Victorious, what’s out next, and all of Blogtor Who’s reviews of the adventure so far on our Time Lord Victorious Master List page.
