The 12th Doctor faces off against his oldest foe for the first time. Spoilers ahead: don't read the review if you have yet to see the episode!

Daleks. It's always the daleks. Thanks to an unfortunate agreement with the Terry Nation estate, the Doctor Who production team is obliged to use the famous exterminators at least once a year, lest their rights to use them be forfeited. As such, they're no longer the menacing monsters they used to be. In my opinion, we haven't had a fantastic dalek episode since 2005. But have writers Phil Ford and Steven Moffat broken the trend and given us a dalek episode to rival the greats? No, they haven’t, but it’s certainly one of the better ones.

Into the Dalek sees the Doctor (Peter Capaldi) and Clara (Jenna Coleman) miniaturised and injected into a 'sick' dalek in order to find out what's wrong with it, and rectify the fault if possible. All the while, the Doctor is pondering over the answer to the question: "Am I a good man?"

Whether or not the Doctor is a good man is a question that has been asked quite a few times since the programme was brought back in 2005. Interestingly, the general answer to it leans towards the negative; the 11th Doctor specifically denies being one in 2011’s A Good Man Goes to War. It’s implied that this drastic change in self-perception was a result of the Time War, but with that conflict finally brought to a resolution last year, it seems fitting that the Doctor wants to re-evaluate that position once more. Thus, as the episode plays out, we see the Doctor struggling to answer the question as he sticks to his long-ingrained prejudices against the daleks. Ultimately though, it’s the Doctor’s own hatred for the dalekanium dustbins that provides a possible answer to his question through his realisation that maybe he is no better than them. Despite his efforts, to prove himself a good man and ‘reprogram’ a dalek to be a force for beauty and peace instead of against it, hatred prevails. Rusty the Dalek is quite correct in pointing out that the Doctor is a good dalek. Daleks are fuelled by hatred, and when facing his oldest foes, so is the Doctor.

But, as Clara mentioned towards the end of the episode, it’s still not quite clear if the Doctor is a good man or not. He certainly made an effort to act like one towards the end, but this is all overshadowed thanks to his incredibly callous attitude throughout most of the episode. This lack of sensitivity is probably at its worst level we’ve seen since the Sixth Doctor tossed two guards into an acid pit on Varos, and it’s a rather shocking. After so many years of seeing the Doctor be ‘warm and cuddly’, having him be rather fierce and uncaring is quite a jarring change, but in a good way. It’s always a breath of fresh air for the programme to head in new directions, and this is certainly an interesting way to go. A Doctor who is less than compassionate to those around him will not be someone particularly likeable, and I wonder how Clara will cope with this, especially if she’s having to care so that he doesn’t have to. It’s a Doctor/Companion dynamic that I can easily see becoming one of my favourites.

This episode also sees the introduction of a new character, Danny Pink (Samuel Anderson), a former soldier who now teaches maths at Coal Hill School. In just a few short scenes, his character was given enormous depth, with the hint that he killed a civilian and suffers from PTSD as a result, and the fact that his former career means he’s not worthy of a romantic relationship. Danny’s very obviously set up to be a recurring character, so it will be great fun to see him explored in further episodes, along with his budding relationship with Clara. While I’m not too sure that Clara absolutely needs a love interest, the interplay between the two was great fun, and I hope we’ll see more of them together as the series progresses. Hopefully Danny’s existence as a love interest will be justified as well.

While the characters and their interactions are certainly the highlights of the episode, the same can’t be said for the practical side of things. Exploring the inside of a dalek is a good premise for an episode, but for the episode to work, the interior needs to look believable, and unfortunately that’s not the case here. Despite the efforts of the CGI department, it is painfully obvious that the inside of the dalek consists entirely of sets and location shooting in a large warehouse. It just didn’t look convincing – and the plastic tubes doubling for nerve endings didn’t help. Part of this problem though, might be that the trip through the dalek is quite confusing. One moment, the cast is at the top, then they’re in a chamber somewhere, then they’re down the bottom, then they’re in the middle, and suddenly they’re back at the top. It’s hard to form a picture of exactly where in the dalek they are. This problem could have been fixed if Ford and Moffat had gone into the episode with a clear idea of what the anatomy of a dalek actually is. There are plenty of cross-sections on the web that could have easily been used as reference points.

Fortunately, not every aspect about the daleks in this episode is bad. Of note is the fact that, for the first time since 2010’s Victory of the Daleks, we actually see them exterminate people! Granted, the people who are killed are only background soldiers and not any characters of mention, but the fact that the daleks finally follow up on their threat of extermination instead of shouting it repeatedly for several seconds is a definite step in the right direction. I do think that the dalek platoon was defeated a little too easily though; Rusty should have encountered some opposition instead of simply steamrolling his way through.

In conclusion, Into the Dalek is a serviceable and enjoyable dalek episode, and probably the best we’ve had since 2005. It’s not fantastic, but is by no means bad either. The characters shone throughout, but some poor set design and realisation of concepts did let it down somewhat.

7/10