Dr. Who & The Daleks: The Official Story of the Films

by John Walsh

The definitive guide to the making of the classic 1960s Dr. Who movies, lavishly illustrated and packed with insights into these beloved films.

Dr. Who and the Daleks: The Official Story of the Films is the definitive guide to the making of Dr. Who and the Daleks and Daleks’ Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. The first and only big-screen adaptations of the long-running TV series, the films, starring Peter Cushing as the titular time-traveller, are beloved by fans – and the Daleks, in glorious Technicolor, have never looked better.

Author and film expert John Walsh has unearthed a treasure trove of archive material, interviews and stunning artwork, and takes us through the whole process of translating the metal monsters from small screen to big. In-depth information on the production, design, casting and special effects is accompanied by full-colour illustrations, including props, posters, and behind-the-scenes photography – making it the perfect gift for fans of the films.

Genres: Doctor Who, Nonfiction

160 pages, Hardcover

Published September 6, 2022

About the author

John Walsh is a double BAFTA and double Grierson-nominated filmmaker, best-selling author and founder of Walsh Bros Ltd, one of the UK’s top 100 production companies.
John met Ray Harryhausen as a film student to make a documentary about his life and work. Today, John is a Trustee of the Ray & Diana Harryhausen Foundation and, in 2021, founded the Harryhausen Awards.

His books include Harryhausen The Lost Movies and his acclaimed non-fiction Official Story of the Film series with titles on Flash Gordon, Escape From New York and Dr Who & The Daleks. All four Rondo Award Nominees for “Book of the Year”. 2023 saw the release of Conan The Barbarian, and The Wicker Man. 2024 saw the publication of The Third Man: The Official Story of the Film, celebrating the 75th anniversary of “The best British film of all time.” New book in 2025, Gladiator II: The Art and Making of the Ridley Scott Film.

John's notable film and television work includes the historical feature film Monarch, restored and remastered after John tracked down the original 35mm camera negative in a film vault and was the subject of a BBC News story about lost films and is now available on Prime Video.

ToryBoy The Movie was nominated for the Grierson Award for “Best Documentary on a Contemporary Theme.” The film unlocked politics to a broad audience and is Britain’s most successful political documentary feature film. It is now available on Prime Video.
John’s landmark Grierson-nominated homeless series Headhunting The Homeless for BBC2 lifted the lid on the corporate world and today’s most vulnerable adults. Sofa Surfers for the BBC was television’s first homeless series for children and was Rose d'Or nominated. The BAFTA-nominated Don’t Make Me Angry brought clinical psychology into the home environment for the first time. All programmes can be viewed in full on the Walsh Bros YouTube Channel.

Reviews

[Richard Lyons · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dr Who and the Daleks at The Movies ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
As other reviews have revealed, this book is the definitive piece on the two Peter Cushing Dr Who films. From new interviews and new photography, there is more than you might expect from this making-of-movie book. That said, if you have any of John Walsh’s other books, and I have them all, then perhaps you won’t be that surprised. Time and again, he has hit a home run with his work on Ray Harryhausen, Flash Gordon, Escape From New York, Conan The Barbarian next year and another volume based on a British horror film. I have read many books purporting to be an inside look at how a film was made but is just a tedious BFI-style lecture where the author’s ego is writ large on each page. Walsh’s background as a double BAFTA-winning filmmaker has positioned him ideally for a more independent and roving eye. I have seen and heard a series of interviews on this and other books where he talks about the “burning questions” he always had for these films and other films. I am a huge Doctor Who fan, and even I was surprised at what Walsh turned up here. I pre-ordered my copy in March. Good job, too, as it sold out on its first day on Amazon UK and almost everywhere else in the UK at the date of writing. To order today will cost twice as much as I paid £30.00 as an import from Amazon US. I’m now a John Walsh fan too. Did you guess?

[RogerThornhill · Rating 5 out of 5]

John Walsh has done it again with an excellent making-of-book which tells the story of the classic 1965 and 1966 Dr Who Dalek films. New photos and artwork galore are here. There is so much further information and images I wonder how it was kept secret for nearly 60 years. Even the pictures I have seen before are of incredibly high quality in this new film art book. A must-buy for all fans of Dr Who. I can’t wait for Walsh’s next one. It sold out now at Amazon on day one of publication but is available from Forbidden Planet until they get exterminated by eager fans too!

[Val McKenzie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Doctor Who At The Movies - It’s About Time!
Finally a full making-of book for a sci-fi classic. I’ve been a fan of the Dr Who films for years, and this book has been worth the wait. With its glossy art book feel and embossed/outstanding cover what more could you ask for Christmas? It would only be better if I were The Doctor. New pictures and old ones in excellent quality. No Dr Who stone is left unturned. I have all of John Walsh’s books and this one is as the Doctor would say “extraordinary.” I’m looking forward to his next book.

[George Kaplin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was so pleased to get this book as it is now sold out on Amazon and most other places too. It comprehensively tells the story of the making of the two Peter Cushing Doctor Who films, with many facts I didn't know. The photos and artwork are superb. The ones I have seen before are of razor-sharp quality. The new ones are amazing too. So much colour as well. Most of the photos I have seen before were faded black and white. Nothing like that here. I would give this book six stars if I could.

[The Blind Bard · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a huge fan of Doctor Who, I was very excited to pick this up and it did not disappoint! It offers great insights into the making of the two 1960s Dalek films starring Peter Cushing in the lead role with lots of interesting information around the casting, set design, music composition, marketing, and pretty much every aspect of the films' production. Sad I can't see the amazing photos (one day, perhaps, if I get a Dalek eyestalk installed...) but even without those I thoroughly enjoyed it. Highfor recommend to any fans of the Aaru films or the classica era of Doctor Who — even fans only familar with the modern reboot will love it as aspects of the films fed into the design of Tennant and Smith's TARDIS's. And, you know... Daleks ❤️

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love the Peter Cushing films of Doctor Who, and it was great to see a book full of vibrant photos and images from these films. Some interesting narration, but slightly lacking compared to the likes of The Making of Star Wars books that I've read.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

It probably hasn’t passed you by that as I type this we are approaching the end of the year and are entering that time that involves CHRISTMAS SHOPPING  - something that may give you a feeling of enormous joy or sheer terror.

But never mind – coming for anyone who is a fan of the original  Doctor Who series is Dr. Who and the Daleks - The Official Story of the Films,  a coffee-table book that summarises and celebrates the two Dr. Who movies released in 1965 and 1966. (Please note – NOT “Doctor Who”, as there is a copyright issue there, I understand)

Context first – as I mentioned in my review of Doctor Who and the Daleks – the Illustrated Version these movies were made as a result of the unprecedented success of the television series which started in November 1963 and starred William Hartnell as the First Doctor. The second story of the season, shown between December 21st 1963 and February 1st 1964, introduced viewers to the Doctor’s nemesis The Daleks. The reaction was immediate and uncharacteristic in restrained Britain, leading to what has been referred to as “Dalekmania” in 1964, and especially for Christmas 1964.

The selling point was that not only were these films movie length – 90 minutes or so rather than the usual 25-minute episodes of the television series, but that for people used to watching television on a small black-and-white set, these were the first time that people could see the Daleks in cinematic colour, as was proudly proclaimed on the cinema posters.

It has been admitted that the production of the first was rushed to meet cinema deadlines, and although it was a movie rather than a black-and-white TV series money was tight. This was not the budget of a Marvel blockbuster, instead a much more modest children’s film seemingly made for a quick buck and a future in children’s matinees. Although the first film was in the top twenty box office hits of 1965, neither movie was received well by critics.

Personally, I was a little disappointed when I saw the movies years later in 1972 (and ironically on the BBC television channel.) They looked great in colour, but the scripts were not great and with the addition of two actors for comic effect (Roy Castle and Bernard Cribbins respectively) the overall result seemed a little uncharacteristic of the TV series. It was different to what I knew.

I was also bemused by Peter Cushing (who I really liked for his Hammer horror films) playing a very different type of Time Lord to William Hartnell’s version. Instead of the angry, grumpy Hartnell Doctor we got a kindly yet bumbling grandfather type figure which seemed at odds to my understanding of the character.  As the book admits, the Doctor of the second movie is more restrained and less comedic. It is interesting to note that Cushing is in the second movie less due to poor health.

Over the next fifty years or so, with the films not being BBC property and therefore not part of the BBC canon meant that even with the revival of the television series in 2005 these films became mainly ignored and often regarded with disdain.

And yet over time their reputation seems not only have been maintained, but even improved. 2022 has seen the two movies – Dr. Who and the Daleks, originally released in 1965, and Daleks’ Invasion of Earth 2150 A. D. originally released in 1966 – released in 4K Ultra High Definition, something which for nearly-60-years-old children’s movies is rather unusual. It may also explain the release of this book in December 2022, surely a sign that the films have become more noticeable again. Roberta Tovey, who played the young Suzie, is quoted as saying, “I don’t think we appreciated at the time how big it would become. I certainly didn’t.”

So, what do we get in this big (25 x 30 cm, or 12” x 10” in old measurements) book? As it is printed on heavy stock paper, we get lots of colour photos, not only of the movies but of the cast behind the scenes, merchandise such as posters, models, music and so on. Some of these have not been seen in years, if at all, which may be the attraction of the book.

The ordering of the book is a little odd, following events through time (TV series (briefly), first film then second film)  but then in each section there are what feel like a random miscellany of articles on disparate topics. The first section of the book looks at the big picture and explains the context of the origins of the films as I have mentioned already. There is then a section about the main cast of the first movie – Peter Cushing, Roberta Tovey (in both films) but also supporting cast Roy Castle and Jennie Linden.

All of that you might expect, but then we get a hodge-podge of interviews and material. For example, in the section on the first film we have interviews with Art Director Bill Constable and Gerald Larn who created the matte paintings for both films as well as an analysis of the Director Gordon Flemyng, based on old interviews and interviews with the surviving members of the cast. Nearly sixty years on there’s not many of these around so Walsh has to summarise articles and quotes from documentaries to add to his own details. They are generally interesting for the super-fan, but perhaps not for the casual reader.

The success of the first movie led to the second movie being made for twice the budget, and would involve outdoor filming and a Dalek saucer spaceship. In the next section about the second movie we have details of this shoot, and there is a section on the outdoor locations used for filming. There’s a good interview from the stuntman injured during filming which illustrates the dangerous nature of the stunts, as well as details again given on the models, the music, posters and the music of the second movie.


The book ends with an intriguing look at what was proposed for a third movie that was sadly never made. Like the first two movies, Lost in Time was intended to be based on one of the television serials. This time it was The Chase, broadcast in May 1965 and would have involved Terry Nation’s* Mechanoids as well as a chase through time of the Doctor by the Daleks. There were also moves made for a movie in the 1970’s involving Tom Baker, the Third Doctor, although this never came to fruition. The details are brief, yet tantalising about what could have been.

Summing it up then, Dr. Who and the Daleks - The Official Story of the Films is a great assemblage of material about the first two movies that would go nicely when accompanied with those new 4K editions of the films. It is good to have a physical summary the films and all of the related paraphernalia all in one book. Whilst some of the material is quite limited, presumably because it is hard to source such details nearly sixty years on, the variety of images and interviews do give you an impression of what it must have been like in the 60s “Dalekmania” era. For those who were around at the time and are looking for a nostalgic reminder of details all in one place, or for those fans not around then but who want to know what it was like, this is an admirable summary. And, coincidentally, just in time for Christmas!

* the creator of the Daleks

[James Lark · Rating 2 out of 5]

Daleks – Invasion Earth: 2150AD was my introduction to Doctor Who. My best friend put it on when I was staying at his house and my imagination was instantly fired by the Technicolor swirl of the time vortex, that Dalek gliding out of the Thames, and the metal armies that followed with their brilliantly echoey, grating voices. Sylvester McCoy was my first Doctor, but Peter Cushing was my first Dr. Who, and I have always been cheered when the films are acknowledged by mainstream Who commentators – the thrill of getting Peter Haining’s (by then, very out of date) Doctor Who: A Celebration for Christmas and finding several pages on the Dalek films, with photos! The delight when the not-insubstantial section on the Dalek films in Kevin Davies’ More Than Thirty Years in the TARDIS was followed by a whole straight-to-video documentary Dalekmania.

Haining’s book was, now slightly notoriously, mostly cobbled together from existing interviews and is not exactly a high water mark when it comes to research, and Dalekmania, whilst grabbing some crucial interviews and considerably expanding our appreciation of the films, had its reach limited by its budget and in any case is now nearly 30 years old, so the time is ripe for a proper, comprehensive tome about the Dalek films (especially in the year they have been given a 4K restoration). So John Walsh’s large coffee table book, promising never-before-seen photographs and ‘the official story of the films’, is something I have been anticipating with something of the heart-thudding excitement with which I first experienced the Dalek films themselves.

It was a little underwhelming, then, to read the dry and terse opening chapters, which lack any enthusiasm or passion – and, apparently, an editor. Because whilst the chapter headings break down the topics in a way that (sort of) makes sense, the stream-of-consciousness prose leaps illogically from one idea to the next, like a series of gobbets popping into the author’s head: the biography of Barrie Ingham suddenly digresses into a discussion of the episodes wiped from the BBC archive, and a section on Bill McGuffie’s music for the second film becomes a discussion of the restoration and release of both scores in 2009, before hastily polishing off the same paragraph with a few mentions of other films scored by McGuffie. If it was handed to me as a school essay I’d send it back for a rewrite.

The chapters on the production are disappointingly sparse – you’ll find more detail on Wikipedia – and mostly filled out with quotes from the cast and crew. And as I was reading, an odd thing happened: everything started to feel... well… familiar. In fact I recognised much of the text word for word. The truth finally hit me: John Walsh has done a Peter Haining and cobbled together a book from existing (and mostly very old) interviews. Except that Haining had the advantage of a time when any information at all about Doctor Who was like gold dust; in this internet age the interviews quoted are widely available and pretty well known. There seems to have been almost no attempt at original research and barely any background reading, a suspicion confirmed by a very sparse bibliography on the final page; in fact, the quotes are mostly from Dalekmania, so it’s no wonder that there aren’t any new insights here.

Walsh also seems unfamiliar with the nature of primary sources, treating them as unassailable facts and failing to contextualise them, or simply tautologously repeating them in his own prose (‘Cushing recalled the plan for the films was to set a darker, more serious tone. “We intended to make them a little darker.”’) Some quotes seem not even to have been understood before cutting (a nonsense sentence about the winner of the Sugar Puffs Dalek competition suddenly becomes clear when compared to the image of the newspaper article from which it is lifted, revealing the vital clause that has been removed).

It’s not just a problem of recycled material, either: in several places the book is downright inaccurate. ‘Some of [Bill] Constable’s visual flourishes would endure’, we are told, with reference to the white interior TARDIS doors and the exterior St John’s Ambulance logo seen again in the eleventh Doctor’s era; but the St John’s Ambulance logo actually goes back to the Peter Brachacki’s police box built for the television series, whilst the white TARDIS doors were designed by George Provis for the second film, not by Bill Constable. The book’s rambling conclusion declares that ‘Milton Subotsky achieved something no other filmmaker has: putting Doctor Who on the big screen’ – which must be news to Steven Moffat, whose 50th anniversary story The Day of the Doctor saw a worldwide cinema release. It casts doubt on some other ‘facts’ for which no evidence is provided – did the cast of Oliver! really frolic with a Dalek on a Victorian London set? The only story I can find resembling this outside this book is that the Daleks were left to moulder on the Shepperton backlot which is where some of Fagin’s gang were photographed leaping around with one.

In honesty, there are times when one begins to wonder if Walsh has even seen the films. We are told that the Dell Comics adaptation of the first film has ‘some anomalies’, because ‘Dr. Who has a moustache in this version’ – as opposed to what, one wonders, staring at the clearly moustachioed Cushing in the photographs throughout the book.

The photographs, though – what photographs they are! On this front, the book fares much better, Walsh having had access to materials in the StudioCanal archive and reproducing many never-before-seen images on a glorious scale. Some of them have been brilliantly recoloured by Clayton Hickman (whose work is long overdue a volume in its own right), and page after page of glossy production shots and behind-the-scenes images provide an absolute feast for the eyes, along with reproductions of publicity and other related pictures. Pure delight, and almost worth the cover price alone. But even here I can only offer reserved praise, since the book is also peppered with stills from the films themselves that look uniformly grainy and washed out, a poor representation of the excitingly colourful widescreen that looks considerably better even on my DVD version. Since they have just been restored to 4K there surely must be better options than this.

There is a wealth of writing about these films that Walsh’s bibliography doesn’t even seem to have approached – the incredible work of the dalek6388 blog, podcast and videos, multiple articles in different issues of Doctor Who Magazine and the recent piece about the unmade third film written by Matthew Sweet. These may delve into the subject in more depth than a volume of this nature requires, but they offer insights that go well beyond the decades-old material Walsh has clearly relied on (when Peter Haining’s Celebration is one of the few books on your bibliography you know you’re in trouble).

Buy it for the pictures if you must, but that the official book on these films has been so shoddily, haphazardly put together is inexcusable.

[Dave Morris · Rating 4 out of 5]

I went to see the first Dalek movie twice in eight days, first in Slough and then a week later when it opened in Woking. Each time I sat through the supporting feature so as to see the whole movie twice. (My dad was very patient.) And I was very excited, because here were Daleks on the big screen. But it wasn't a patch on the original TV stories. The interior of the Tardis looked a mess (more Albert Steptoe than I.M. Foreman) and cramped with it. It didn't make the proper dematerialization sound. The Doctor was an embarrassing goof. Susan was just a kid. The Daleks looked too cumbersome and they were the wrong colour (blue not silver), their guns fired extinguisher gas, and their city was too '60s psychedelia. Also, the filmmakers had dumbed the story down, as if that's what children wanted. The TV version got it right. That was dark and made no concessions.

To be fair to Milton Subotsky & co, perhaps John Trevelyan and the BBFC should take some of the blame. These are the same idiots who vandalized Michael Powell's Peeping Tom. They apparently thought movies for kids should be soft & soppy, which in my view doesn't shape responsible kids, it just creates infantilized adults.

Anyway, it was Daleks! In the cinema! And the Daleks moved beautifully in their big control room, and the finale was more dramatic than on TV. So I overlooked all the shortcomings and bliss it was in that dawn to be alive. And the book recaptures that feeling.

There are a few errors. The photo on page 15 is described as showing Terry Nation with one of the Daleks from the first television story. In fact it's from the second story, as you can tell by the thick base that was added to protect the Dalek's wooden skirt from getting damaged on the London streets. (Yes, pedants, the shell itself is still the Dalek casings used in the first story, but it's been styled for the second one.)

The book fails to mention that a mistake was made in making the movie casings, and some of them at least had misaligned bobbles on the rear panel. I would have liked to know more about that, seeing as Shawcraft Models also made the TV Daleks and so ought to get it right.

Also -- the absolute worst carelessness a Dalek book can perpetrate, this -- the photo on page 38 is mirror-flipped. You can tell because the gun is on the wrong side. And to compound that, the same image appears on the back cover and they didn't spot it there either. That's grounds for extermination right there.

[Jason Arbuckle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book 218 - John Walsh - Dr Who and the Daleks

As said many times through my reviews I grew up on Doctor Who… I say grew up and use the phrase loosely. My earliest TV memory was of Jon Pertwee being chased by the Sea Devils round an old sea fortress…this was followed very closely by an early memory of seeing the Daleks…in colour…with Peter Cushing.

It wasn’t until many years later during a TV strike that I remember them showing the first movie ‘Dr.Who and the Daleks’ starring Peter Cushing as ‘Dr.Who’…not ‘the Doctor’…as all aficionados know he is to be called…but actually’Dr.Who’.

This joyous tome is brilliantly crafted with incredibly remastered photos and also some never before seen stills from behind the scenes and movie posters from across the globe.

The colour leaps off the pages and the sheer size of the book makes every page almost poster-like.

The main character sketches are excellent and the structure is superb. From discussing why William Hartnell, the original Doctor himself, was offered the part through to a potential third movie in the series that would have bookended the remakes in a glorious race through space and time in ‘The Chase’…but alas it wasn’t to be.

Cannot recommend this book highly enough, whether you are a science fiction nerd or Peter Cushing fan…this book is a must.

[Jane Lane · Rating 5 out of 5]

As Roberta Tovey writes, in one of the Forewords, she felt that the two full colour Doctor Who films made in the 60's, starring herself and Peter Cushing, might get forgotten as time moved on but then she sees how affectionately they are cherished by fans of all ages and it makes her think how delighted Peter Cushing would be to know that they are not only loved but that his Doctor is still so highly regarded almost 60 years after the two films were made.

Because of the love for these two , pretty close, film adaptations of the stories The Mutants and Dalek Invasion Of Earth, from the TV series, it is nothing short of a pure delight to see a superb volume such as this created, which fully investigates the films, the casts, the backstage crew, the music, the posters and the release of each film. And with a coda which describes a third, unmade, film, plus the wealth of photos and art work (some never seen before this publication), John Walsh presents every fan with a wonderful in depth view of the story behind Doctor Who's brush with the cinemas of the 60's and how they rode the wave of Dalekmania which had begun with the very first Dalek story at the end of 1963.

[Robert Welch · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of The Best Books That I Own!

This book is stunning! As soon as you hold it you will notice how luxurious it looks and feels in the hand. The beautiful colourful painting by Tom Chantrel looks amazing on the front cover along with the design, quality printing, laminating, embossed lettering and spot varnishing make this book look like something very special, which it is.
The quality and quantity of photographs is incredible with many printed filling the page. There are many behind the scenes photographs which are fascinating, particularly those of the bombed street ruins of London film set.
The author John Walsh is obviously a huge Dr Who fan and he has done a thorough job researching all of the facts and figures. Everything that you could wish to know about the making of these two Dr Who & the Dalek films is included in this book!
If you are a fan of Dr Who and/or the first two Dalek films then this book is a must!
Don’t hesitate in buying this, it is more than just a book, it is a work of art!

[A_Place_In The_Orchard · Rating 5 out of 5]

a very quick read - a couple of hours, tops - but that's a tribute to the amount, and quality, of photos included. Great fun!