Howling:Genesis of the Daleks already an alternate timeline?

I used to think that Dalek history didn't diverge from how it had previously gone until the exact moment the Time Lords sent the Fourth Doctor, Sarah Jane and Harry to ancient Skaro. But is it at all possible that history had already been rewritten when they arrived? One thing that suggests to me that this could be the case is the fact that in "Genesis", the Daleks are considerably more advanced than those in "The Daleks" and "The Dalek Invasion of Earth", being able to freely move outside without a need for static electricity. Could some unknown party have travelled back into Skaro's past and given Davros some helpful hints? If we want to get really wild, perhaps in the original timeline, Davros didn't create the Daleks at all, and they weren't designed until much later, after the remnants of the Kaleds had retreated inside the city in "The Daleks." (Incidentally, I have a theory that what the Thals say in "The Daleks" about the city being that of the Dals is true; the Dals were a third group that lived on Skaro at the time of the war, possibly allied in some way with the Kaleds, and after the Kaled city in "Genesis" was eventually destroyed/rendered uninhabitable, the surviving Kaleds went to live with the Dals in their city. The Dal cities' lack of a protective dome is a bit of an oddity, though, I do admit...) Also, if we assume that someone did travel back in time to make the Daleks more powerful, who could it have been? I did think maybe the Master, but I'm not sure even he would do a thing like that, and besides, that would make him ultimately responsible for the Time War. 82.2.136.93 08:38, August 2, 2011 (UTC)&nbsp

This is why I personally never include the Peter Cushing movies in my own Dr Who canon. The way the Daleks were portrayed in those movies is so contrary to the tv shows that it's impossible to marry the two together. I know Steven Moffatt is a huge fan of these movies and is one of his reasons for re-introducing the many coloured Daleks but so many anomalies occur when one tries to include the movies that it isn't worth the effort. The Doctor is a different species, his family are not only magically included but they differ from one film to the next, and as pointed out above the Daleks are an inferior species to their television counterparts. Apart from all that, let's be honest here, the movies are actually crap, aren't they?

2.27.154.67 09:20, August 2, 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I agree with you about the Cushing films, they are pretty awful. I personally don't know any DW fans who count them in their personal canons. However, many (such as myself) do count the TV series stories "The Daleks" and "Genesis of the Daleks" in their personal canons, and both stories present noticeable discrepancies in their accounts of the war on Skaro and the creation of the Daleks, hence my attempt to rationalise said discrepancies above. For me, the big indication that history has already been derailed when the Fourth Doctor arrives, is that the Daleks in "Genesis" are significantly more advanced than those in "The Daleks". My query is, who could have been responsible for rewriting history in such a way? 82.2.136.93 18:52, August 2, 2011 (UTC)

Well, there are two popular explanations for this.

Maybe Genesis erased, or at least modified, all of the previous Dalek stories, so those low-tech Daleks don't exist on this timeline. (But RTD says the 22nd-century invasion was critical to the future history of humanity, it's been indirectly mentioned on TV, and it's been directly referenced in the novels…)

Or maybe they both happened, on the same timeline, but in the centuries since Genesis, the Daleks who'd been trapped in the city became degenerate. Since they couldn't leave the city anyway, and they were in desperate straits, they switched to low-tech, low-energy solutions like static electricty. These Daleks later died out (in Destiny the city is ruined and uninhabited, except for hibernating Davros), while other Daleks outside the city went on to build a galactic empire. (But those later Daleks appear to remember that first story; how?)

Anyway, your theory about someone traveling back in time to help the Daleks doesn't seem too much worse to me than either of them. And there's an obvious culprit that you overlooked: the Daleks themselves. At some point in Dalek history, they have time travel, they know that the Time Lords have tried to interfere with their creation, and they're plotting a war with the Time Lords as a result. And there's plenty of evidence of them interfering in their own history, from the pre-Genesis days up to City of the Daleks. So, why not go back in time to buff themselves before starting the war? (If you accept the novels, it makes perfect sense for them to do this between the Second War in Heaven and the Last Great Time War, while there are no Time Lords around to stop them. There was supposed to be a plot arc about the Daleks in the EDAs, but it had to be canceled because they couldn't get the rights to the Daleks—but that doesn't mean it couldn't have happened, just that we never got to read about it.) --173.228.85.118 03:04, August 3, 2011 (UTC)