Old Who Question

[LapsedPacifist]

I've been showing a friend of mine and his wife the first season of New Who. We're getting up to the episode Dalek, and he's afraid of spoiling her with some of the information there. Here's the question he posed to me, and never having seen a lot of the Old Who, I can't answer. Could those in the know share some light?

" I've been meaning to ask you: does the
Dalek episode of Doctor Who contain any noticeable spoilers from the
Doctor's backstory, or did they just make new things up. In particular,
I'm wondering if they give away the fairly important point that the
Doctor had the opportunity to wipe out the Daleks entirely and he chose
not to. That's part of the full scale dick-writing involved with Daleks
wiping out Gallifrey (besides that if they did, the Tardis would not
work anymore, since it was remotely powered, last I heard). I'd rather
the new stuff didn't give away too much of the old stuff we've been
slowly watching (we haven't even gotten to Cybermen or The Master yet)..."

[Stark]

Your friend is an idiot. Why doesn't he watch it himself?

The new show - while it was any good - avoided creating barriers to the audience with obtuse references. Dalek just talks about how war has changed the Doctor, it doesn't 'spoil' 30 year old stories.

Ps you need to research Genesis and pay attention this time.

[NecronLord]

I've been showing a friend of mine and his wife the first season of New Who. We're getting up to the episode Dalek, and he's afraid of spoiling her with some of the information there. Here's the question he posed to me, and never having seen a lot of the Old Who, I can't answer. Could those in the know share some light?

" I've been meaning to ask you: does the
Dalek episode of Doctor Who contain any noticeable spoilers from the
Doctor's backstory, or did they just make new things up. In particular,
I'm wondering if they give away the fairly important point that the
Doctor had the opportunity to wipe out the Daleks entirely and he chose
not to. That's part of the full scale dick-writing involved with Daleks
wiping out Gallifrey (besides that if they did, the Tardis would not
work anymore, since it was remotely powered, last I heard). I'd rather
the new stuff didn't give away too much of the old stuff we've been
slowly watching (we haven't even gotten to Cybermen or The Master yet)..."

It's spoiler-free.

Incidentally the thing about being powered from Gallifrey is so very obscure that you'd need to be very into Who to know of it (it's never said onscreen but inferred from a couple things) at all. And it's actually addressed in seasons one and two of the new series, tell him the TARDIS has alternate power systems now.