The Doctor is in the house(?)

[Mikey]

The Tardis seems to have set down at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts:


while his old friends seem to have missed the location by a bit, finding themselves in L.A. instead:


These are real, un-"doctored" photos, BTW - the MIT prank and Matt Smith's appearance on American late-night.

[Mark]

Why does the robot have a toilet plunger?

[Lighthawk]

I'm more worried why it's lower half looks like an adult toy.

[Mikey]

Why does the robot have a toilet plunger?

I'm more worried why it's lower half looks like an adult toy.

Well, I guess i don't need to ask, "Has Mark or Lighthawk ever seen Doctor Who?"

Short answer - Daleks in the relaunch of DW are made to look pretty close to Daleks in old DW... when the BBC SFX dept. was one old guy in a room with three toilet paper tubes and a hot glue gun.

[Captain Seafort]

Short answer - Daleks in the relaunch of DW are made to look pretty close to Daleks in old DW... when the BBC SFX dept. was one old guy in a room with three toilet paper tubes and a hot glue gun.

Plus sundry sink plungers, egg whisks, and old props from Dixon of Dock Green.

[Mikey]

Short answer - Daleks in the relaunch of DW are made to look pretty close to Daleks in old DW... when the BBC SFX dept. was one old guy in a room with three toilet paper tubes and a hot glue gun.

Plus sundry sink plungers, egg whisks, and old props from Dixon of Dock Green.

Indeed. Plus a good score or two of spare headphones... hence the Cybermen.

[Lighthawk]

I'm sure they were quite menacing...or something.

[Reliant121]

From what I understand they are rather tall...

[Lighthawk]

Like a tall man tall, or inhumanly tall?

[shran]

Man tall, and thay're probably so scary because they look really fake, but the effects of their presence are far more menacing than their appearance.

[Tyyr]

For MIT that's a positively pedestrian stunt.

[Mikey]

I'm sure they were quite menacing...or something.

I'd never be so foolish as to argue the high quality of old BBC SFX... but the Daleks (and the Cybermen, and the Silurians, et. al.) were menacing. In an odd way of doing things that is nearly forgotten today, these things were made dramatic by the quality of the writing rather than the quality of the visual FX.

[Reliant121]

Additionally, they are virtually unstoppable by just about anything. Barring high intensity beam weapons, like the ANNEdroid.

[Mikey]

Additionally, they are virtually unstoppable by just about anything. Barring high intensity beam weapons, like the ANNEdroid.

They were the weakest link. I think bullets to the eyestalks stopped 'em, too.

But in general, the Daleks weren't scary because of their appearance - they were scary because they embodied a completely inexorable, nigh-unstoppable force of destruction on a universal scale; not at any one point, but throughout space and time.

[Reliant121]

The only reason bullets to the eye stalks worked is that they saturated the damn things with so many bullets, the defense field couldn't get them all. But, you are correct. On a more psychological level, they were scary because they were they felt only a single emotion in any level, which is hate. They know no fear, no compassion, no remorse and no love. Essentially, the antithesis of humanity.