Jason Lenox

Davros:   “Now, you will tell me the reason for every Dalek defeat. With that knowledge, I will programme them. With that knowledge, they will know their errors and how to avoid them. With that knowledge, there shall be no defeats! We will begin…..”  from Genesis of the Daleks 1975

And so my fifth and final Dr. Who pinup begins.  I knew in the back of my head I wanted to end on another classic villain I loved as a kid- Davros, the creator of the Daleks.  As a fan of the militant villains that the FASA Dr Who RPG fleshed out in the 80’s I was obsessed with the crippled and evil Davros who was introduced in the 70’s on BBC as the twisted genius that created the cybernetic Daleks.  Davros first appeared in the 1975 Episode “Genesis of the Daleks” and then back in 1979’s “Destiny of the Daleks” & 1984’s “Resurrection of the Daleks” where a new (and very lame)  enemy of the Daleks called the Movellans apparently had the Daleks at a “logic” impasse in a huge intergalactic war.

To quote: “For years, the two were locked in a long stalemate, each side’s purely logical battle keeping them in deadlock. Hundreds of Dalek and Movellan battlecruisers flew across space, without a single shot being fired. ” 

Again, more lame from the BBC- we never saw the fleets, and the Daleks were always thinking outside the box on the show, now they dont fire their guns and can’t make a move in a war??  as a fan, I was left thinking “What the f***?”

The Movellans ultimately defeated the Daleks offscreen with a biological virus…. as a fan, I was left thining “What the f***?” yet again.

The Movellans were androids with a  metrosexual/rasta look that were the height of lame late 70’s/ early 80’s design.  It looked as if the Movellans came off the set of SOUL TRAIN or SOLID GOLD, I was not pleased at all as a fan of the Daleks that this was the endgame.

I WANTED THE DALEKS TO WIN- and if they were to lose- the freaking Movellans?  A totally lame villain didnt deserve to win… surely they had a better nemesis than that.  And then Dr. Who the BBC television show went away unti the 2005 reboot, where a new improved Davros was involved with a war against the Time Lords and the Daleks kicked enough ass to fight the Time Lords into a mutually assured destruction in a “Time War” – and I was left thinking “What about the Movellans? As much as they sucked- THEY WON THE WAR!! Where was the resolution?”  On top of that the BBC never showed the Movellans after 1979, and we never saw the galactic war the Daleks Lost- and then, did they come back and win the war to become the New super Daleks?  WHAT HAPPENED THIS MADE NO SENSE FROM START TO LACK OF FINISH?!?!?!

Ah poor/incomplete writing and cheap production values from the BBC yet again-  a storyline we never liked …that we never saw a resolution to ….just gets ignored, and then we just move on since the writers realized the Daleks kicked ass and needed to be the top dog of the villain food chain of the Dr. Who Universe…. and who needs a lame android from the late 70’s to get in the way of that?

In the Movellan Dr Who Wikia page I saw that a 1997 book based on the 8th Doctor tried to retcon the old Androids off the show… to quote from the Movellan Entry here… where the Daleks lost a writer would eliminate the old dreadlocked robots once and for all…..

” Fans have, generally speaking, not warmly received John Peel’s suggestion, in War of the Daleks, that the Dalek-Movellan War never actually happened. “

And I realized that nobody liked the Movellans, and the BBC was just lazy and hiding from a lame decision in the first place.  So this project was in many was a correction to do several things, besides being a great piece of Dr. Who artwork.

1- Show the Daleks kicking ass on the Movellans

2- Davros running the show from a headquarters area- he sort of looks like the Crypt Keeper, which works for him here.

3- Illustrate elements from the War on the Movellans that we never saw, at all.  This includes a space ship battle with a Movellan Ship and Dalek ship (hey wasnt this a battle in space with two war-fleets?) the Daleks using a nuke in a city (they are radioactive mutants in hard shells, wouldnt they use nukes liberally on the enemy?) and finally the close up death of a Movellan via a Dalek.  We all hate the Movellans so that brings some closure to the composition of the piece.

4- Make the up close Movellan death, horrific.  I hated these guys and wanted to end this with a bang, so I felt a laser cutting one in half from a Dalek POV was what I wanted to see.

5- Make the continuity that I wanted (and I suspect many fans would as well) in one spectacular image around Davros, and the Daleks defeating the Movellans- once and for all, once Davros fixed the virus and put the Daleks back on top- then they are free to fight the Time Lords, or whatever adventures they need to have.

So here is my final pencils, pencil tracings from my thumbnails and layouts and the original source material I used for the character and ship models.  I hope you enjoy this piece for some killer artwork, and well, my own little retcon with Davros, the Daleks and the Movellans -which in this piece the Movellans are sort of cool for once!

I look forward to inking it soon!

FINAL PENCILS

DAVROS /DALEK/ MOVELLAN PENCIL LAYOUTS

SOURCES

 The Cyber Controller: We will survive.

This simple quote above from 1967’s Dr Who Episode “TOMB OF THE CYBERMEN” sums up this set of cybernetic villains.  They take over and make humanoids like them via use of forced surgery to cybernetic conversion to their army of Cybermen.  And if this sounds like the BORG from Star Trek- yeah, they ripped off the concept in the 80’s for The Next Generation 20+ years later.

So as a kid in the 80’s I loved these guys- for a few reasons, cool design, neat appreances with Tom Baker, wierd voice modulation and the paramilitary look and military structure appealed to my love of toy soldiers and war movies.  Of course they were supposed to be a cybernetic army that was also constantly converting new recruits forcibly into Cybermen, but again, this was mostly in your imagination.  Thanks to special effects limitations and cheap BBC budgets you only saw a few of them on foot at any given time on the show- moving slowly and barely doing much.  My love for them translated into two pieces of art in 1987 a logo from the show and a group of three Cybermen in a corridor- see below.  Which brings us to 2013- and my 5 Doctor Who pinups- this is the fourth of five.

So here was my inspiration- in video clip form for this as I did research

1- The awesome anime of Dr. Who- Cybermen actually seem cool here and have a military force of attack ships and space cruisers, Ive cited this before- it was key to inspiring this whole project.  They understand what I wanted in Dr. Who!

2- 1967’s TOMB OF THE CYBERMEN intro to the CYBER CONTROLLER who kicks ass for the 60’s (see the quote above, and the cool voice modulation!) here

3- a look at Cybermen models over 45+ years here

4- A newer 2011 episode from Dr Who which has a little intro to the 12th Cyber Legion as a small aside here.  This showed them with ships and a military structure we never saw before, thus the name for this pinup.  This was like the Klingons in Star Trek the Motion Picture for a few minutes at the beginning, where you had this glimpse into a really cool environment for the villains you actually wanted to know about, but you as the viewer didnt get very much, and you were left wanting to know more.

5- Nazi tanks in Saving Private Ryan in this clip here  the last bastion of a rag tag losing army trying to make this happen on the run- of course the “bad guys” are still proud and dangerous even in defeat- and I love the powerful images of the officers looking out of the top of the big tanks as they roll in the background, so I lifted the idea.

So then I made a list of what I wanted in this piece

 1-Different models in the same pic- we never saw this on the show- and why not?  A rag tag army of cyber soldiers- why not mix ranks of old and new?

2- Cyber Tomb of frozen reinforcements

3- Cybermat attack “pets” the metal bugs they use like dogs to attack and scout

4- A vehicle/heavy weapon- and the impact they are a military force, and look like some kind of military organization, as opposed to a bunch of guys shuffling in a group.

5- Cyber Controller

 All five goals are here in the piece- the 1966/1967 models from the show and some from the 2006-2010 episodes- the kneeling guy is like a sapper engineer opening the tombs and running the cybermats while the new model Cyberman runs point with a heavy weapon I made up so they looked like actual heavy weapon soldiers- I made it like a minigun, but energy based with a back based reactor.  Cyber Controller from the 1967 video clip is running point from the top of the tank like the German Officers in the Saving Private Ryan Tank attack video clip- note the tubes coming from his head (something I also added into the Cyber Controller that was not seen on the show, but in my mind- makes sense!) as he “links up” with the troops, orbital ships, communications etc. A cyber-tank (with logo on the front) reminiscent of Warhammer 40k also fills the composition background.  I wasnt sure on the design for the tank and considered going ultra futuristic but hey, it’s cool and retro so I figured “why not? it’s working!”.  We as fans have never see them with any vehicles, which is lame for an army- right and it sort of fit the Saving Private Ryan imagery. Three Cybermats are present- can you find them?  And the Tomb of the Cybermen is the background as well as the back story.  The guys on the top catwalk are my nod to the metal miniatures I loved as a kid and my fascination with toy soldiers from my childhood- it’s fun to draw small toy sized images for me, I love to make them and look at them, and I think it’s fun for the fans as well to find them hiding in the background!  In my mind as I created this image I had the 12th Legion of Cybermen on the run from someone (Daleks, Earth, Sontarans?) from a string of battles they have lost and the 12th Cybermen Legion is now close to defeat- but they are going to get massive reinforcements here at a lost tomb of frozen Cybermen they have located to turn the tide once and for all. As Cyber Controller says- WE WILL SURVIVE.

Below is my initial 80’s artwork, a ref model sheet of the Cybermen, the first thumbnail, a composition study and layout with POV lines and the final pencils.  Enjoy!

Composition and Layout for Cybermen

 First Thumbnail on 12th Cyber Legion

Quick Reference to Cybermen Models from 1966-2013

1987 Jason Lenox Cybermen pinup in colored pencil

1987 colored pencil artwork from Jason Lenox of the Tomb of the Cybermen Logo.