Dr Who Dalek CG webcomic series: Second Empire

[SpaceMarine93]

This is as far as it is concerned one of the most interesting Dr Who (fan) fiction I had ever read. The Second Empire is a CG webcomic created by a web user going by the title 'Mechmaster', with the protagonists being Daleks.

Premise as described from TVtropes:

The story follows that of General Xenol of the First conquest army. Having ignored the orders of The Golden Emperor to establish an outpost at a swamp-world in favor of invading another, more threatening planet of Slepkt IV he is brought to Skaro for insubordination. At first The Golden Emperor congratulates Xenol for identifying the greater threat, only to chastize him for having failed to secure victory against the Slepktians.

Xenol then complains that the reason he hasn't been able to conquer Slepkt is because, while the genetic programming of his Daleksoldiers produces excellent soldiers, they lack initiative and have been out-thought by the Slepktians.

The Golden Emperor is having none of it and it soom becomes obvious that he cares more about having obedient drones than competent soldiers.

And of course, the final straw came for General Xenol when he learned just how bad the Gold Emperor's disregard of Dalek lives, form and survival for his own ends and obsession of obedience had become, and makes a fateful decision:

http://www.mechmaster.co.uk/cg-lair/dal ... emp024.htm

http://www.mechmaster.co.uk/cg-lair/dal ... emp025.htm

General Xenol ends up becoming the Emperor of a faction of Dalek Separatists, hoping to restore the Dalek race, and the battle for the future of the Daleks begins.

Your mileage may vary about how the Daleks are portrayed. Sure, while the Daleks' ideas of conquest and genocide is repeatedly emphasized, characterization occasionally changes, many deliberately, to show the widening difference between the two factions of Daleks as well as to submits bits of humor.

I find it a rather interesting and exciting read - very good canon-wielding and reinterpretation, well portrayed characters, epic battles that are surprisingly very clever on strategic and tactical levels, many moments of pure win and awesome, BRIMMING with shoutouts from not only Doctor Who but also many other science-fiction shows and films. Much drama, action, intrigue.

And lots and lots of EX-TER-MIN-ATION!

Currently have 503 pages, with no actual update schedule (I estimated he could update an average of around 8.7 comics simultaneously per month)

For more, visit:

http://www.mechmaster.co.uk/cg-lair/dal ... -index.htm

Trust me, its going to be one worthwhile read.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I've been following this for about six months now, it's excellent. The artwork is outstanding (I'd encourage people to look at the site for the images alone) and the storyline is good as well.

As SM93 noted, the Daleks are still genocidal warmongers out to conquer the galaxy, and yet they are still presented as likeable characters, which is an impressive feat. And the humour is there, but subtley done. As for the interpretation of cannon, it's excellent. It includes elemnts from pretty much every Dalek story, even reconciling the histories seen in The Daleks and Genesis of the Daleks.

I particularly like Xenol's speech to the 3rd Army where he manages to include every Dalek story title up to Doomsday.

[Johonebesus]

Sometimes the humor isn't subtle at all and can be very silly, for example the Daleks' siege engines are shaped like giant travel machines with Godzilla spinal plates and tails. Some people would likely find the silliness distracting and stupid.

It has very sporadic updates, a dozen or so pages at one time every couple of months, but I prefer it that way. To me it's easier to get engaged in the story than if I had one page per week.

[mr friendly guy]

I have saved the images onto my hard drive. When they finish I might convert the images into a CBR or CBZ file so it can be read like an online comic.

[Crossroads Inc.]

RISE FROM THE GRAVE!!!

Ok so first off, yes yes I know this is one HELL of a Necro, BUT it is with New Content!
The "Second Empire" comic is effectively finished!
Final count, over 700 pages of very VERY skilled CG renderings.
Almost half of that makes up the final showdown between the renegade Emperor and the 'Golden' Emperor.

For those who have not read it, the basic premiss is:
"What if the Davors had NOT been an utterly megalomaniacal madman bent on creating soulless, emotionless killing machines?"
The Daleks we have were basically left with most 'human' emotions, although still rampaging killing machines.
The story itself follows a Dalek Black General who fears that the Golden Emperor is going too far in re-engineering Daleks. Giving them less and less emotions, making them more and more obedient, and for him the tipping point, producing Daleks with no names at all anymore, just numbers, endless numbers.

The story itself is quite good. there are very few "stupid" moments and a lot of thought has gone into two equally devious minds facing off against one another. The humor at times is a bit over the top, there are many not so subtle references to other Sci-Fi shows ((ESPECIALLY at the end)) but they don't do much to ruin the flow of the story, and the story over all is well worth it.

The comic for a long time was hard to follow because the 'updates' were, maybe, a half dozen or so per month.
Well in the last week he has basically finished the comic, uploading nearly 50+ pages in a few days.

For ANY Doctor Who I very VERY much recommend reading this, especially now as the comic is finished

[Soontir C'boath]

Wow, I could've sworn I checked his website monthly for updates and yet he's been putting things up since August... Can't wait to read how it ends.

[Eternal_Freedom]

87 pages in six days with a final update to follow before xmas. I was very excited when I found this out.

I'm not sure about the ending though.
Spoiler

I want to know what happenned to Grexnarl and Storm. I'm glad they saved Aychemex, Snelldron and Longbark however.

[Crossroads Inc.]

Spoiler

I'd say it was pretty clear that both of them died in a "Blaze of Glory" toward the very end.

As for the comic, well when it finished, I really REALLY wanted to just, you know, TALK to someone about it! I was disappointed that theres no "Second Empire" web forum or discussion forum
Mostly I want to go on about certain things without having to put spoiler tags everywhere

[Eternal_Freedom]

They unquestionably
Spoiler

went out in a blaze of glory, but I want to know whether they made it out of the base, off-planet, what happenned when Gnerk showed up with the rest of the fleet, etc.

Oh well, he promised another, final update before xmas, so I'm still hopeful.

[Darth Lucifer]

Special thanks for the links, that was freaking incredible. I would love to see someone attempt sound FX and voiceovers, though I haven't heard a Dalek voice-changer that didn't sound like shit.

On a side note, I had the "heartbeat" sound effect from the Dalek ships looping in the background the entire time I read it. Hell, in parts I was reading it out loud in a choppy staccato voice. I admit I blew through the entire thing in one sitting (so addicting), though this is something I could read again and again and again....

EDIT: Looks like someone is already on the conversion job:

[Iroscato]

Daleks with northern accents. Ladies and gentlemen, I have officially Seen It All.

[Bedlam]

Daleks with northern accents. Ladies and gentlemen, I have officially Seen It All.

Lots of planets have norths

[Iroscato]

But yeah, I just 'finished' the comic, and I can clearly see where the epilogue is going. It really is extremely impressive, it had some ingenious battle scenarios, absurdly funny dialogue, kickass action, a metric fuck ton of sci-fi references and outright parodies...what more could you want from a comic about a race of murderous pepperpots?
What impresses me most is just how much humour and personality the artist manages to extract out of the Daleks, who have no facial features, and are essentially static for the most part. Imagining some of the lines being spoken in a grating, high-pitched Dalek voice only made it funnier. What also strikes me is the total absence of a certain meddling time lord, except for a VERY brief mention near the beginning. The Daleks work very well in supporting the story on their own, a feat that shows just how creative the mind behind the comic truly is.

[Eternal_Freedom]

That is probably the author's greatest feat, making genocidal, xenophobic monsters fighting a civil war for dominance of the galaxy into likeable characters. I had thought that impossible until I came across the comic.

[madd0ct0r]

That was an excellent read.

The amount of exposition was jarring at first, but as the scenes follow thick and fast it really pulls together as a story. It was a good enough tale that I found the penultimate heavy references actually disappointing - the author had the talent to be far more original.

[Nari]

Spoiler

I'd say it was pretty clear that both of them died in a "Blaze of Glory" toward the very end.

As for the comic, well when it finished, I really REALLY wanted to just, you know, TALK to someone about it! I was disappointed that theres no "Second Empire" web forum or discussion forum
Mostly I want to go on about certain things without having to put spoiler tags everywhere

Start a new thread with *** Spoilers *** in the heading (unless someone corrects me on the posting etiquette). I'd love to talk about it as well. Those 600+ pages were just beautiful and went by too fast.

[Ahriman238]

Reading now. So... many... references. Star Trek, Star Wars, Monty Python, James Bond, possibly Babylon 5. Oh, and the speech where every Dalek episode is named. I really burst out laughing with Red 5, and later when they did the James Bond sequence, only with Dalek.

EDIT: and now Aliens.

[Sleck]

I recall not liking this one much. It had some nice jokes, but the pacing was ungodly-ly slow, with very few panels on a single page. A comic doesn't need panels that huge - it means that I spend half of my time waiting for the next one to load.

EDIT: also, I'm not a fan of the CGI artstyle, but that's subjective.