The Supreme Dalek was a white-coloured Dalek specialised for leadership in the New Dalek Paradigm. As with their fellows bar the Eternal Dalek, the sense globes on their base unit were coloured dark silver. The first one was created by the Progenitor in 1941. (TV: Victory of the Daleks)
History[]
The original Supreme white Dalek of the New Paradigm, along with the other original four Paradigm Daleks (the yellow Eternal, blue Strategist, orange Scientist, and red Drone), were created when the three survivors of an encounter with the Doctor tricked the Eleventh Doctor into allowing them to activate the Progenitor device. The Supreme condemmed the survivors as "inferior" and ordered their destruction to "cleanse the unclean."
It escaped through a time corridor with the others, and went on to help rebuild the Daleks and restart their empire. (TV: Victory of the Daleks) Forming a new Supreme Council with the other four, the Supreme Dalek became the ruler of the New Dalek Paradigm. (PROSE: Dalek: The Astounding Untold History of the Greatest Enemies of the Universe)
When the Doctor travelled back in time to Kaalann to stop the Daleks rebuilding their empire and invading Earth, a squad of Daleks led by a Supreme arrived. The Doctor erased their alterations and the Supreme Dalek, along with the rest of its squad, was destroyed. (GAME: City of the Daleks)
Another Supreme Dalek led the Daleks on their attempted take-overs of the SS Lucy Gray in their efforts to recover their lost Time Axis. The Daleks, including the Supreme Dalek, were destroyed when their ship was sent into the sun. (GAME: Evacuation Earth, Return to Earth)
Daleks arrive at Stonehenge. (TV: The Pandorica Opens)
The Daleks, yet again led by a Supreme, joined the Pandorica Alliance to imprison the Eleventh Doctor in the Pandorica to save the universe. They arrived at Stonehenge in 102 AD with the rest of the Alliance and locked the Doctor in the Pandorica (TV: The Pandorica Opens) in what the Time Lords had foreseen as the "Total Collapse Event Incident". (PROSE: Dalek Combat Training Manual) The Alliance failed to save the universe. Many races, including the Daleks, were wiped from existence, leaving only stone "after-images". When the Doctor reset the universe and timeline, the Daleks were restored to their former form and place in spacetime. (TV: The Big Bang)
Supreme Daleks led Drones as the Daleks fought to protect their weapons bases from the Silurians, Sontarans and Cybermen. (GAME: Dalek Supremacy)
The Doctor confronts the dying Supreme Dalek. (TV: The Wedding of River Song)
Searching for information on the Silence and why they wanted him dead, the Doctor found a badly damaged Supreme Dalek and harvested data on the Silence from it. From this he learned that the Teselecta had infiltrated the Silence, posing as one of their humanoid agents. Its eye stalk was taken for bartering leverage. (TV: The Wedding of River Song)
A damaged Supreme from the Paradigm was once discovered in the wreckage of a Renegade Dalek base on Thule, indicating to historians that the Paradigm had interfered in the earlier Imperial-Renegade Dalek Civil War. (PROSE: Dalek: The Astounding Untold History of the Greatest Enemies of the Universe) Another had been confined to the Dalek Asylum. (TV: Asylum of the Daleks)
The wrecked New Paradigm Supreme on Thule. (PROSE: Dalek: The Astounding Untold History of the Greatest Enemies of the Universe)
When the Daleks invaded London in 2106 using a piece of the Eternity Clock, the Supreme Dalek oversaw the operation from the Dalek Command Node. The Doctor and River Song hacked into the Dalek transmat systems and sent the Supreme Dalek to the North Pole. (GAME: The Eternity Clock)
When the Daleks established the Dalek Foundation and the Sunlight Worlds while searching for the Cradle of the Gods, the Supreme Dalek became impatient and demanded that the Dalek Time Controller take action against the Doctor and activate the Cradle as soon as possible. The Dalek Time Controller refused as Dalek intervention would disrupt the flow of time, thus harming the Daleks, and pulled rank, forcing the Supreme Dalek to comply. Reluctantly, the Supreme Dalek obeyed. (PROSE: The Dalek Generation)
The repeated failures of the original Supreme Dalek eventually resulted in it, and its fellow founders, being demoted to subordinates of the new Prime Minister of the Daleks, maintaining only token presences in the Parliament of the Daleks of the resurrected Dalek Empire (PROSE: Dalek: The Astounding Untold History of the Greatest Enemies of the Universe) When the Doctor, Amy Pond and Rory Williams were transported to the spaceship of the Parliament, the Supreme informed the Doctor of his title as "the Predator" within Dalek society and some of the information regarding their mission to the Dalek Asylum, where a damaged Supreme still remained. Before the Parliament destroyed the Asylum, Oswin Oswald removed any memory of the Doctor from the Daleks' Pathweb from the centre of the Asylum, causing the Supreme Dalek, along with all other members of the Parliament, to forget the Doctor entirely. (TV: Asylum of the Daleks)
Redemption for the original Paradigm Supreme came when the Prime Minister of the Daleks was driven insane upon remembering the Doctor. Declaring the Prime Minister unfit for service, the Supreme exterminated it and retook command of the New Dalek Paradigm, commanding Dalek forces throughout the Siege of Trenzalore. Though it came close to exterminating the dying Doctor, it was ultimately destroyed by the regeneration energy that the Doctor released when the Time Lords granted him a new regeneration cycle. (TV: The Time of the Doctor; PROSE: Dalek: The Astounding Untold History of the Greatest Enemies of the Universe)
Behind the scenes[]
Appearances in invalid stories[]
In-character[]
The Supreme Dalek made an appearance in two Christmas adverts on BBC. One had the Dalek leader gliding across the screen with a shopping bag hanging from the manipulator arm. The other involved the Dalek booking into an airport for a flight back to Skaro - noted to be near Mechanus. These were also considered promos for the BBC's new comedy series "Come Fly With Me" as the show was set in the airport and two of the characters made an appearance in one of the Dalek's adverts.
All five archetypes of the New Dalek Paradigm feature in The Lego Batman Movie, appearing among the inhabitants of the Phantom Zone, alongside many famous villains from a number of fictional franchises. Like the others, they are unleashed upon Gotham City by the supervillain known as "the Joker" at the climax of the film, only to be defeated and sealed back inside the prison dimension. Their one line is the exclamation "Exterminate!", actually a piece of archive audio originally recorded by Nicholas Briggs for The Parting of the Ways.
The New Paradigm Supreme Dalek is also one of the many Dalek enemies used in the Doctor Who: Legacy mobile game.
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The alternative design of the New Paradigm Supreme featured in TV: Doctor Who at the Proms.
A New Paradigm Supreme Dalek was also featured in one of the monster skits of the 2010 edition of Doctor Who at the Proms. Gliding on-stage, it declared that "it [was] time now… for the Symphony of the Daleks!" and threatened conductor Ben Foster with extermination if he didn't play this piece of Dalek music — really the soundtrack used in Victory of the Daleks for the reveal of the New Dalek Paradigm. Interestingly, this Supreme's mechanical eye glowed red, rather than golden as it did in the original televised story. It was voiced by Nicholas Briggs in the same deep voiced he used for the Supreme in Victory of the Daleks, rather than the higher-pitched one of the Supreme of The Pandorica Opens.
Prop[]
The Supreme Dalek's prop, along with that of a red Dalek Drone, appeared on an episode of Top Gear when James May hosted a race between two free runners and a motorcyclist through the BBC Television Centre. In the comedic The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot, Peter Davison also climbs into the Supreme Dalek casing to secure a fraudulent appearance in the 50th Anniversary Special, only for the scene to later end up being cut by Steven Moffat.
Merchandise[]
- A figurine of the "New Paradigm Supreme Dalek" was released with issue 64 of Doctor Who: Figurine Collection magazine.
Other matters[]
- Doctor Who The Official Annual 2011's feature on the New Dalek Paradigm makes the claim that there is only ever one Supreme Dalek and Eternal Dalek. Given that one Supreme Dalek is seen within the Parliament of the Daleks while another is within the Dalek Asylum in TV: Asylum of the Daleks, this cannot be true.
- The Supreme Dalek's colour scheme is a reversal of the original series' Supreme Daleks, who were black with white bumps.
- The Supreme Dalek in Victory of the Daleks has a deep voice like that of the Dalek Emperor (TV: The Parting of the Ways) and the Red Supreme Dalek (TV: The Stolen Earth/Journey's End) and its lookalike. (TV: The Magician's Apprentice) This, however, is dropped in The Pandorica Opens.
- In Dalek Hack, the player has the option to turn a Dalek's casing, shaped identically to the bronze Dalek, into any of the five colours of the New Dalek Paradigm.
