For years I wasn’t too happy with how Steven Moffat tackled Skaro’s finest. After Davies had built them up into the ultimate Doctor Who villain, it felt a little bit underwhelming seeing them just go back to being ordinary alien conquerors again in the Moffat era.

However having looked at the 11th Doctors Dalek stories again I not only think they hold up a lot better than before, but I can also see that Moffat actually did manage to come up with a fairly new and interesting take on the Daleks.

I would still rank Moffat as the weakest of the main 4 Dalek writers on television however. In all fairness though he has actually only written one Dalek story by himself so far.

Still despite this he did develop their characters somewhat, and also managed I think to take a deeper look at their relationship with the Doctor than anyone else before him.

I don’t blame Moffat any more for making the Daleks less powerful than Davies did.

Like I said at first for obvious reasons it did seem like they were now lesser foes in Moffat’s era. They went from catapulting planets through time and space, to needing the Doctors help to take care of a few insane Daleks. They went from being the main villains of whole seasons like seasons 1, 2 and 4 of the Davies era, to not being the main focus of most of the stories they appeared in during 11’s era, such as “The Pandorica Opens/ The Big Bang” and “The Time of the Doctor”.

However when you actually look at the position Moffat was in he needed to make the Daleks less powerful if they were to ever appear in the series again.

Davies’s Daleks had come to a natural end. Throughout his era he had only shown us glimpses of the Daleks power. Even in stories like “The Parting of the Ways” and “Doomsday” we only see an army of Daleks which cannot even begin to represent the full power of a Dalek Empire. However in “Journey’s End” we finally saw what a full empire could do. It took the full force of Russell T Davies’s entire Doctor Who universe to stop them, all of his main Doctor Who cast, Torchwood and the Sarah Jane Adventures.

Now that we had seen what a full empire could do, we couldn’t exactly go back to having Dalek stories that hinted at what a full empire could do.

Added to that making the Daleks so powerful did somewhat limit the types of stories they could appear in. Every story had to be the fate of the entire universe or multiple universes. Notice how all but two Dalek stories in the Davies era are the season finale’s. That’s because Davies era Daleks are such huge and powerful characters they kind of have to be in the biggest story around. That in itself becomes a problem as people who love the Daleks like me, only get the one type of story where millions of Daleks attack the earth and the Doctor has to make a big sacrifice to stop them, whilst people who can’t stand the Daleks have to see them in every season finale.

As much as I love the Davies era Dalek stories and how he wrote them overall, it is true that they were getting a bit samey by the end of his tenure.

For instance 9’s plan to use the Delta Wave to destroy the Daleks that will also sacrifice the earth at the same time, is very similar to Martha’s plan to use the Osterhagen key to destroy the earth in order to foil their plan in “Journey’s End”.

Rose getting god like powers to defeat them in “The Parting of the Ways” is similar to Donna getting the Doctors power to stop them in “Journey’s End”. Both occasions feature a companion getting a power that allows them to thrash and humble the Daleks. There is even a bit where the Dalek unafraid and ignorant of how powerful Rose has become zaps her only for Rose to block it with her new powers, that is replicated in “Journey’s End when a Dalek tries to zap Donna only for her to shut its power off.

The power in both instances is something that the Doctor has to deal with every day, but a human being is unable to cope with it.

“I can see everything. All that is, all that was, all that ever could be.

“That’s what I see. All the time. And doesn’t it drive you mad?

“She took my mind into her head. But that’s a Timelord consciousness. All that knowledge, it was killing her.”

Both Donna and Rose even get twinkly golden eyes.

Also both “Doomsday” and “Journey’s End” feature tragic departures of companions who do go on to still live normal and happy lives, but unfortunately the Doctor is unable to see them ever again. Both “Doomsday” and “Journey’s End” also revolve around multiple universes being threatened too.

Davies’ Daleks were really beginning to run their course as effective as they may have been in the beginning.

Restoring the Daleks to just being normal space conquerors again rather than long lost gods opened up the potential to do more with the Daleks. Now they could be featured in more low key stories like “Asylum of the Daleks” which is just a problem with Daleks on a far away planet, rather than the fate of all of creation itself.

Not every Dalek story in the classic era had to involve the fate of the entire universe. Many were actually quite low key like “The Daleks”, “Power of the Daleks”, “Death to the Daleks”, “Revelation of the Daleks” and “Resurrection of the Daleks”. Power in particular is very low key. It simply involves a few Daleks on a far flung earth colony.

Of course as to why Moffat era Daleks were so much less powerful than Davies’s Daleks in universe I have no idea. My head canon was that the Progenitor Daleks were weaker because they were created from the old Dalek empire before the Time War, during the events of the classic era. Even though they were purer they were more primitive. I quite like the idea that the last of the RTD era Daleks could have given the Paradigm Daleks all of their advanced technology like the reality bomb, but they lost it all in their desire to remain pure.

Finally another problem with Davies era Daleks is that because they were meant to be a near extinct race, every story had to feature yet another group of Daleks who somehow survived the war that had supposedly killed them all. I was beginning to wonder if any Daleks had actually died in the Time War so many of them had survived!

With “Victory of the Daleks” Moffat and Mark Gatiss (who actually wrote the story) both ensured that the next time we saw the Daleks we didn’t need to spend ten minutes explaining why they had survived.

I think having the Daleks escape at the end of “Victory of the Daleks” also got round making them a threat after “Journey’s End” quite nicely too. It would always be difficult to make them seem menacing after “Journey’s End” as it showed them threatening every universe. Where do you go from there? Anything is going to seem like a come down after that. Also in “Journey’s End” they actually managed to kill a recurring character, Harriet Jones, and it took the combined might of the main cast of three different series to stop them.

“Victory of the Daleks” however gets round that by having the Daleks win for the first time in the revival against the Doctor. The Daleks completely win in that story. They manipulate the Doctor and trick him into creating the new Dalek race, and they manage to escape. Though the Doctor prevents them from destroying the earth, that was of secondary importance to them. Their main plan this time actually worked. They played on both the Doctors hatred of them and his compassion. No matter how hard he tried to stop them, they always had another little trick up their metaphorical sleeves. When he tried exposing their true identities to the humans, it turned out that was what they wanted. When he threatened them, thinking they were powerless, they were able to manipulate the human beings into almost killing one another. When he thought he had finally beaten them he discovered that they had placed a bomb in Bracewell.

At no point in that entire story does the Doctor have the better of them. Its a great way of making them still seem powerful after “Journey’s End” and at the same time having the Daleks escape, so we don’t need to have any more last of the Daleks stories. It kills two birds with one stone.

The idea of the Daleks winning against the Doctor would be revisited again somewhat in the Moffat penned “Asylum of the Daleks” where the Daleks manage to capture the Doctor (not believing he died at lake Silenco unlike the Silence) and force him to destroy the asylum. It is only with the aid of Clara that the Doctor is able to escape and though he is able to wipe their memory of him, the Daleks main plan which is to use the Doctor to destroy the asylum is undoubtedly a success.

Even in “The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang” they do actually manage to trap the Doctor who is only saved because all of reality crumbles. On top of that they manage to shoot the Doctor too.

Even in “The Time of the Doctor” whilst their invasion force is destroyed they still cause the death of the 11th Doctor.

Overall Moffat’s Daleks have a much better track record than any other for actually beating the Doctor.

I think Moffat took a leaf out of David Whitaker’s Daleks and made his much more manipulative and cunning.

His Daleks despite being less powerful than Davies win because they are much craftier and use their wits against him rather than sheer power.

Even their cameo in “The Wedding of River Song” showed how they were somewhat more crafty than the Doctor, as they were shown to have knowledge of the Silence before anyone else including even the Doctor himself.

Again this was another good way to get round these Daleks being less powerful than the ones in Davies’s era, make them smarter.

I feel that you can recognise quite a lot of Moffat’s usual tropes in how he wrote for the Daleks, though that is true of all the major Dalek writers to some extent. For instance Russell T Davies’ Daleks embodied the theme that ran through all of his stories of characters being terrified of deathm, and doing their best to try and avoid it.

Still you can learn a lot about Moffat era Who just by looking at either of the Dalek stories he wrote, or even just the Dalek stories produced in his era.

Moffat often has the Daleks not just simply kill their enemies, but inflict much worse fates on their victims.

This is a recurring trope of Moffat’s. His monsters never just simply kill people. The Weeping Angels zap people back into the past and make them live out the rest of their lives there. Whilst some see that as preferable to just getting zapped, in some ways it could be seen as worse.

Imagine getting transported to a horrible period in earth’s history like the middle ages. Even if it wasn’t a horrible period it would still be worse to be forced to live out the rest of your life in a completely unfamiliar period in human history, permanently separated from the people you love, none of whom would ever know what happened to you.

Then there is the horrible fate they try to inflict on Rory Williams in “Angels Take Manhatten”. Locked in a tiny little room, kept alive for decades without any human company. I’d take getting shot by a Dalek and it all being over in a second over that any day.

Then there are also the gas mask zombies in Moffat’s first ever Doctor Who story. Again they don’t just simply kill you, they slowly and painfully transform you into a living corpse who will go on to infect others.

Even outside of Who in “Sherlock” Moriarty doesn’t just simply want to kill Sherlock Holmes. He wants to completely ruin him, destroy his entire reputation and legacy, even to his closest friends.

Then of course there was the latest finale which revealed that after we die our minds still remain aware trapped in our bodies experiencing the pain of being cremated, or eaten by worms as our bodies slowly rot.

The idea of death not being the end and your torment going on and on is an idea that clearly fascinates Moffat, and is one he has used to terrific effect throughout a lot of his work.

I must admit though I did think he went a little too far in “Dark Water”, but still by and large Moffat has been able to create very effective, horrifying scenario’s that make us long for monsters that just used to shoot us instead.

“Don’t cremate me, don’t cremate me, don’t cremate me”.

Now getting back to the point Moffat’s Daleks similarly never just zap you. This was something that angered a lot of fans as at first it appeared that the Daleks in Moffat’s time never killed anyone. They actually kill just two people on screen in 3 seasons.

However what the Moffat era Daleks actually do to you is actually more horrific.

In Moffat’s era the Daleks turn people into their puppets. The Dalek puppets are absolutely horrific. They kill you, then revive your corpse and use it as a servant, and what’s worse is that they can bring you back to life for a few minutes at a time.

In “Asylum of the Daleks” they bring the woman they actually use to capture the Doctor back to life for a few moments. As the Doctor himself tells her she is a trap and she doesn’t even know it. She still thinks her daughter is alive in the Dalek camps. Her daughter most likely died years, even decades ago, but she still thinks there is a chance for her daughter. Then however when she is told the horrifying truth, she has a few seconds to realise and regain her memories, before she dies and becomes their servant yet again.

She will die over and over and over for decades more to come. Each time she will realise just before she dies the horrible cycle she is trapped in, only to forget it when she is brought back the next time, and then realise it again just before she dies yet again.

Like I said before I’d rather they just shoot me.

The Dalek puppets embody other a few other prominent Moffat tropes. The idea of a persons corpse being revived and used by an enemy in some way is an old Moffat trope that has been featured in a number of his stories, including when the Vashta Nerada revive the astronauts corpses after devouring their flesh, or when the Weeping Angels use Bob’s consciousness to communicate with the Doctor.

Also the body horror aspect is another favourite trope of Moffats. Again gas masks bursting out from under people’s faces, the Vashta Nerada eating people’s faces off, and even Amy’s hand turning to stone are all classic examples of the body horror aspect in Moffat’s Who.

Then there is the fate the Daleks inflict on Tasha Lem. They break their way into the Papal Mainframe and capture Tasha. They need information from her. They could have just extracted the information from her mind (which they later do after she has died,) but first they decide to torture her to death many times ,and then revive her corpse so that they can torture her to death again.

“She would have died before telling you”

“I did several times, I died screaming your name”

They decided to torture her instead for no reason other than sadistic cruelty.

This adds a whole new dimension to the Daleks. Before though they were evil, they never actually enjoyed inflicting pain on their victims. It was hinted at in “Destiny of the Daleks” that they enjoyed persecuting humanoids, but by and large they were not sadists. They killed only because they felt they had to. They were seemingly incapable of taking pleasure in it.

Moffat era Daleks however enjoy extending their victims pain for as long as they possibly can. Just imagine being at the mercy of a Moffat era Dalek. Its a truly frightening thought. Even if you killed yourself to avoid capture, they could just bring you back to life like they did to Tasha Lem. There would be no escape from their cruelty even in death.

One of the most horrible fates they inflict on their victims however is in “Asylum of the Daleks” where they transform Oswin into a Dalek. This transformation is even more horrible than being turned into a Cyberman. She is turned into a freak who is rejected by both Daleks and humans alike. She wont be able to live as a human, but she wont be able to live even among Daleks either as she is too human and therefore impure. Instead they keep her locked up in the Asylum, in solitary confinement with the knowledge of what she has become, which she eventually blocks out because it is too horrifying.

At the very least when you are turned into a Cyberman they accept you, you become part of their race. In their own way they believe they are helping you, by removing your emotions which they see as a weakness and source of pain.

With the Daleks however they remove your humanity, but still reject you as you are still not truly one of them. They’ll lock you up in their asylum, all alone, and leave you there until they need to make use of your intelligence.

Terry Nation’s Daleks may have been the most alien, David Whitaker’s may have been the most cunning, Russell T Davies’s may have been the most powerful, but Steven Moffat’s were definitely the most sadistic.

I quite liked the idea that initially the Daleks were incapable of taking pleasure in the chaos they caused. They couldn’t feel anything but hatred, therefore they could not take pleasure in anything. However now after all of these years they have learned other emotions, but they are still linked to hate. They can now feel pleasure and joy, but it is in causing pain to those they despise. They also now in the Moffat era have a concept of beauty too, but again it is linked to their hate. They think hatred itself is beautiful and even consider it offensive to destroy hatred.

In this respect Moffat era Daleks were by far the most frightening. There was a sickness that had developed in them that had nothing to do with Davros altering their minds.

Another trope of Moffat’s that is present in the way he writes the Daleks is his obsession with showing us the impact the Doctor has had on those around him.

There are a few Steven Moffat penned episodes that end with the Doctor being able to make enemies literally retreat at the mere mention of his name his reputation has become so great.

Amy Ponds story arc in series 5 meanwhile revolves about the effect the Doctor has had on her life and how she has become somewhat obsessed with her “raggedy man”.

Series 6’s story arc is all about the effect the Doctor has on other life forms both good and positive, with the Silence striking out in fear of him.

Even the latest story arc about Clara and how she is becoming more like the Doctor is obviously once again about the effect the Doctor is having on her.

In “Asylum of the Daleks”  we are taken deep into the relationship between the Doctor and his greatest enemies.

We see how the Doctor has actually made them stronger, ironically in his many battles between them. Davros removed all emotions from them except hatred, but the Doctor taught them how to fear.

A lot of people said it was out of character for the Daleks to show fear, but I don’t think so.

The Daleks have been shown to fear the Doctor for many years. A very important plot point of “Day of the Daleks”  is the Daleks fear of the Doctor. The character of the controller serves the Daleks because he believes that there is no way anyone can stop them. Thus he serves them as he thinks that way he can make things easier for the people they have enslaved. He thinks that the human rebels who fight the Daleks are simply making things worse by angering them in a futile battle which they will inevitably lose. However when he see’s how the Daleks react just to the Doctors name, it is the first time he has seen the monsters genuinely terrified and it is for this reason that he later allows the Doctor to go and is exterminated as a result for his treachery.

Unlike with the rebels the controller genuinely believes that the Doctor can stop the Daleks.

The idea of the Daleks being scared of the Doctor has its roots way back in the Classic era and so I don’t think its out of character at all for them to show fear in the Moffat era.

In “Asylum  of the Daleks” it is said that The Daleks fear of the Doctor caused them to up their game, it kept them on their toes, metaphorically speaking of course as Daleks don’t have toes.

A prime example of this is in “The Chase” the third Dalek story. Here the monsters actually discover the secret of time travel solely with the purpose of hunting the Doctor down. Had it not been for their feud with the Doctor they may never have even believed in time travel. The fact that they, from the very beginning were facing an enemy who could tamper with their history, even wipe them from existence obviously caused them to advance much more quickly than if they had been facing the Thals, who were mere farmers or even the human race itself.

It also hinted in Moffat’s stories that not only did the Doctor teach the Daleks to fear which became a useful tool for them to survive, but he also taught them how to hate in a different way. It was through him that the Daleks learned to take pleasure in their victims suffering. It was through him after all that their hatred became more personal. Prior to their dealings with the Doctor they had always hated whole species and life forms, but there was never a single figure they despised. They grew to despise the Doctor in a totally different way to Davros’s conditioning. They wanted to make him pay for all the defeats he had inflicted on him.

At the same time however Moffat’s stories also show us how the Daleks have affected the Doctor too. Just as the Doctor taught the Daleks fear, the Daleks have taught the Doctor hatred.

Davies was the first to show us that the Doctor hated the Daleks. Moffat meanwhile continued that idea and showed us how the Daleks were able to manipulate that hatred for their own good. In “Victory of the Daleks” it is ironically the Doctors hatred for the Daleks that allows them to survive ironically. In “Asylum of the Daleks” they are able to use his hatred of them to destroy their Asylum.

The 11th Doctors interactions with the Daleks where arguably among the most tense. A lot of people have said they don’t think the 11th Doctor was as well suited to the Daleks as other Doctors such as “Who Addicts Reviews”. However I disagree, I think his interactions with them where very memorable. There was one scene in “Victory of the Daleks” in particular where the 11th Doctor reacted with violence towards a Dalek, striking it with a wrench that I think perfectly demonstrated the Doctors hatred for the Daleks.

I remember even “Who Addicts Reviews” had to admit that this scene was brilliant, because 11 was the last Doctor they would have expected to react this way. 11’s intense hatred for the Daleks was slightly more unexpected than 9’s. 9 was a darker Doctor so naturally his interactions with the monsters would be darker where as 11 really is the last Doctor you would expect to take pleasure in destroying another life form, as seen in “The Wedding of River Song”.

The relationship between the Doctor and the Daleks is a hateful, poisonous relationship so it makes sense that the Daleks, creatures of hate would get stronger as a result of it, whilst the Doctor a good man would be almost destroyed by it.

At the end of “Asylum of the Daleks” we see the Doctor finally break this hateful cycle when he has Oswin erase him from the Daleks memory.

It was a shame that Moffat never really followed this story up, having the Daleks simply gain information from Tasha Lem in their next appearance about the Doctor.

I think it could have been interesting to show us how the Daleks had become weaker and even stagnated without that fear of the Doctor, which had helped drive them forward almost as much as their hatred for other life forms.

Moffat much like Russell T Davies also went to great lengths to show how the Daleks were the Doctors archenemies too, albeit in a different way to Davies.

With Davies he had the Daleks right in our face all of the time and made them behind everything major that happened to the Doctor, as well as showing their superiority to his other foes by having them thrash enemies like the Cybermen and the Master.

Moffat on the other hand was somewhat more subtle. He still made them a major presence in the Doctors life, yet he was able to push them into the background too, which was the right thing to do. The Daleks had been used so frequently and so prominently in Davies time, that we could not possibly have still had them be used the same way in the 11th Doctors time.

Moffat in complete contrast to Davies had the Daleks appear alongside other enemies of the Doctor as nothing special at first. In “The Pandorica Opens/ The Big Bang” and “The Time of the Doctor” they don’t seem to be more powerful or dangerous than any of the others. Not like they were in Davies’s time. However we see what makes them stand out is because they hate him the most. In “The Big Bang” all of his other enemies are wiped from existence, except for the Daleks. Even when all of reality itself has been virtually erased, the Daleks still pursue the time lord.

Similarly in “The Time of the Doctor” they outlast all of his other enemies old and new. Cybermen, Weeping Angels, Sontarans, Silurians, Ice Warriors and Zygons.

The Daleks beat them all not because they are the most powerful, just because they hate him the most. Whilst all of the others flee and eventually give up, the Daleks hatred is too great and they remain until the bitter end.

“The Time of the Doctor” also reveals that the Daleks were responsible for all of the major story arcs in 11’s time too. Throughout 11’s era we were lead to believe that other enemies had in many ways replaced the Daleks. The Weeping Angels for instance had been responsible for the greatest tragedy in 11’s life, whilst the Silence had been his most persistent foes.

In “Time of the Doctor” however we saw that it was the Daleks that caused the siege at Trenzalore, which in turn caused the Silence to go back in time and try to murder the Doctor in order to prevent it. It is also because of their actions, that the Silence try to kill 11, River Song is created, and the Tardis explodes.

It is also the Daleks who in the original timeline killed the Doctor on Trenzalore which allowed the Great Intelligence to enter his timeline. No Daleks, no Great Intelligence messing with the Doctor, no Clara.

It was also the Daleks that caused the Doctors to send Gallifrey into the other universe which begun the siege in the first place.

Finally in addition to this it was also the Daleks who remained there until the very end, and wore the 11th Doctor down, effectively killing him.

Whilst stories like “The Big Bang” and “The Time of the Doctor” may not be Dalek stories per se, I still feel that they do a great job of showing us why the Daleks are his arch enemies.

“The Day of the Doctor” is another story that isn’t really a Dalek story, but still does a good job of showing how they were his greatest enemies. It features the Doctors defining moment. We see the Doctor having seemingly sunk so low he is now prepared to slaughter billions of innocent people to stop the Daleks. He has even changed himself into a warrior to do so. However we soon see that the Doctor would never be capable of doing that. No matter what the situation the Doctor will always find a way to defeat the villains, and it will always be in a completely unpredictable way that eludes everyone else, even his fellow time lords.

That’s why we love the Doctor, he is someone who doesn’t play by the rules, who is a total maverick and who always manages to come through in the end.

The fact however that its the Daleks however that all of the Doctors have to unite to defeat is perfect as it shows how they as his greatest enemies help to define who he really is underneath all of his different faces better than any other villain could.

Overall whilst Moffat may not have done as much with the Daleks as Nation, Whitaker and Davies. By and large I still think he was able to provide a very interesting and fresh take on them, by making them far more sadistic and needlesly cruel than ever before, as well as providing some truly fascinating insights into their relationship with the Doctor.

Always remember that if you want to write a Dalek story in the style of Terry Nation write them as allegories for the Nazi’s, and the threat of nuclear power. Also always write them as totally inhuman and alien, and make them physically weak too. Show the great irony of these creatures who consider all other races inferior yet are very frail, and even quite delicate themselves. Show them as large armies. Make it seem like it doesn’t matter if you kill one, there will always be another 500 behind it. Also make it fast paced with plenty of action

If you want to write a Dalek story in the style of David Whitaker, make the Daleks cunning, and manipulative against a more manipulative Doctor, make them more powerful, and do stories where the Daleks are infected with humanity in some way. Also show us how much damage one Dalek can do. Make it much more slower paced too and really build up the human characters they interact with and manipulate. Show the Daleks manipulate a whole host of different people, not just evil villains.

If you want to do a Dalek story in the style of Russell T Davies, write them as incredibly powerful creatures, the most powerful enemies in the entire Whoniverse, yet portray them as nearing extinction and the stuff of legend. Show how they are trying to rebuild their fallen empire and portray them despite their power as mere shells of their former selves. Also make the body count huge. Also make the Daleks responsible for some horrible tragedy in the Doctors life.

Finally if you want to write a Moffat style Dalek story, make the Daleks take pleasure in hurting people and don’t have them just shoot people. Have them inflict really nasty and gruesome fates on people that will make the viewers wish they did shoot their victims again. Also show the Daleks as being slightly more sly and maybe even have them winning against the Time Lord in some way if not completely.

I have often thought that in Dalek society it goes a little something like this. Nations Daleks are the leaders, as they are the most inhuman and ruthless and thus seen as an inspiration to the other Daleks, what they should be. Whitaker’s Daleks who are the most cunning and best understand humanity are the strategists. Davies’s Daleks who are the most powerful are the soldiers, whilst Moffats are the ones in charge of the death camps. The real sadists of Dalek society.

Best Dalek Moment/ “I Am Not Dalek I Am Human”/ Asylum Of The Daleks

A truly chilling moment, and a great twist that I did not see coming. Clara’s fate is genuinely horrifying and the acting from Matt Smith, Jenna Coleman and Nicholas Briggs is top notch. Watching Clara in her Dalek form mumble pitifully ” I am human” is both disturbing and heartbreaking. This is a perfect example of how the fates Moffat’s Daleks victims inflict on their enemies are often far worse.

Worst Dalek Moment/ The New Dalek Pardigm Emerges/ Victory Of The Daleks

Okay I know he didn’t write this bit, but still he did approve of the new Dalek design. The new design isn’t actually that bad, its just the colours are too bright, which makes the monsters seem almost cuddly. Its a shame as the scene itself the way its written is very good, but the execution is just terrible and for many this is the moment the Daleks ceased to be scary.

Quotes

Actually I can just show you some videos instead.