For many years a number of Doctor Who stories remained to be novelised. Three writers were responsible for this - Eric Saward, Douglas Adams and Terry Nation. In the case of the latter, Nation had never novelised any of his stories anyway, content to allow Terrance Dicks to cover them once the Target imprint started up, but he was in no rush to see anyone work on any of the David Whitaker scripted stories.
Apparently this was due to his dislike of them, as he felt that Whitaker never handled his creations properly. He was especially annoyed at the introduction of a Dalek Emperor, as well as anything which did not show the creatures as anything other than ruthless and threatening. In the case of The Evil of the Daleks, he really did not like the three humanised Daleks - Alpha, Beta and Omega.
Nation would eventually allow the outstanding Dalek stories to be novelised, and selected John Peel to do so. Peel had emigrated to the USA from the UK and was very active in organised fandom, including editing and contributing to a number of fanzine publications. He got to know Nation after arranging a convention appearance and the two went on to become friends.
The novel Doctor Who - The Evil of the Daleks was published in 1993 with a cover by Alister Pearson.
For his artwork, the Doctor derives from a publicity shot from The Ice Warriors, whilst the black-domed Dalek comes from a shot of the Gold Dalek in Day of the Daleks.
The book uses the same chapter heading - "The Net Tightens..." - for both Chapters 2 and 7. Despite coming out after the main Target range had finished, it was given a series book number.
Peel included a prologue featuring the Emperor.
The story was first released in audio form on double cassette. This comprised an abridged version of the soundtrack with narration by Tom Baker, in character as the Fourth Doctor remembering this old adventure. The Dalek is clearly the wrong kind for this story, coming as it does from The Dalek Invasion of Earth, whilst the Troughton image was taken during a later season.
This is the only release for the story in any format not to highlight the distinctive Emperor Dalek somewhere on its cover.
This was released in July 1992. The scenes in The Tricolour coffee bar were omitted as the BBC elected to avoid the expense of music clearances.
The soundtrack was remastered and released in unabridged form on CD in November 2003, this time narrated by Frazer Hines. This had the usual photomontage cover, with images appropriate to the story other than the Troughton publicity portrait which derives from the early days of his tenure.
This one also makes use of the publicity shots taken at Grim's Dyke of Hines and Watling posing with a Dalek.
Once again there was an issue with the music in the coffee bar sequences. Whilst The Seekers song could be cleared, the Beatles track could not. Rather than omit the scene, a track by Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich - Hold Tight - was used.
The third and most recent audio release of the soundtrack came in July 2019, when the story arrived on vinyl from Demon Records. This also went for a striking image of the climactic scenes from the final episode. (In the same way that some people accuse The War Games of being nine episodes waiting for the Time Lords to show up, so critics of The Evil of the Daleks will claim it's six episodes of running around waiting for the big battle). On the rear and inside we have other images relating to the final episode.
The vinyl pattern is described by the company as "Orange & Black Haze (Skaro Swirl)".
The orphan episode was also included when the story was released in animated form on DVD and Blu-ray in September 2021. The 7 instalments could be viewed either in colour or in B&W. The Tom Baker-narrated audiobook was included as an extra. Unfortunately, the animation is in the usual very basic style, with characters possessing unfeasibly long arms. Likenesses are okay and the Daleks themselves always come across well in animation.
As usual, a steelbook version was also available:
As you will no doubt be aware, The Evil of the Daleks was repeated in the summer of 1968, and this screening was made to form part of the on-going series narrative by having the Doctor recall these events for the benefit of Zoe at the conclusion to The Wheel in Space, to give her an idea of what she is letting herself in for.
In 2023 Frazer Hines authored a new novelisation of The Evil of the Daleks - the version being related to Zoe by the Doctor, so basically the book of the repeat screening.
The cover design was by Lee Binding, and naturally Jamie takes centre stage as it is written from his perspective.
Free copies of this new iteration of the story were given away the following year - with an inferior new cover - by Doctor Who Magazine (Issue 609). This also used the new 60th Anniversary version of the logo, and tied in with a number of newer stories being released as Target books. The reason for my dislike of the cover? The Doctor's head and hand are totally out of proportion to his body. It's like a really bad photoshop.
Whilst the cover only credits Hines as writer, inside the credit is shared between him and Mike Tucker & Steve Cole. It contradicts the earlier Peel novelisation by giving Kemel a different origins story.
Finally, prior to the animated DVD release, the missing story was represented on the movie database site (moviedb) with a strikingly colourful photomontage image.
I think the problem with getting the dalek stories novelised, especially the Saward scripted ones, was that Terry Nation wanted an unrealistic amount of money just because, obviously, he owned the copyright on his creations!
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