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- This article is about the character. For the Big Finish Audio see Davros (audio story)
I cannot alow myself the privelage of death
Originally head of the Kaled Scientific Elite, Davros created the Daleks. During the Imperial-Renegade Dalek Civil War, he served as Emperor of the Imperial faction and later of the Dalek race itself.
Biography
Early life
Davros was born during the Thousand Year War between Thals and Kaleds on the planet Skaro. It was a time when mercy and nobility was all but non-existent and life was harsh and grim. The use of atomic weapons and other agents of mutation had started to produce mutants known as mutos, however Davros himself was originally physically healthy and un-deformed. (DW: Genesis of the Daleks)
As a child Davros claimed only his mother believed in him. Others feared him and his determination. His father wanted him to become a soldier like his elder generations. Davros was determined to become a scientist. (BFA: Innocence)
Davros had a sister called Yarvel. Davros disagreed with her ideas of a compromise with the Thals. Davros was forced into the military where he was put in charge of developing new weapons. After his mother killed his father, sister and auntie, Davros no longer had anyone that he could impress. In honour of Yavel's death he and his mother commissioned a statue to be made to house her ashes. (BFA: Purity)
Davros began experimenting with organisms and teaching them to speak. In particular the word Davros. For his first experiment he used a Thal brain instead of a Kaled one. (BFA: Guilt)
Davros was grievously wounded by an attack and afterwards he needed a mobile life support system just to stay alive, let alone to move. (DW: Remembrance of the Daleks) 30 seconds without his life support would have killed him. The life support system was controlled by a switch conveniently placed on his panel of buttons on his life support system. (DW: Genesis of the Daleks)
Creation of the Daleks
Today, the Kaled race is ended, consumed in a fire of war. But, from its ashes will rise a new race. The supreme creature. The ultimate conqueror of the universe. The Dalek!
With his equally ruthless aide Nyder, Davros ascended to a high rank in the Kaled Scientific Elite and presided over the creation of the Daleks. (DW: Genesis of the Daleks)
- For more see main article.
The Doctor was sent to Skaro during this time period by the Time Lords, where he witnessed Davros' first demonstration of the Daleks to the Scientific Elite. The Doctor and Davros first met at this time. Davros learned of the Doctor's mission and imprisoned him. He used a lie detector to force the Doctor to reveal the details of the Daleks' future defeats, so that he could learn from them and so that his creation, the Daleks, could avoid them. (The Doctor later had this record destroyed.) (DW: Genesis of the Daleks)
"Death" and revival
I created you. I am the master. Not you, I, I I!
The Daleks eventually turned on Nyder and exterminated him. Later, they apparently exterminated Davros himself (DW: Genesis of the Daleks), but he survived in a form of suspended animation while his life support worked to regenerate him. After an unknown period of time had passed, Davros was sought both by the Daleks, now a major galactic power, and by the Doctor. The Daleks sought to revive Davros so that he might offer them a way out of their impasse in their war with the Movellans. Davros was found in the underground remains of the crumbled scientific elite bunker, and was revived. Davros opted to help the Daleks in their war against the Movellans. He devised a plan to destroy a Movellan ship but after this failed he was captured by the Doctor and escaped Dalek slaves and imprisoned in a block of ice. (DW: Destiny of the Daleks)
Leader of the Imperial Daleks faction
I have waited a long time for this. Once the Doctor is exterminated, I shall build a new race of Daleks. They will be even more deadly and I, Davros, shall be their leader! This time we shall triumph. My Daleks shall once more become the supreme beings!
The Humans had decreed a sentence of ninety years of suspended animation, during which time Davros retained full consciousness. The Daleks, at this time led by the Dalek Supreme, liberated Davros from a prison ship in space, and revived him again. They again believed that he might help them win the war with the Movellans. The Doctor then fought Davros thousands of years later and placed him in suspended animation. The Doctor, now in a new incarnation, almost killed him during this time, though he did not have the resolve to do it directly. Davros soon rebelled against the Dalek Supreme and began to convert Daleks to his side when Stien caused the station to explode. (DW: Resurrection of the Daleks)
Davros at this point almost took his own life. He met the Doctor and tormented him as he would not kill him. (BFA: Davros)
Davros, however, survived, and set himself up as "the Great Healer" on the planet Necros and lured the Doctor there. Using the bodies of the dead at Tranquil Repose, Davros created a new race of Daleks with white and gold livery, who would be named "Imperial Daleks". The new faction was totally loyal to him. The Supreme Dalek's forces also arrived on Necros and captured him in order to put him on trial. (DW: Revelation of the Daleks)
- For more background on and an account of the war that followed between Dalek factions, see Imperial-Renegade Dalek Civil War.
By the time of his attempt to recover the Hand of Omega from 1963 Earth he called himself the Dalek Emperor (of the Imperial Daleks only). Apparently, he had lost most of his organic body, and was completely encased within an Imperial Dalek-like shell, though his head and upper body still appeared to be at least partially Kaled. (DW: Remembrance of the Daleks) Apparently killed by a supernova started by the Hand of Omega, he survived by escaping in an escape pod and once more confronted the Doctor, now in his eighth incarnation.
Davros descended further into madness. He found himself teetering on the edge of sanity when he encountered the Doctor on Earth, which he had taken over with a virus. (BFA: Terror Firma)
He returns in the Series 4 two part finale, The Stolen Earth, and Journey's End. His new incarnation, played by Julian Bleach, (in terms of design) stays remarkably faithful to his previous incarnations, and only a few minor changes have been made. This includes a more defined face, and an overall more rounded look. The base of his life support chair follow the same colour scheme as his previous incarnations, black with silver spheres, and he also has a cybernetic hand, on a count that his previous one was shot off in remembrance of the daleks. In the new series Davros is guarded by a red dalek (possibly a dalek supreme) whose purpose in the episodes are as of yet, unknown.
Creations
Most notable of Davros' creations is the Mark III travel machine, which then became known as a Dalek. Davros also experimented with other Dalek forms, such as a Dalek able to walk over rough terrain known as a Spider Dalek. (EDA: War of the Daleks)
Davros also created an Imperial faction of Daleks to counter what he saw as a Renegade faction of Daleks, as well as the cyborg Juggernauts by combining Human DNA with the mechanical Mechanoids. (BNA: The Juggernauts)
Personality
Yes... yes. To hold in my hand a capsule that contained such power... to know that life and death on such a scale was my choice. To know that the tiny pressure on my thumb, enough to break the glass, would end everything. Yes - I would do it. That power would set me up above the gods! And through the Daleks, I shall have that power!
Davros had a sound mind early in his life. Brilliant and driven, he relentlessly experimented to find the final form of the Kaled people. Davros was a cool and sadistic person; it was his ability to command and delegate that was most forceful and cold. While his conversation with the Doctor following his awakening (DW: Destiny of the Daleks) suggests that he may have survived the extermination attempt through forethought, it does still seem to have made Davros more bitter than he had originally been.
Physical characteristics
Davros was originally seen sitting upright in a movement and life support chair resembling the base of a Dalek. His Kaled body was similar to that of a human but with a central blue eye in the centre of his forehead, allowing him some semblance of sight. He had only his right hand, which he used to operate various controls on his chair. These in turn could perform various functions from controlling doors, the Mark III travel machines, to his own life support system.
On Necros, Bostock fired a gun which destroyed most of his right hand and thus his independent operability. (DW: Revelation of the Daleks) Thereafter, he had to use a prosthetic substitute. Leaked internet pictures of Series 4 Davros show him with a metal hand which could be a replacement hand from Revelation as the hand was not was not seen in Remembrance of the Daleks.
Behind the Scenes
Michael Wisher (who had previously played the voice of the Daleks in several Third Doctor stories) portrayed Davros (as well as provided the Daleks' voices) in his debut story Genesis of the Daleks. The creator of the Daleks and of Davros, Terry Nation, intended to imply that Davros had not actually died during that story by showing Davros' life support button still working, a detail not actually shown in the filmed story. When Davros returned in Destiny of the Daleks, Wisher could not play the part, so David Gooderson was cast in the role. Subsequently, Terry Molloy, who first appeared in Davros' third story, Resurrection of the Daleks, has played the role on television and audio more times than any other actor.
Davros appeared in a one-off fan-produced stage play, The Trial of Davros, with Michael Wisher. The second version of the play starred Terry Molloy and Peter Miles reprising his role as Davros' henchman Nyder.