Terry Nation for those of you who don't know created the Daleks in Doctor Who and Blake's 7.

He seems to be quite a divisive figure. People either think he was an unoriginal hack who leeched off of other people's hard work, like most notably Raymond Cusick the actual designer of the Daleks, or the view him as a genius the best Doctor Who writer after Robert Holmes.

I remember in 2003 he was voted the 4th best Doctor Who writer of all time whilst recently Siskoid's blog of geekry ranked him the worst writer of all time.

Here are my opinions on him http://t.co/r98rJ4etzX can you check it out if you have the time its about how he wrote for the Daleks only.

He had amazing ideas, but soon got bogged down in goodies-versus-baddies stuff that didn't show off those ideas to the best. Some of his Dalek scripts aren't up to much (even the first Dalek story has all that dull stuff about climbing through caverns).

Survivors was an incredible idea, but is best when written by someone else. There's an episode about a stolen petrol tanker (quite an important thing in a post-apocalyptic world with no fuel etc), but it just becomes goodies and baddies shooting at each other. After the initial fantastic set up for the show, it wurbles on for a bit before other writers come in. Blake's Seven is another great example: a brilliant beginning, and then it ... sort of ... drifts ... til someone else takes over the typewriter.

Created the Daleks, cool.

He wrote Rebeccas World : Journey to the forbidden planet, which was my favourite book as a kid.

I think he getas too much praise for the creation of the Daleks. Whislt the concept was his, it was Raymond Cusick who actually came up with the design, didn't get any royalties and was never (untill fairly recently) acknowledged as creative genius who's vision of a Dalek is still as good today. Nation took all the plaudits and most of the money. Thats not to say he didn't have some great ideas, as others have already noted, Survivirs and Blakes 7 are two good examples, but he also wrote many other scripts including comedy for Tony Hancock.

Nation came up with the concept of the Daleks - living, mutated creatures housed in a metal exoskeleton. Cusick came up with the physical design of that housing.

However, the Daleks were long regarded as robots in the olden days by 'normal' viewers, and it's seen as a clever thing by the new show to 'reinvent' them as living beings with minds and personalities, all of which somehow makes them far more sinister and thought provoking than the old robot perception of them. Same thing with the Cybermen.

But really, what's being celebrated about the new show is simply them highlighting nation's original concept, and separating it from Cusick's visualisation. Surely that means Nation is massively under-credited for his actual idea?

I think there's plenty of scope for Nation's concept and Cusick's iconic design to happily co-exist without being compared or played off against each other.

Perhaps whether you appreciate him or not largely depends on whether you think Daleks are pepper pots with sink plungers and egg whisks, or mutated and corrupted Kaleds in MKIII travel machines.

Either way, I think Terry nation was a c***, and if the rumours that have surrounded his estate since the show returned are true, those c*** genes have certainly been inherited. That is my opinion.

Terry Nation What are your opinions on him : simple he was a genius some of his writing and ideas were brilliant. he made have used other peoples thoughts but he brought them to life ...
Never met him so can not comment about him as a person and never believe wholly what is written in press

That's harsh, Raymond Cusick had a contract with the BBC that said they retained the rights to everything he designed for them, which was nothing to do with Nation.

By the time of Destiny of the Daleks Nation himself had seemingly forgotten that the Daleks were living creatures as his script has the Doctor (and Davros) call the Daleks Robots on a number of occasions.

You can't really blame Nation for something that was almost certainly written by Douglas Adams.

Ah, wasn't aware Adams had done such a major rewrite.

Exactly. It was Nation's agent that advised him to ask for 50% rights to his creation as part of his fee. He was freelance and so able to do this so I don't see how getting the best for himself makes him a c***. Alex Guinness famously negotiated an unusual at the time 2% cut of sales from Star Wars as part of his contract which has earned his estate about £60million and rising. Both of these people, and their descendents, are lucky enough to benefit hugely from their foresight. What a pair of c***s with c*** familes eh?

Personally, I think (apart from a few exceptions) many of his stories were crap. Many of them have a very clichéd sci-fi feel about them; planets and aliens with stupid names, simplistic plots which usually involve some BS element or mineral as a plot device, "bug-eyed monsters"... that sort of thing.

It's tempting to think he was a hack who got lucky. His scripts for shows like The Avengers were certainly formulaic. But a writer who is prolific and delivers on time is much less frustrating in the business (trust me, I know of what I write!) than a genius who delivers late.

Is this relating to the reluctance top bring back the Daleks in C21st DW? That sounds like sound business sense to me. Terry Nation had a very effective and capable agent who worked hard to protect copyright and struck a hard bargain with the BBC. Doctor Who "needs" the Daleks, and I can entirely understand the agents holding out for a better and better and better deal for their client. At the end of the day, business is business.

I disagree with this. There's a brand association with the Daleks but are they really that popular? Perhaps in the 60s but since then it's rare for a Dalek episode to outperform a regular episode in ratings terms (not sure about Appreciation figures). The Daleks are simply one of those things that people expect to see every now and again but the series could happily thrive without them.

Which is why the Nation estate baffle me a bit. In 2005 it had been 17 years since the Daleks were last in Doctor Who, their value should have been relatively minor yet it sounded like they associated a high value to the property. I don't blame them for that but the BBC should have played hard ball with the talks as the Dalek property needed to be in the series far more than the series needed the Daleks.

It had happened in the 90s too. I remember UKGold were unable to show Dalek episodes for some years as they couldn't acquire the rights at a price they could afford. And then there's the lingering accusation that the rights over the Daleks has helped many missing episodes stay missing. Never quite agreed with that myself but I can understand why many do.

As for Terry Nation. I quite liked him and I quite like his shows (Blakes 7 and Survivors). There's nothing really original about them though. Blakes 7 was, in his own words, "Dirty Dozen in Space" and Survivors was a fairly standard post-virus idea that's been done many many times before (and after). He was better at the world-building stuff than the actual stories (cue a character to twist their ankle at some point during the story ).

Actually thats not true. George Lucas gave Guiness his percentage cut as well as the rest of the main cast (but not 2%) something that astounded other film producers at the time. Guiness discussed this on a Parkinson show.

Sorry, I didn't make my original point very clearly. Personally, I don't think DW needs the Daleks, but the general public does think that, and the media would expect it too. There was as much hype about the Daleks returning as there was about the show itself returning. Russell T Davies said that he held back the Dalek to episode six to get a second blaze of publicity. The 90s TV movie wangs in a spurious Dalek moment. As you say, Nation withdrawing the rights for sale of Dalek stories overseas scuppered the sale of a lot of Troughton, which MAY be one of the reasons why so much Troughton is missing from the archives. I remember my grandparents talking about "Doctor Who and the Daleks" as the title of the programme: one is intrinsically linked to the other in the view of the Great British Public, and the Nation Estate is acutely (astutely?) aware of the financial benefits of this.

Nation was great at world building, but his scripts ... a bit formulaic.

Anyone for Tarrant?

He's credited on The Daleks, The Dalek Invasion of Earth and Genesis of the Daleks. Whilst the latter doesn't float my boat as much as a lot of fans, it's clearly very good, and I love those aforementioned Hartnell stories. Certainly agree with the above post that he could be a bit formulaic, but just for those he deserves great credit, although yep it was a team effort and Raymond Cusick had a huge input.

Also fond of Blakes 7 and Survivors, so he must've been doing something right IMO.

Oh, and whilst I don't think he really 'got' The Avengers, I love 'Legacy of Death' so that's another thing in his favour.

One of the best ever Who writers? Probably wouldn't say so myself. But a hack? Too harsh.

Oh, in the top 3 of classic Doctor Who writers, behind Robert Holmes and David Whitaker. His scripting of The Dalek Invasion of Earth received universal acclaim as it was so recent to events of the second world war and the performances enhanced his dialogue. And not forgetting his ending to episode 1 of The Daleks with Barbara's scream of terror.

Terrific.

Not just main cast, technicians and other staff were offered percentage contracts but many turned them down. Guinness accepted a percentage deal and negotiated the best for his, 2 1/4 %. You are saying this is untrue?

Let's get this in context. Guiness liked the script and turned down his fee in favour of a % deal BECAUSE he did not think Lucas could afford him. He did NOT see that it would be a stratospheric hit and make him a personal fortune

Source; EVERY interview he really gave about Star Wars.

His scripts for The Avengers weren't great and, as you say, he never really got the show. And, personally, I think Legacy Of Death is awful, although I really do like the Tara King era.

did he also write survivors.

Very fond of the era too. Ropey start, but when it was good it was very very good. And when it was bad it was 'Invasion of the Earthmen'.

(Sorry Terry. That was one of his! In fairness, it was more the production than the script IMO. Not that the script was all that great either.)