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Quoth Mytical
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Daleks are basically like Space Nazis. They have one emotion (HATE), one volume (LOUD), and one imperative ("EX-TER-MIN-ATE!"). They're also kind of like cockroaches. You can never quite wipe them out completely. They're also, like most Who baddies, immune to bullets. The Doctor has been fighting them all his lives. Daleks are the classic villain for Doctor Who, across all of the franchise. Toward the end of the classic series, they got a little bogged down in warring factions and were on the verge of becoming a joke. When they were re-introduced into the relaunch, the showrunners took steps to make them threatening again.
Cybermen are basically the inspiration for the Borg. The classic Cybermen were from Mondas (Counter-Earth, basically) and were originally human, but kept upgrading themselves into metal monstrosities. Their classic mantra was "You will be like us." Anything they couldn't upgrade, they deleted. nuWho's Cybermen were re-introduced as being from a parallel universe, but basically had the same kind of backstory, just sped up a bit. Neil Gaiman wrote a Cyberman episode ("Nightmare in Silver") that subverted all the criticisms about the Cybermen and made them scary again.
The TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimension In Space) is the traditional Time Lord mode of transport about the cosmos and all of space and time. They can disguise themselves as pretty much anything, although The Doctor's TARDIS has a malfunctioning "chameleon circuit" that leaves it stuck looking like a 1950's police box. Although it looks, from the exterior, as if it should be no bigger than a phone booth, it is famously "bigger on the inside." (IIRC, there are only two exceptions to people verbally remarking on this fact upon seeing it. The first was Rory Williams-- who had read up on science-fiction after his first meeting with the Doctor, and thus wasn't too surprised, much to the Doctor's annoyance. The second was Clara Oswin Oswald, who instead commented, "It's smaller on the outside." The Doctor was more amused by this one.) The TARDIS is sentient, though generally it does not communicate in any way we can really understand. Or even that the Doctor can understand. It frequently takes the Doctor not where he wants to go, but somewhere he needs to be.
Steven Moffat, the current showrunner, is notorious for coming up with frightening monsters (the Weeping Angels being the scariest) or concepts (cracks in time that can retroactively erase you from existence) in his episodes, but a lot of fans also hate him for his plot twists, timey wimey ball hand-waves, and long-game plotting.
No ruining things 
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