12 Days of Christmas – Day 8
Onward still with the questions!
The sands of time are running out for the Tennant era, for the RTD years and this very blog of course. So, another question about the new series:
Question 8: Families run strong through the new series – each companion has one, and they figure largely in the Doctor’s adventures. Which family is your favourite – and is this an element that should remain in the series to come?
December 22nd, 2009 at 6:57 am
I’m going to answer in reverse:
Yes the familty element should absolutely remain. Not only does it flesh out the companion as an actual person (Remember how utterly real Rose Tyler seemed back in the early days of series 1?), but it opened the programme up to a viewing demographic which it had never had before.
Favourite family, well the mighty Cribbens edges out Jackie Tyler and the scary Mrs Jones, so it has to be the noble Motts.
December 22nd, 2009 at 7:03 am
Hi Al!
Oh yes Bernard’s a colossus striding over all the others, but he’s as far as I’d want family members to go – or as close, I suppose, to the TARDIS. Mickey aside, Jackie’s best moments were outside the TARDIS (including her bits in Torchwood Tower). family is good, they ground the companions, but they shouldn’t be companions.
So I’d have them in the new series, but sparingly. And no repeat Journey’s End/We Are The World all-in benefit gig again, please.
December 22nd, 2009 at 7:39 am
Hmmm, well this is a hard one – Martha is my fav companion of the three (with Donna a close second), but she seemed to annoy me in Series 4. Having said that, it’s an even split between Rose and Donna – I love Wilf, but also thought Jackie was irksome, very real and simply great.
I think I’ll go with Rose’s family at the moment BUT may change my opinion post the final two episodes. With Wilf playing a much large part in the finale, it might be what sways me.
And yes, they should keep the family aspect, but not to the detriment of the story. I wonder if Amy Pond will have a back story or it’ll be right into the action?
December 22nd, 2009 at 7:59 am
Hi Foo
Yeah, Martha did lose something in year 4, didn’t she? Weird – this once strong, professional woman the previous year sort of got drowned in cheese, starting with her space phone in Sontaran Stratagem (“I’m bringin’ you back to Earth!” – er, yeah I’d probably say the same thing on the blower to an old friend in broad daylight. maybe), being the spare wheel in Doctor’s Daughter, and then ending with that piece-de-fromage grin to camera around the TARDIS console in Journey’s End. The family was fun though, especially the dad.
December 22nd, 2009 at 11:21 am
Mr Adamson, please – as you keep telling us all: it’s Christmas remember?
A time for being nice, even to companions and stories you have unseasonal issues with…
December 22nd, 2009 at 12:21 pm
I’m tempted to pitch in my answer for Day five again, my favourite family moments have been the Doctor’s recollections of his own. I’m also tempted to agree with Foo that the jury is still out on the Mott/Noble dynamic.
It’s interesting that (IMHO anyway) that the companion family setups all seem to come with some form of paternal estrangement (either by death, Rose/Donna (although in the later case this is more by tragedy than design), or separation Martha, by some extensions the Doctor. While conflcit may be a principal element of drama it would be nice to see a companion family led out that had a different dynamic other than the harridin mother.
One other thing to note is that family seems vitially important to the show outside the confines of the Companions, further than the Luke/Sarah Jane adoption, or the Mothercare range at Torchwood. Consider the familal relationships in things like The Doctor Dances, Fires of Pompei, Forest of the Dead, Children of Earth, Next Doctor, Idiots Lantern, Love and Monsters, Fear Her (…I’m drifting Proffessor…) even the family Slitheen.
December 22nd, 2009 at 2:10 pm
Oh Al – put your handbag away! You know I thought Martha was the bees knees and had simply the best theme music ever (especially as it wasn’t actually ‘Simply The Best’ a la David Brent). I just think her best stuff last year was in Torchwood!
So… nobody voting for Jennie Who then?
And Dave – I noticed that too and had plans (oh I had plans…) to write something up similar to this for RTP. families come in shapes and sizes of course – human/cat person family unit in Gridlock, the Racnoss queen and her ‘children’, does Davros call his Daleks ‘children’? And of course Miss Foster in Partners in Crime was deliberately named…
Anyway, as I seem to have forgotten myself and the initial question I’ll say favourite family is the Tylers. The mother is dotty and less shrewish than her successors (she’s the best thing about Love and Monsters to me) and Petes 1 and 2 both seemed like good guys despite life having dealt them both very different hands.