Companions: An Idea For A More Unpredictable Season Format
Guest contributor Sam Forshaw on how Doctor Who could shake things up following Clara’s exit.
I love two-parters as much as anyone else, but I found one aspect of the last two Series 9 stories quite painful: the cliffhangers are very weak. In The Magician’s Apprentice, the TARDIS exploded, Clara died, Missy died, and the Doctor looked as though he was about to exterminate Bubby Davros. Meanwhile in Under the Lake, we had a slightly toned-down cliffhanger, which was appreciated, where the Doctor was revealed to have died in the past.
But do you see what’s wrong with that? All of these things are obviously going to be reverted, and that’s jarringly obvious to the majority of the audience. People won’t tune in next week just because of the cliffhanger—because of course the Doctor/Clara isn’t dead, of course the TARDIS isn’t destroyed. It makes the show predictable, and that’s not what we want. In this article I have proposed an idea for a new format of seasons to make the show much more unpredictable.
The most widely-praised, most popular TV shows at the moment — Game of Thrones and The Walking Dead — have a connection: they both have an ever-changing cast. You never know from one episode to the next whether the main characters are going to survive, or whether they’ll be dead before the credits. I heard a statistic that said Game of Thrones kills off an average of 13 characters—that’s main characters and side characters—each episode. That’s astonishing.
Of course, that’s not what we would want in a show like this. For a family show to have lots of brutal deaths each week would bring in more complaints to the BBC than “Don’t Cremate Me”. Equally, though, when every one in three deaths in the show is reverted (yes, I made that statistic up), something needs to be done to gain the show more respect, to give it an unpredictable edge.
Here’s my idea. After Clara has left, and after whatever the hell is happening next year… For season 10, there is no permanent companion. A companion is announced, but no one is sure for how long he/she’ll be staying for. Then, in the opener, he/she is introduced, and it seems plain sailing. They have good chemistry with the Doctor, they get along fine… And then during an episode sometime in the middle of the series, the companion dies. How much would that shake up the show?
One of the problems I’ve seen for Doctor Who is its desire to publicise all the cast changes — 7-point-something million people tuned into a drawn-out special to reveal the 12th Doctor. Meanwhile, in Game of Thrones, someone dies and then the stories go and focus on someone else. (Who, knowing that show, will surely be killed off two episodes later.) Which one is more unpredictable?
A season where a companion is introduced in episode 1, and then maybe shockingly killed off in the middle of the series, before another one is introduced, would totally shake things up. And then—heck, maybe that one is killed off as well, or leaves, and the Doctor meets another companion in time for the finale.
Those companions don’t return. They aren’t resurrected, they’re mentioned again, but never brought back, if Moffat can resist it. For many people, that would gain the show a lot of respect. Especially in the Whoniverse, for someone to actually die (I know, right!) is astonishing. Not a Missy/Clara teleportation, not an Osgood inexplicable reappearance. They are just gone, and it scars the Doctor. Then, whenever there’s a cliffhanger of a companion death again… we won’t be quite so certain who will make it out alive.
Now, there’s definitely pros and cons to this—the pros of which I’ve mostly mentioned already. It would also keep things extremely fresh, having minor cast changes every few episodes, and would earn some viewers back who turn off because they don’t like the companion. (Clara gets on many peoples’ nerves, for example.) It also gives the writers more chance to flex their creativity, having to create companions with stark contrasts to each other so as not to make it seem like it’s just the previous companion reincarnated. I’m sure if Toby Whithouse eventually becomes head writer (which I’d be extremely pleased about, if that ever happened) he would be especially good at sculpting new, interesting characters, which seems to be his strongest ability. It also lets the writers vary the different characters by giving them different backgrounds—unless we want to keep travelling back to contemporary London each time to pick up the next companion, the Doctor will just pick up his friends from all the faraway galaxies that he visits. The companions can be different genders, different ages, different ethnicities, different species—the huge plus with this is that it doesn’t matter as much, because they won’t be here as long. If the audience reaction is largely negative towards a certain character, that’s fine, because they might not be here the whole season.
Now for the cons, because there are definitely a few: most importantly, it would put a massive strain on the Doctor, for his companions to be killed off after only just getting to know them. It would mean darker, brooding episodes probably, straight after the companion’s death—like The Snowmen was. The writers would have to come up with compelling reasons for the Doctor to get up again each time.
Also, the audience may not like the lack of reliability that the show offers, or may dislike the Doctor for moving on so quickly. But he doesn’t need to pick up a new friend straight away—he can always leave it a couple of weeks and go off on his own to collect his thoughts, like in the 2009 specials.
Another con would be that with so little time spent with each companion before they are gone from the show, we build up less of a connection with them—but sometimes we don’t need to have watched them for years and years to feel sad when they leave. If the writers try hard enough, and the actors and actresses are great enough, then the audience will automatically love them. Just think back to River’s departure in Forest of the Dead—we’d only known her for two episodes back then.
It may also be out of trend for an important character to be killed off so swiftly—heaven knows we all love a big soppy goodbye. Just look at Doomsday, Journey’s End, (and to a lesser extent for me) The Angels Take Manhattan. And I’m not even going to mention all those classic era stories. However, to me, the care I have for the character doesn’t come from how big and majestic his or her departure is from the series, but just how sad I am about it, and that comes from the quality of writing of all the previous episodes the companion starred in, and the convincingness of the actor/actress’s portrayal.
You see, for me, the pros of this season format definitely outweigh the cons, on paper at least. I wouldn’t want this trend to last forever, because it’d be pretty brutal for the Doctor to be getting through two or more companions every season, but I definitely think this’d be worth trying out. Then every time we sit down to watch another episode, we won’t be quite so sure who will make it out; when Clara is in that Dalek we won’t know for certain that she’ll find a way out. Our hearts may be beating a little faster each time the Doctor and his companion are being chased down a corridor, not quite so sure what will happen next…
But what do you think? Is this a good idea, or are the companions more than cannon fodder? Let me know your views in the comments.
