http://www.hypable.com/2014/08/16/jenna-coleman-leaving-doctor-who/
Not the biggest Whovian, but of all the new-Who companions, she’s the one that has made the least impression on me. OTOH, my daughter is upset.
She’s one of the longest-standing companions? Doesn’t seem like it. Maybe I was just waiting for her to become interesting and she kind of never did. Oh well. It will be interesting to see who’s next.
I don’t get this either. I thought she just joined in season 7, taking over from Amy Pond
She’s only been in a few episodes.
Maybe they’re counting from Asylum of the Daleks. That’d put her starting in September of 2012. She’s been a “companion” for a long time, but she hasn’t really done much. There’s been an obscene amount of breaks between seasons with this show, almost to the point where I’ve stopped caring.
There’s not much for Jenna to do with the new older Doctor. She was originally cast to flirt with Matt Smith. Add a touch of romance to the Tardis. That won’t work with this older guy. He could be her grandfather.
Both Martha and Donna had only one season, 14 episodes or so, and Clara has so far had only half a season, but by the end of this coming one will have had 1.5 seasons, around 21 episodes, so that puts her ahead of half the batch of recent companions.
Yes, Rose was there for two series and Amy Pond and Rory were there almost all of Matt Smith’s runs.
Are Amy and Rory the longest lasting companions ever? Especially Amy, who is in pretty much every Matt Smith episode(except the Clara ones).
No. Amy was in 2 seasons as a regular Companion, lasting a little under 2 years of real-world time, just barely edging out Rose (2 seasons, ~1.5 RW years), so, yes, she is the longest running Companion of the current series.
Ever, though? Nope. The first three Companions were Susan, Ian, and Barbara. While Susan left after 1 season, Ian and Barbara stayed 2, lasting a little OVER 2 years, RW.
One of the more popular Companions is Sarah Jane Smith, who lasted 3 seasons and change, or just shy of 3 real-world years. So, she beats out Amy on both counts. (Amy has slightly more stories, but given the shorter nature of the stories in the new series…)
Those were the only ones I checked, but I’m sure there are more original-series Companions who beat Amy - there may be some who beat Sarah Jane, even.
It might have been nice if Moffat had ever actually bothered to write her a character other than “perky girl who drives strained plot”. Reasonable eye candy, otherwise totally unmemorable.
Jamie holds the record at 117 episodes, which works out to roughly 39 shows in the new series (Amy had 34 series)
Depending what counts as a companion Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart did 8 years
Yes after a promising start, she really did fade. But a shoe box would have been better than Amy and Rory
The analysis I’ve seen ranks companion times:
Tegan
Sarah Jane (a few weeks behind Tegan)
Jamie (a few months behind Tegan)
Though apparently things get muddy when you consider Ace.
What about K9?
I really liked Clara, heading into her bit. But now it just feles like they rushed through everything with her too quickly. It’s like taking Amy’s story, all the way from a little girl through to River Song’s reveal, all in the space of a half-season. Where the hell are you supposed to go after that?
I have to assume that they came up with the concept, cast her, filmed the first few episodes - locking it all in - and then Matt Smith announced that he was quitting. In a panic, they decided to rush it all through, instead of passing the story line onto the new Doctor. All that netted them was a post-intriguing companion who never lived up to the intrigue, and a slate of stupid Hollywood-themed episodes that were written by monkeys.
I hope, for Jenna Coleman’s sake, that they give her some good material in the new season, so that they haven’t trashed her career. I don’t feel like, like with Agyeman Freeman, that it was the actress’s fault that the character ended up milquetoast. In this case, she just got handed a bum gig.
Affirmative!
Hey! That’s my pretend wife you all are disparaging!
A little respect please.
So thats the Doctors big secret.
He is a big ole time travel perv!
Heck, thats probably why he stole the TARDIS. He’s on the run from the Time Lords for pedophile charges.
Overall I have not been happy with the writing all through the Matt Smith era. At first I thought it was him, then realized the writers were just getting lazy. Every week seemed to find Rory dying or Amy dying, followed by a quick reboot of wibbly wobbly time and on too the next adventure.
Thank God for River Song.
What the shoebox? 