I Love Debating About Doctor Who Companions

A Companion To The Doctor’s Companions: Rose Tyler

It’s pretty clear now, that when Doctor Who came back after its enforced lay-off, the character on whom the production team’s hopes rested wasn’t so much the Doctor as his first companion. Get that right, and you’re back in the game. Get it wrong, and you might as well give up.


In terms of the Doctor and his role in proceedings, it’s close to business as usual. He flies around time and space, acts like he’s in charge, fixes things, saves the day, blows up the baddies, and whooshes off once more.


Whereas Rose – played by Billie Piper – is the converted sceptic, representing the wary Who audience, who want to believe but have been let down too many times in the past. She’s from an estate in London, lives a life which does not lend itself well to fantasies, does not know how to create made-up bombs, does not have a plummy accent and has clearly not come straight out of drama school. Rose Tyler is, if the term has any meaning for a TV show in which people can travel in time and space, real.


As much as Russell T Davies and the Ninth Doctor combined, Rose is the person who resurrected Doctor Who the show, because she represents the fans who loved it, and wanted it to come back better. She not only healed the emotional wounds of the Doctor himself, she healed ours too, allowing the show to return in triumph, not limp out with all the same tired old gags, for a wheezy victory lap.