How important is it for Doctor Who Companions to be ordinary people?

[betawho]

I just saw this quote from nrrrdy_grrrl about Supernatural, and realized it could also apply to Doctor Who.

Quote:

It took me a while to figure it out but the biggest difference between old and new Supernatural for me is that I miss Sam being a little brother. I miss him picking fights and being the one with a perspective from normal life, I miss the challenges

Comments

[betawho]

I don't watch Supernatural, so I'm not exactly sure what went on in that series, but this struck a chord with me and made me realize why I tend to prefer the Classic Companions, why I tend to like Donna and Rory as my favorite New Who Companions, and why I've always had a problem with Amy

[10littlebullets]

I think it's important to draw a distinction between outside the Doctor's world and normal. Especially with a show like Doctor Who, which tends to attract people who are, well, a little odd, and who often cling to their own oddness as part of their identity. It took me a long, long time to warm up to Rose, for example, because she was so aggressively characterized as being normal and down-to-earth, and then the One True Companion claptrap started creeping its way into the show and alienated the hell out of me. Because it was setting her up as a normal/default viewer-identification figure and then glorifying that as the only way to be, and the problem was I barely related to her at all. Nor to Rory, though I didn't react the same way to him because he was always one of multiple views on what was going on. But I liked both him and Rose a lot better after I dropped the "oh, this is what the writer is telling us regular people should be like" idea and got a handle on their quirks and flaws and individuality. (I'm half-convinced you

[betawho]

I had this same reaction to Rose, the fact that she was being passed off as so incredibly normal that she almost couldn't be real, and yet at the same time we were being told how amazingly special she was. Either way, she didn't seem like an actual person to me. No one is that normal.

And I completely agree, one of the risks of going for that approach is that most people do want to consider that there is something special about themselves, no matter how normal they all. To me, every normal person has some focus, some attribute or attitude or aptitude that is different from most other people

[londonkds]

The biggest viewing figures the show ever had was when the regular cast was two Time Lords and a tin dog.

[philstar22]

I prefer a balance of someone who is from outside the Doctor's world and new to all of it and yet at the same time can hold his/her own. I love that all of the New Who companions have that balance.

[ladymercury_10]

Hmm. I mean, I think a large part of the appeal of Doctor Who is seeing "normal" people overcome both their internal demons and external ridiculous monsters to become heroes, but at the same time, I think it's possible to relate to characters who don't share very much of your background. I mean, really, what's a "normal" person anyway?

That said, I have mixed feelings about the tendency for the companions to become more "special" and "doctor-y" the longer they travel with him, to turn into soldiers and so on.