“Past or future?”
The choice offered to Bill Potts in ‘Smile’ is one his new friends are often asked to make when first they step through the doors of his TARDIS.
Pre-order the new season on DVD on Amazon here.
Pre-order the new season on Blu-ray on Amazon here.
With Bill enjoying her first trip to the past in ‘Thin Ice’ this week, and having considered first trips to the future, we thought we would take a look at the other 21st century Who companions and their first trips back in time…
5. Amy’s ‘Victory of the Daleks’ trip (2010)
Fresh from ‘The Beast Below’, the Doctor and Amy were called into action by none other than Winston Churchill, and on arrival in 1941 Discovered that Daleks had become part of the British war effort.
Despite some great fun with the devious “Ironside” Daleks, in a new green livery, the story felt a little rushed at its conclusion and also launched a divisive new Dalek design on the world. On the plus side, it did see the Doctor face down his old enemies armed only with a jammie dodger.
4. Clara’s ‘Cold War’ trip (2013)
After her trip to ‘The Rings of Akhaten’, Clara’s first visit to the past stayed pretty close, temporally speaking, as the TARDIS arrived on a stricken Russian nuclear submarine, circa 1983.
Dealing with a recently defrosted Ice Warrior, there was precious little time for nostalgia – although writer Mark Gatiss managed ground the story in the 1980s by gifting David Warner’s Professor Grisenko an interest in the pop music of the time.
3. Martha’s ‘The Shakespeare Code’ trip (2007)
Martha Jones’ first TARDIS trip took her back to Elizabethan times, for an encounter with the William Shakespeare and a coven of Carrionite witches – which results in a terrific finale on the stage of the Globe theatre.
In a story centring on the power of words, writer Gareth Roberts gave a typically Doctor Who solution to the fate of the legendary lost play Love’s Labour’s Won, as well as presenting Shakespeare as a sexually flexible, genius rock-star playwright of his age.
2. Rose’s ‘The Unquiet Dead’ trip (2005)
A failed attempt to arrive in Naples, 1860 actually delivers the Ninth Doctor and Rose to Cardiff where they bump into Charles Dickens and a rash of animated corpses.
Introducing a little more of the Doctor’s Time War backstory, as well as rift in space/time which bisects Cardiff, this is the first of the modern-era’s celebrity historicals with a charismatic performance by Simon Callow as the world weary Dickens – who the Doctor turns out to be a big fan of.
1. Donna’s ‘The Fires of Pompeii’ trip (2008)
Donna’s first visit to the past was to Pompeii and it introduced her to the dilemmas of time travel, as arriving just before volcano day, she received a heart-breaking illustration of the concept of fixed points in time.
In traumatic scenes as Donna railed against the inevitable, and allayed our fears that Donna would be was too much of a comic creation, Catherine Tate won us over while she persuaded the Doctor to save someone from the tragedy.
Of course, the story has extra resonance now due to familiar face of one of the people he saved…
Honourable mention: Rory’s ‘The Vampires of Venice’ trip (2010)
While we’ve focused on the ladies, and poor Mickey Smith was not on the TARDIS long enough to have a proper trip back in time, Rory Williams was coaxed on board for a trip to Venice, 1580 after the Doctor gate-crashed his stag night.
Soon investigating the suspicions Calvierri school for girls, Rory got a taste of action in a fight with an alien fish monster – all while wandering around 16th Century Venice in jeans and a t-shirt, bearing a love heart picture of him and Amy. Oh, Rory!
Pre-order the new season on DVD on Amazon here.
Pre-order the new season on Blu-ray on Amazon here.
What’s your favourite first trip to the past in Doctor Who? Let us know below…