Doctor Who: From Rose to Name of the Doctor, the Companions of New Who

You may have noticed by this time that I refuse to call it "NuWho" which is what other fans seem to be doing all the time. It's only one extra letter - I will write it out properly. Anyway, this post will be filled with spoilers so if you haven't watched all 7 seasons of the revived series you should go do that now. You have been warned.


SPOILERS AHEAD


Rose

Rose is both the name of the companion and the title of the first episode of Doctor Who in 2005. She stuck around for the first two season seeing Christopher Eccleston's Ninth Doctor regenerate into David Tennant's Tenth Doctor. The first season of Doctor Who focused quite a bit on Rose's development as a character and as such fans grew to love her. She has her own personality and is a very relatable character.

First Encounter with the Doctor: 
He saves her from the living plastic mannequins at her shop and tells her to run and forget about him.

First Journey in the TARDIS: 
she watches from a spaceship/satellite as the earth finally dies. Also encounters  The Face of Bo, Cassandra "the last human", and some other pretty ridiculous aliens.

First Contribution: 
when Rose encounters the Dalek on her own and tries to help, without the Doctor being around. In that episode she also shows more compassion than the doctor and literally yells at him asking him to look at what he's changing into. Beautiful scene and wonderful strength of character.

Focus Episode:
Father's day shows her humanity. In this episode she does what any person in her situation would do, she tries to go back and save her father from dying and the consequences of that make for a wonderful story.

Regrets:
The way she keeps leaving Mickey and treating him. This is mostly the writer's fault, but we're pretending she's a real person here. Also, the stupid jealousy in the episodes with Mary Jane Smith and Madame de Pompadour.

Exit: 
Her exit at the end of season two was poignant, and her little moments of "haunting" in the beginning of Donna's season were great. Turn Left was also excellent. If only she hadn't had that lame ending with the half-doctor everything would have been perfect. I still prefer her exit at the end of season 2 as her proper goodbye.

Mickey 

Mickey is Rose's boyfriend and while he starts off as a 2D joke character he eventually comes into his own. Some people don't classify him as a companion, but he does accompany Rose and the Doctor on the TARDIS and helps them in several adventures.


First Encounter with the Doctor: 
He meets the Doctor in the first episode Rose, but at that time he's scared and spends most of the episode clinging to rose in fear or telling her to leave the doctor to his fate, etc. Not a great start at all.

First Journey in the TARDIS: 
Mickey goes inside the TARDIS several times before actually journeying on it. He helps Rose open it up so she can access the heart of the TARDIS in the season 1 finale and helps with the captured Slitheen in Boom Town. At the end of School Reunion Sarah Jane suggests that he travel with the Doctor and Rose and the Doctor agrees to this, Rose is a little reluctant/upset he then accompanies them in The Girl in the Fireplace.

First Contribution: 
Mickey's first contribution is during Age of Steel when he takes on his alternate self Rickey's role and helps take down Lumic's Cyberman factory.

Focus Episode:
Rise of the Cybermen and Age of Steel are the episodes in which Mickey plays the most prominent role and his character actually gets developed.

Regrets:
Rose and the Doctor's treatment of him in the first few episodes as well as the constant shifting about to make sure he's always in a parrallel universe and not with Rose. There were better ways to have him get over Rose and allow her to fall for the Doctor without doing this to Mickey.

Exit: 
Unfortunately this came too soon after he actually became a character. I consider the season 2 finale his exit, although just like Rose he came back for a little bit later on.


Martha

Martha is the companion that traveled with the doctor directly after Rose. Many fans hate her, but I don't think this is fair. Like I said in my season 3 review, her family was terribly written, but Martha herself was really good. I like that she was a doctor in training and that her exit didn't involve dying or being left behind with her memory wiped or any other such thing, but just a decision on her part that she wanted to be with her family and focus on the real world. One of my favorite companions, to be honest.

First Encounter with the Doctor: 
She first meets the Doctor in a hospital in Smith and Jones, which is a wonderful entry for her character. She's clever and makes actual proper contributions right from the start, which is awesome. Smith and Jones was a wonderful introduction.

First Journey in the TARDIS: 
The Shakespeare Code is rather unimpressive coming just after the awesome Smith and Jones, but then, I also found Rose's first journey to the end of the world a little unimpressive.

First Contribution: 
Right from the start in Smith and Jones she helps the doctor and it's clear that she's quite intelligent and competent.

Focus Episode:
Smith and Jones focused on her the most, I think, but there was also the excellent two-parter Human Nature/The Family of Blood in which she had to fend for herself and take care of the doctor!

Regrets:
The stupid clone version of her in the season 4 finale. Her family's lack of development.

Exit: 

She leaves the doctor at the end of Season 3, but like many of the other characters she comes back later on. Martha is perfectly set to keep coming back in a way that works/doesn't seem stupid or cheap. 

Donna 

Donna is a fan favorite. I will admit that I thought I was going to hate her after seeing her in the Christmas special after season 2, but when she came back as a full-time companion she was wonderful. One of the best things about her is that there was never any love story between her and the doctor, which is quite refreshing.

First Encounter with the Doctor: 
The Runaway Bride. Terrible intro.

First Journey in the TARDIS: 
Her first adventure was in The Fires of Pompeii in which she showed her determination to change the world for the better and help others.

First Contribution: 
She helped a bit, I guess, in Runaway Bride, which I wish I could forget, but in Partners In Crime the season 4 opening episode, she is actually doing her own investigations into the fishy-sounding Adipose.

Focus Episode:
There are many episodes in which she is the focus/plays a huge role, but I think Turn Left is the most outstanding by far because it combined her uncertainty and her old life with her kick-ass nature as the doctor's companion.

Regrets:
The mind-wipe. They could have done anything else to get rid of her, but this was cheap and just wrong.

Exit: 

Journey's End. A terrible exit that robbed her even of her memory of the adventures she'd had with the doctor.


Amy Pond 

Amy Pond is the first companion to travel with the Eleventh Doctor after his regeneration and she stayed for two and a half seasons. Many fans love her, but in my opinion she was a cardboard cutout character who overstayed her welcome. She's not only in love with the Doctor, they take it to a whole new level where she keeps coming on to the Doctor even after she marries Rory. The Doctor tends to call her "Pond."

First Encounter with the Doctor: 
She first meets him as a child in the wonderful and promising The Eleventh Hour and after promising to come back for her in 5 minutes he ends up returning when she's a grown woman.

First Journey in the TARDIS: 
The Beast Below where Amy gets to know the Doctor on board a ship that is being pulled by an alien whale. It's not as bad as it sounds when you write it out like that and Amy is actually the one to figure stuff out at the end and solve the supposed problem.

First Contribution: 
in the Beast below, see above.

Focus Episode:
Unfortunately, her character is never fully developed and the only insight or development we get into her is through her relationship/love story either with the doctor or Rory. She doesn't seem to have any motivations or much of a personality. That being said the standout episode is probably The Girl Who Waited in which she ages and there are two versions of her.

Regrets:
Lack of development, the way she treats Rory, her skirt, her daughter, and... yeah, let's just leave it there.

Exit: 

The Angels take Manhattan in the middle of Season 7. Silly ending with the Angels suddenly behaving completely differently, Amy and Rory deciding to jump of a roof causing a time paradox that resets the universe yet again, and really she should have left half a season ago.


Rory Williams 

Rory Williams is Amy's husband and he eventually ends up accompanying them on the TARDIS on their adventures, mainly because the Doctor is tired of Amy coming on to him and decides to marry her off. Rory is there so that there can be a love triangle of sorts and unfortunately most of the episodes focus on his love for Amy, Amy's confusion/hovering between her love for him and the Doctor and so on. However, when allowed to do things other than this, Rory ends up being a very promising character, much more 3D than Amy.

First Encounter with the Doctor: 
In the Eleventh Hour when Amy meets him.

First Journey in the TARDIS: 
The Vampires of Venice in the middle of season 5 where the Doctor takes them as a wedding present/honeymoon.

First Contribution: 
He seems to be doing stuff that helped in The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang, but that story was so convoluted you can never really tell. For me his first real standout moment was in The Rebel Flesh/The Almost people.

Focus Episode:
The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People, he shows his personality and goes on his own mission with his own objectives regardless of what Amy and the Doctor think.

Regrets:
Being killed off every couple of episodes, bad writing that didn't allow his personality to grow as well as it should have, and the way Amy treats him.

Exit: 

The Angels Take Manhattan just like Amy. I'm not going to repeat the problems with this exit.

River Song 

River Song is possibly the worst character ever invented. She started off fine and the mystery was good at the beginning, but Moffat quickly blew this Mystery way out of proportion and ruined her character completely by making up the most random and stupid background for her. They keep telling us that she and the Doctor have this awesome relationship and that she's really cool, but telling is no way to develop a character. 

First Encounter with the Doctor: 
Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead is a great intro to her character, although for Timey Wimey reasons it's not her actual first encounter with the Doctor. At this point she was a mystery but not in a bad way - yet - and I could still buy the possibility that she would develop this awesome relationship with the Doctor.

First Journey in the TARDIS: 
This is unclear. She keeps meeting the Doctor and having adventures with him, but because their "timelines are backwards" or whatever that nonsense reasoning is we don't really know when the first time she goes on the TARDIS is. She seems to know how to fly it so I assume that at one point she will be a full-time companion (or was, in her timeline) but in the episodes we see she never actually goes on a full journey with him.

First Contribution: 
Silence in the Library she seems competent and helps out in all the running/surviving...>.>

Focus Episode:
A Good Man Goes to War and Let's Kill Hitler are the episodes when we find out who she really is, episodes better forgotten to be honest. Also The Wedding of River Song focus on her in, again, a nonsensical timey wimey way without actually giving her a personality.

Regrets:
Her entire existence. Moffat being showrunner and not having someone tell him it was a stupid idea.

Exit: 

Unfortunately, I don't think we've quite seen the end of her yet. However, since she died in Forest of the Dead that could be considered her Exit... 

Clara Oswin Oswald 

The soufflet girl. Another complicated mystery character thought up by Moffat. I'm not sure if Moffat thought River had been such a success he'd do the same thing again or if he realized he had failed so decided to try again. Either way, her whole existence is a mystery and instead of getting to know her the Doctor, and the viewer, are always trying to "figure her out" and solve the mystery surrounding her character. Despite this, she isn't as bad as River Song and actually some great episodes. 

First Encounter with the Doctor: 
Asylum of the Daleks. This is an excellent intro to her character where she's the one who gets them out/saves them while the Doctor is being incompetent and Amy and Rory are fighting.

First Journey in the TARDIS: 
The Rings of Akhaten which is far less interesting than her previous adventures.

First Contribution: 
Asylum of the Daleks. She also consistently makes contributions on their adventures.

Focus Episode:
There isn't really one. Asylum of the Daleks and Bells of Saint John are great ones to watch.

Regrets:
Lack of development beyond the "mystery". The Doctor saving her at the end of Eleventh Hour

Exit: 

I don't think we've seen the end of her yet. 

Finally, I will say that I wish some characters had been given the chance to be full-time companions. Wilf is the biggest one, as well as Rita from The God Complex, Brian Williams (Rory's dad), and Dr. Nasreen Chaudhry from The Hungry Earth/Cold Blood.