I didn't mean to.

[scarfman]

evilgrins posted at doctorwho yesterday contending that the Doctor tends to kidnap his companions, compiling a list from memory. For twenty-four hours I resisted compiling a rebuttal, but I fell.

It's difficult for me to say the Doctor kidnaps anyone, since as a rule - at least before the Time War - he resists taking on a new companion as hard as he can. Often they are intentional or unintentional stowaways.

• Doctor One
  • We didn't see his granddaughter Susan board the TARDIS. She may have stowed away or not.
  • He took off with Barbara and Ian aboard as an alternative to allowing them to report his presence to the 1963 authorities.
  • He took Vicki aboard as the only alternative to leaving an underage girl alone on an alien planet.
  • Steven stowed away.
  • If I ever knew details of Katarina's boarding or Sara Kingdom's boarding I've forgotten them.
  • Dodo was welcomed aboard, as the possible descendant of someone the Doctor wanted to think hadn't died two hundred years before, and because she looked like Susan.
  • Ben and Polly climbed aboard just before a takeoff because they wondered why the Doctor went into a police box.

Doctor Two

• Jamie is goaded into boarding the TARDIS just before it departs by one or more of its current crew, but I don't know by whom.
• Victoria is another Susan-surrogate, having lost her father to the Daleks.
• Zoe is brought aboard only after being compelled to watch a video of the adventure when Victoria lost her father.

Doctor Three

• Liz never set foot aboard the TARDIS that we know. (Of course, that was the year it never moved.)
• Jo was invited into the TARDIS only after the Doctor had got to know her over three adventures already.
• The Brigadier and Benton only boarded the TARDIS under emergency circumstances.
• Sarah Jane snuck aboard.

Doctor Four

• Harry was invited on as a practical joke.
• Leela invited herself on against the Doctor's express wishes.
• Romana was put aboard by the White Guardian against the Doctor's express wishes.
• Adric stowed away.
• Nyssa met up with the Doctor on Logopolis ostensibly only to get help finding her missing father, but then the Master destroyed her planet.
• Tegan boarded the TARDIS thinking it was a police box.

Doctor Five

• Turlough boarded the TARDIS with ulterior motives.
• Peri was brought aboard by Turlough in emergency circumstances.

Doctor Six

• Non-causal loop aside, we don't know how Mel originally boarded the TARDIS.

Doctor Seven

• It was Mel's idea, not the Doctor's, that Ace board the TARDIS.

Doctor Eight

• The Doctor asked Grace to board the TARDIS but she declined.

Doctor Nine

• Rose was the first to be asked to board the TARDIS twice.
• The Doctor asked Mickey aboard but he declined.
• Rose asked Adam aboard over the Doctor's objections.
• The Doctor asked Jack aboard as an alternative to allowing Jack to die after proving his worth.

Doctor Ten

• The Doctor asked Rose a third time, being uncertain she still wanted to after he regenerated.
• The Doctor and Rose asked Sarah Jane to come with them, but when they get Mickey instead Rose was more put out than the Doctor.
• The Doctor asked Donna along, but she found him scary.
• The Doctor strung Martha along with several just-one-more trips until finally admitting she was "never just a passenger".
• The Doctor and the TARDIS both ran as hard as they could from Jack, but under special circumstances.
• Spoiler for next season We don't know yet the circumstances surrounding the boardings of next season's companions, all return companions: Donna, Martha, and (according to the latest shooting news) Jack.

I didn't want to do this, I really didn't. There's a Saturday hour I'll never get back.

Comments

[scarfman]

I tend to take as rule of thumb the definition of companion used by Doctor Who Magazine in the 80s, which went something like: Anyone who's appeared in more than one story and taken more than one trip in the TARDIS. Therefore I count Katarina and Sara, but not Jackie, on the grounds she only had that one trip.

(You may say, "Liz doesn't meet the definition, since you admit she never set foot in the TARDIS," but come on now.)

[laws-of-fizzix.livejournal.com]

*headdesk* I wasn't thinking, I tell you!