Boys Boys Boys

Another good indication that Season 12 wants to get back to the Troughton era is the composition of the TARDIS crew: one male and one female companion. It's funny how we're now conditioned to think of the orthodox TARDIS complement as the Doctor plus one female companion: since Season 12, only the first half of John Nathan-Turner's tenure (Seasons 18-21) has deviated noticeably from this formula.

Back in 1975, such an orthodoxy wasn't even dreamed of yet. The black and white seasons of Doctor Who always had at least one male and one female companion, and quite often a fourth crew member of either sex just for good measure. Pertwee may have had only one, female TARDIS companion at any given time, but with a squad of beefy UNIT soldiers hanging around at all times, the testosterone levels were kept high. What an innovation it was to ditch Harry Sullivan at the end of the Zygon escapade and head off into the vast universe with just one eccentric Gallifreyan and one Earth girl for him to explain the plot to on board the ship! The series would barely ever look back from here.

I do kind of mourn the loss of male TARDIS crew members - and yes, I'm aware that New Who has flirted with the idea of them, with Mickey, Adam and of course Captain Jack. When the Doctor decided to leave the well-meaning but dim Harry at home, he unwittingly gave birth to a lot of the fundamentals of the 21st century series. The Doctor is now young(ish) and athletic enough to do his own fighting and stunts. He is also, on some level, sexually rather than just paternally motivated: see how much gentler the Fourth Doctor is with Sarah than Harry, and of course the most romantic Old Who story ever, City of Death. With a slimmed-down crew the focus can go onto the stories instead of the characters - well, actually that's something they reversed for the new series, writing in friends and families for the companions to help construct some rather elaborate personal development arcs. But when the Tenth Doctor and his lady friend of the hour zoom off to another planet, there's usually only two people for whom the writers have to find something relevant to do, which I'm sure must be a great relief with only 45 minutes or so to work with.

As I say, I find it a bit saddening that the Doctor took over the parts of action man and romantic lead in his show; there's nothing wrong with it per se, it just seems like an eccentric old man taking youngsters on semi-educational, semi-terrifying trips in time and space in his magic caravan is a more original premise than the intergalactic superhero with an adoring woman on his arm.

Oh well, nothing to worry about, even if Moffat looks set to cleave firmly to the one-hot-babe-companion rule with Amy Pond: Doctor Who is always amazing. Some days I just quite miss the likes of Harry and Jamie, Steven and Ian, that's all.