Oh, just a random question. Did any one else feel that the Ostenhagen key and the warp star were just cop-outs to bring Martha and Sarah Jane into the story? I mean, they came in, and then didn't really do anything. I know I don't like Martha, but I love Sarah Jane, and I thought both of them were thoroughly pointless to the plot line.

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Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you!

^I already agreed with you on that, but I'm reiterating it here. The Ostenhagen Key thingy was a total cop-out to get Martha in. However, it was less random than the warp star. I mean, come on now. Perfect timing, Sarah Jane just so happens to have a warp star handy? I love Sarah Jane, don't get me wrong. I was glad to see her, but I wish she would have been dropped in for a different reason besides that. As for Martha, she was a bit too mellow dramatic about exploding the earth for my tastes. It was like...she was trying to be big bad Martha Jones and failed miserably. I've said it before. That's why she bugs me, because she tries so hard to be tough but falls all over herself whenever The Doctor looks at her. Anywho, yeah. Total cop-outs.

johnny&orlifan6422: You pretty much summed it up, but in far better words than I could. lol.

Aliana: I didn't see Martha fall all over the Doctor at all this season. She had moved on, got a boyfriend and gotten engaged and embarked on a career in UNIT. She still cared very deeply for the Doctor, but as a friend only. Just my take

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And she bugged me just as much, proving to me that it wasn't just her infatuation with the Doctor that made me dislike her.

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Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you!

Mkay, since I've been ranting about it to Tar, I figured I'd put my Martha-hater points here. Excuse the scatter-brainedness.

1. Martha wasn't all that important.
RTD created scenarios out of the blue for her to be an important companion, even though anyone else could have done what she did a lot more suavely, as with the Master at the end of Season 3. Rose was the bad Wolf, the end of the universe. Donna became the DoctorDonna and saved the universe. Tar pointed out that the Ostenhagen key was a cop-out to get Martha in the story and, whereas the warp star was completely random, she had to try and be the Big Bad Soldier exploding the earth. Which brings me to my next point.

2. Confusing sentimentality with toughness.
Martha tries time and time again to be a BA companion, the black-wearing doctor chick she is, but retains too much sentimentality for it to be plausible. I'm not going to believe someone's going to put a gun to my head or pull the switch on my evil scheme if you're shaking in your boots and giving puppydog eyes to the Doctor, who will inevitably clean up any mess you make. She got lucky a LOT, because apparently the villains in S03 weren't awesome enough to see through it.

3. PhD?
I've never seen her doctor anyone, despite being around dying people several times and despite all the talk of being a doctor. Donna was more doctor-y than she was in Planet of the Ood.

4. Family matters.
For someone whose family is so important to them, she was real quick to join UNIT and decide to explode the earth. Her family betrayed her to the Master, which doesn't exactly convince me of the trust factor. Rose's mom was there for a lot of her adventure, to the point where she was pulled to a parallel dimension with her and came back from it to help fight against the Daleks. Donna's grandfather respected and admired the Doctor and even her mother wasn't as gleeful to have her back and memoryless than she would have been when Donna first started traveling with the Doctor.

5. Companion duties.
Tar pointed out that she guesses and makes a lot of assumptions. It's not the Doctor's fault that he believes her because, as knowledgeable as he is, he's not human. That's why he needs a companion, to be able to add that special human intellect, proven by the DoctorDonna being so powerful. If you guess about things you have no idea about and state opinion as fact, the Doctor is too used to trusting his companions to question you. Again, she got lucky a lot, but a good guesser does not a good companion make.

6. Doctor love.
Let me clear some things up here. Rose did not fall all over herself the first time she saw the Doctor, nor did she shirk her duties as a companion when she did finally fall in love with him. He's the Doctor, he's brilliant, of course people will love him, but that can not get in the way of a companion's duties to help him. Donna didn't fall for him, but that was because of her personality. Rose fell for him because she knew him, in two completely different bodies no less. Martha was trying to impress him from the beginning.

7. The only companion to leave.
Rose was pulled into a parallel world, against her will. Donna's memory was wiped to save her life, also against her will. Martha, however, left the Doctor because he didn't love her back and said as much when she did leave. And, at the end of it all, she trotted off on her merry way to join Torchwood. No, Rose didn't complain much about being left with Thing 2, but that's got to be confusing. After all, she still had the Doctor with her. Kinda. And, again, she was in a parallel world. Not much she could do about that. Donna, of course, lost her memory, so she can't be blamed for leaving the Doctor by himself. Martha's the only one that left him, twice, and then went and became a soldier, which he hates.

There's my two cents. I probably missed some stuff and, if I did, I'll check back later and add it in.

Oh, and just one more point to add on that final one. Most of the companions traveled with the Doctor for two reasons: to see the universe, and because they saw that the Doctor was lonely. Both Rose and Donna even said as much. They cared about how much the Doctor suffered, and they would never leave the Doctor (if they had a choice), because they saw his pain. I don't know exactly if Martha ever even saw that, and if she did, she just ignored it and walked out on him anyway. And, being the softy (for the Doctor) that I am, that really didn't sit right with me.

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Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you!

Phoenix- You mean how I described my mystification about the dividing line between those who love Rose but can't stand Martha, and those who love Martha but can't stand Rose ? If so, I think you wrote down your reasoning quite well .


***Tiptoes quietly out of thread until the Martha-hate subsides a bit (and to figure out, with my limited Doctor Who experience, how to respond to Aliana Fae's well-thought out argument )***

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The end is where we start from.
– Captain Jack Harkness

^
thank you

Part of me wants to back away too. The Martha hate is quite overbearing at times. But I feel I owe it to Martha to stand by her. So I shall give it my best, and probably final shot at getting things off my chest.

1. Martha wasn't important? The final three episodes of the Master arc disputes that. Martha took the Doctor's instructions and faithfully did as he asked her to do, despite the obvious risks to her and everyone else. She took the challenge and she rose to it and without her the Doctor could not have managed to set himself free. Now, I'm not going to say that neither Rose or Donna could have done the same thing. But fact is it was neither of them, it was Martha and she deserves some credit for helping the Doctor save the world.

2. Martha only wore black because of necessity. You can't do what she did in the above reply and wear high heels and bright clothes. She HAD to wear black to go as undetected as possible. Same goes for when she was doing all the stuff to do with the Osterhagen key. The Daleks are roaming the streets, either killing or rounding people up. She was ordered to do it by her commander in UNIT, so again black is a stealthy colour so it makes sense for her to wear that rather than something that would make her stand out more.

3. Martha was not a Doctor. She was a trainee, a Med student. She makes this quite clear. My memory isn't the greatest and I've only ever watched each episode of this new revised series once each. But I don't recall her being in many positions to show her worth as a Doctor (I'm willing to concede this if evidence proves otherwise). That wasn't really shown till Torchwood imo. Even at that, she said UNIT pushed her through, so technically she would still be considered a student doctor and not an actual Doctor. Not all Doctor's have the best bedside manner and tend to close of there emotions to better deal with there job. Martha may well fall into that category.

4. She had already been a part of UNIT for not much more than a year, maybe less. I can't honestly remember any mention of how long she'd been there. So she didn't just up and leave her family to blow up the earth with the Osterhagen key. Before she did it, she ended up going to her mum's house as the device (forgot it's name) tapped into her mind and sent her there. If she didn't care for her family, this would not have happened. Her family didn't have much of a choice regarding betraying her to the Master. I doubt they were given much of a choice, it had nothing to do with trust on either side and everything to do with being forced to. Not all people will act the same under difficult and life threatening circumstances. I don't think it's particularly fair to paint Martha's family as horrible, selfish and uncaring people.

5. She may have had bad judgement, that's like most of this debate, a matter of perspctive. End of the day the Doctor is in charge, not the companions. They never have been and never should be. So the brunt of this should fall squarely on ole know-it-all Time Lord. The buck does and should always stop with him. If he feels what a companion says is right, then how can that be the companions fault, regardless of wether it's Rose, Martha, Donna, Ace, Tegan ect. I agree the human companions should be there to ground him and keep him real and I think for the most part they have done. No more so than Donna imo.

6. The Doctor never had companions falling over themselves originally. This is an exclusive #10 Doctor/RTD thing only. As I've said before I'm very anti Doctor/Companion romantic relationship. I have also said I may be looking at things through rose tinted nostalgic lenses, but it's not something I ever remember happening and the old curmudgoen in me does not like it one bit. A crush is one thing, because that is outwith the Doctor's control. But a full on relationship is something I'll always be against no matter who it is, that being said I'm happy for the Rose/Doctor shippers that you sort of got your romantic happy ending with them. I won't ever be though .
Martha did not ever shirk her duties, despite her crush on him. She may have had bouts of jealousy, but she is only human after all and in her eyes made the first move by kissing her. She had no idea what it meant at the time. How would you feel if this gorgeous, handsome man laid one on you out of the blue like that?

7. I've not blamed any companion for being left behind or leaving of there own accord. So I really have no response to this one other than she didn't just up and leave the Doctor to join Torchwood. She was there on loan from UNIT, whom as I've said was with them for a good 6-8 months maybe more. She's technically not joined the Torchwood team and if rumours are to be believed, she won't be now as Freema has signed up for a show on ITV.

Feel free to rip my post to shreds

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^
thank you

Part of me wants to back away too. The Martha hate is quite overbearing at times. But I feel I owe it to Martha to stand by her. So I shall give it my best, and probably final shot at getting things off my chest.

1. Martha wasn't important? The final three episodes of the Master arc disputes that. Martha took the Doctor's instructions and faithfully did as he asked her to do, despite the obvious risks to her and everyone else. She took the challenge and she rose to it and without her the Doctor could not have managed to set himself free. Now, I'm not going to say that neither Rose or Donna could have done the same thing. But fact is it was neither of them, it was Martha and she deserves some credit for helping the Doctor save the world.

2. Martha only wore black because of necessity. You can't do what she did in the above reply and wear high heels and bright clothes. She HAD to wear black to go as undetected as possible. Same goes for when she was doing all the stuff to do with the Osterhagen key. The Daleks are roaming the streets, either killing or rounding people up. She was ordered to do it by her commander in UNIT, so again black is a stealthy colour so it makes sense for her to wear that rather than something that would make her stand out more.

3. Martha was not a Doctor. She was a trainee, a Med student. She makes this quite clear. My memory isn't the greatest and I've only ever watched each episode of this new revised series once each. But I don't recall her being in many positions to show her worth as a Doctor (I'm willing to concede this if evidence proves otherwise). That wasn't really shown till Torchwood imo. Even at that, she said UNIT pushed her through, so technically she would still be considered a student doctor and not an actual Doctor. Not all Doctor's have the best bedside manner and tend to close of there emotions to better deal with there job. Martha may well fall into that category.

4. She had already been a part of UNIT for not much more than a year, maybe less. I can't honestly remember any mention of how long she'd been there. So she didn't just up and leave her family to blow up the earth with the Osterhagen key. Before she did it, she ended up going to her mum's house as the device (forgot it's name) tapped into her mind and sent her there. If she didn't care for her family, this would not have happened. Her family didn't have much of a choice regarding betraying her to the Master. I doubt they were given much of a choice, it had nothing to do with trust on either side and everything to do with being forced to. Not all people will act the same under difficult and life threatening circumstances. I don't think it's particularly fair to paint Martha's family as horrible, selfish and uncaring people.

5. She may have had bad judgement, that's like most of this debate, a matter of perspctive. End of the day the Doctor is in charge, not the companions. They never have been and never should be. So the brunt of this should fall squarely on ole know-it-all Time Lord. The buck does and should always stop with him. If he feels what a companion says is right, then how can that be the companions fault, regardless of wether it's Rose, Martha, Donna, Ace, Tegan ect. I agree the human companions should be there to ground him and keep him real and I think for the most part they have done. No more so than Donna imo.

6. The Doctor never had companions falling over themselves originally. This is an exclusive #10 Doctor/RTD thing only. As I've said before I'm very anti Doctor/Companion romantic relationship. I have also said I may be looking at things through rose tinted nostalgic lenses, but it's not something I ever remember happening and the old curmudgoen in me does not like it one bit. A crush is one thing, because that is outwith the Doctor's control. But a full on relationship is something I'll always be against no matter who it is, that being said I'm happy for the Rose/Doctor shippers that you sort of got your romantic happy ending with them. I won't ever be though .
Martha did not ever shirk her duties, despite her crush on him. She may have had bouts of jealousy, but she is only human after all and in her eyes made the first move by kissing her. She had no idea what it meant at the time. How would you feel if this gorgeous, handsome man laid one on you out of the blue like that?

7. I've not blamed any companion for being left behind or leaving of there own accord. So I really have no response to this one other than she didn't just up and leave the Doctor to join Torchwood. She was there on loan from UNIT, whom as I've said was with them for a good 6-8 months maybe more. She's technically not joined the Torchwood team and if rumours are to be believed, she won't be now as Freema has signed up for a show on ITV.

Feel free to rip my post to shreds

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You're welcome .

Good response ! Better than I could have written, even with a lot of thinking . I'll just add my own bits here and there.
Point 1- Exactly. As I said in a couple of posts above, it was very courageous of her to willingly "walk the world" to tell people about the Doctor, so they could help him defeat the Master, despite the fact that her life was in serious danger.

Point 2- Can't add too much more to this, but again, good point. I'd never thought of that !

Point 3- Right . Also, she didn't really do much "doctoring", from what I recall, in that Torchwood story arc. She made sure Owen was more or less normal after his encounter with Death, and dressed his hand to make sure it was adequately protected (since, if it was injured again, it wouldn't heal), as well as help the team collect info on that shady pharmaceutical corporation, but that's all.

Point 4- Yes, exactly. And I believe one of the reasons she gave the Doctor for not continuing to travel with him (besides the fact that she knew he didn't, and wouldn't, ever feel the same way about her as she did about him) was because she wanted to help take care of her family. Ditto on the point that her family didn't really have any choice but to give her, the Doctor, and Jack up to the Master. His control over them (and remember, her father's compliance was actually an act) was twofold- "his" charisma drew her mother and the rest of London in, and he strengthened that control with that hypnotic drumming song everyone who had a TV, computer, etc., heard.

Point 5- Again, I can't add much, but as with your other points, this is a good one .

Point 6- All true . In the second part of the "Family of Blood" two-part story, she pleaded with "John Smith" to go back to being the Doctor not so she could snatch him away from his lover (can't remember her name right now), but because the Earth needed him. She was even okay with him inviting her to go back with them. About that kiss- Yes, I'd have gotten the wrong impression, too. Anyone would !


Tar-Dis- I'll have to respectfully disagree . She did know that, and despite her feelings for him, was perfectly happy to be company. She even said so. In the second part of the "Family of Blood" two-parter, when "John Smith" asked her what good she was to the Doctor, and just what she did for him, her response was she keeps him company "Because he's lonely."

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The end is where we start from.
– Captain Jack Harkness

That's a good point, and I'm glad you brought that up. However, that doesn't really disprove my original point. She still walked away from him. And sure, it might be "what was best for her," but obviously companions have never cared about themselves, so I'm not going to let that be an excuse. She still saw how much pain he was in, and it surely it was greater than anything she was experiencing. I mean, really.

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Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you!

j&o: Makin me again lol I just said what I thought. How I saw things from an unbiased perspective. You're likely going to be the only one that agrees with me though

Tar: She walked away from him because she felt she had too. Her feelings for him were too much and after looking at her, her own family and the worlds possible death. She needed to take a step back. Not everyone will react in the same way as Rose or Donna. The Doctor understood why Martha felt she had to end there time together and he cared enough about her to let her go and sort her head out and be with her family. It's that old addage, if you love someone set them free. The Doctor did love Martha, as a friend. Do you think if you loved someone that much and all they ever wanted was platonic love you could carry on travelling? I don't know if I could. How long can you hold on to the vain hope that the love will eventually be returned? Everyone handles there emotions and feelings differently and Martha should not be chastised for reacting in a way that doesn't go along with your line of thinking.

ALL companions leave at some point. Wether by there own choice, or the Doctors (Or die like poor Adric). He knows as human beings they cannot be with him forever. It's a silly romantic notion that cannot be fulfilled ever. It's impossible. So he has to let them go and continue being the lonely traveller. The only companion that would be the exception to this would be Romana, and now Jenny. But with Romana there's great deabte as to wether she died on Gallifrey or wether she is in e-space. I'd personally love for her to be alive in e-space, but that doesn't fall into the new series' Lonely Doctor theme.

So much for me not saying anymore

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Tar-Dis- I see your point . Guess we'll just have to agree to disagree .

Phoenix- Oh, no need to be so modest . You've watched Doctor Who from the beginning (as in, before Christopher Eccleston briefly took the role) , so it's no surprise you know so much .
Maybe so, but maybe not .

Love your banner and avatar, by the way . I still haven't seen The Dark Knight yet .

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The end is where we start from.
– Captain Jack Harkness

I would love to see Romana come back. She was my favorite companion of any of them. I think Donna just beat her out, by a smidgen.

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Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you!

Aahh, but the question is. Romana I or Romana II?

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Romana I, personally, but either one could come back, and I would be just dandy.

Though, I admit, taking the Princess's body was hilarious.

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Be with me always - take any form - drive me mad! only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you!