Fourth Doctor and Companions...
The Fourth Doctor Portrayed by Tom Baker
Appearances: 41 (Robot - Logopolis)
Grade: A
The Fourth Doctor is wildly unpredictable and a queer sight to behold. He is taller than almost everyone he meets, and he has a hilarious if not slightly alarming toothy grin. As he dashes from place to place, his curly hair bobs about, and his ridiculously long scarf gets in the way of his own feet as well as his friends'.
At first this Doctor comes across as a brooding alien with a detached personality, but he soon turns into a more whimsical figure. Clever and optimistic, but never naïve, he holds to the belief all that is required to make a friend is a friendly smile and some jelly-babies. He loves new exciting things, and he loves barging into other peoples’ business to find it. Although he is sometimes thought of as a simpleton due to his eccentric personality and off-beat humor, there is always underlying seriousness and ingenuity in his methods.
The Fourth Doctor has little patience for the dim-witted or the frivolous, and at times he can be irascible or depressed. There are moments to suggest something is seriously burdening the Doctor to an extent he has never communicated before, but they are not openly discussed.
Notable Quotes: (often while grinning wildly) "Would you like a jelly baby?"
"I'm a Time Lord.... I'm not a human being; I walk in eternity."
Sarah Jane Smith
Appearances: 20 (The Time Warrior - The Hand of Fear)
Grade: A
Sarah is a freelance investigative journalist. In her first appearance, The Time Warrior, she infiltrates UNIT headquarters by posing as her aunt, a famous virologist, in the hopes of getting an interesting story. Suspicious of the Doctor, she stows away in the TARDIS, only to find herself drawn into a struggle with a Sontaron officer in the Middle Ages after the Doctor takes off without realizing she is there. After this initial adventure, the Doctor and Sarah become fast friends, and she begins to travel with him.
Sarah has a confident personality that is the perfect compliment to her sharp mind and clever tongue. She is naturally curious and quick to learn, and she is gifted with a strong moral compass. As a companion she refuses to be pushed aside or patronized although at times this mentality puts her in great danger. Sarah is dedicated to her friends, and it is only when the Doctor receives a telepathic distress message from the Time Lords to return to Gallifrey that she leaves.
Sarah Jane is without a doubt the most popular Doctor Who companion ever, appearing in 20 serials from 1973 to 2006. She also has her own spin-off show.
Notable Quote: "Don't forget me."
Grade: A
Sarah is a freelance investigative journalist. In her first appearance, The Time Warrior, she infiltrates UNIT headquarters by posing as her aunt, a famous virologist, in the hopes of getting an interesting story. Suspicious of the Doctor, she stows away in the TARDIS, only to find herself drawn into a struggle with a Sontaron officer in the Middle Ages after the Doctor takes off without realizing she is there. After this initial adventure, the Doctor and Sarah become fast friends, and she begins to travel with him.
Sarah has a confident personality that is the perfect compliment to her sharp mind and clever tongue. She is naturally curious and quick to learn, and she is gifted with a strong moral compass. As a companion she refuses to be pushed aside or patronized although at times this mentality puts her in great danger. Sarah is dedicated to her friends, and it is only when the Doctor receives a telepathic distress message from the Time Lords to return to Gallifrey that she leaves.
Sarah Jane is without a doubt the most popular Doctor Who companion ever, appearing in 20 serials from 1973 to 2006. She also has her own spin-off show.
Notable Quote: "Don't forget me."
Harry Sullivan
Appearances: 7 (Robot - The Android Invasion)
Grade: B-
Harry is a doctor in the Royal Navy who is attached as a medical officer to UNIT. He meets the Doctor when he is assigned to watch over him after his regeneration at the end of Planet of the Spiders. After he has fully recovered, the Doctor invites Harry into the TARDIS, and Harry joins the Doctor and Sarah in their ensuing adventures.
Harry is a fine officer whose medical expertise counts him in good stead during the course of his travels. He is brave and loyal, although he does tend to be slightly accident prone to the point that the Doctor once tells him that he is 'an imbecile'. After a short number of adventures with Sarah and the Doctor, Harry decides to stick to safer and more reliable modes of transportation than the TARDIS and parts from their company.
Notable Quote: "Steady on old girl, steady on."
Grade: B-
Harry is a doctor in the Royal Navy who is attached as a medical officer to UNIT. He meets the Doctor when he is assigned to watch over him after his regeneration at the end of Planet of the Spiders. After he has fully recovered, the Doctor invites Harry into the TARDIS, and Harry joins the Doctor and Sarah in their ensuing adventures.
Harry is a fine officer whose medical expertise counts him in good stead during the course of his travels. He is brave and loyal, although he does tend to be slightly accident prone to the point that the Doctor once tells him that he is 'an imbecile'. After a short number of adventures with Sarah and the Doctor, Harry decides to stick to safer and more reliable modes of transportation than the TARDIS and parts from their company.
Notable Quote: "Steady on old girl, steady on."
Leela
Appearances: 9 (The Face of Evil - The Invasion of Time)
Grade: A
Leela is a member of a tribal clan called the Sevateem on an unspecified planet. Her ancestors were crew members from an Earth spaceship that crash-landed and over a period of generations were forced to become more primitive as they ran out of equipment.
Leela is a warrior, and she is always armed with a knife and set of poisonous Janis thorns. Her solution to most problems is simple: kill it before it kills you.Though the Doctor repeatedly tries to curb her behavior, Leela is strong-willed and ignores his attempts to pacify her. Leela is also a huntress with an uncanny ability to perceive danger as well as a sixth sense that allows her to read people in ways the Doctor does not possess.
Despite her superstitious and primitive upbringing, Leela is open-minded, and she is able to grasp advanced concepts by translating them into familiar terms. She views the Doctor as her mentor, and she is constantly asking him questions. Influenced and educated by the Doctor, she begins to rely less on "magic" and more on science and logic.
Leela is confident that she is more than capable of protecting herself even in strange new worlds. With her warrior instincts she looks after herself and the Doctor in a way few people have been able to do, making her a unique and popular companion.
Notable Quote: "Empty threats, Ruton! Enjoy your death as I enjoyed killing you."
K-9
Appearances: 18 (The Invisible Enemy - Warrior's Gate)
Grade: B-
K-9 is a mechanical dog given to the Doctor as a gift by Professor Marius at the end of The Invisible Enemy.
For the second half of the Fourth Doctor's tenure, K-9 almost acts as the action man (or dog) for the show. While the Doctor rarely uses violence to accomplish his goals, K-9 is fully armed with a laser weapon that can be used to decimate enemies, cut through doors, and create force-fields. Although K-9 is a machine with all of their inherent advantages and limitations, he also has quite a bit of personality and occasionally reveals frustration or even a sense of humor. Examples of this include his one-sided definition of optimism and his delight upon finding a computer friend he can relate to in The Armageddon Factor.
On the down side, K-9 does not do well in rugged terrain, and when his power runs out his value is purely the sum of his electrical parts. As a character, some argue that he acts too much as a deus ex machina, and he is an "ace in the hole" card that can bail the Doctor out if the writers have written him into too messy of a situation.
The Doctor leave K-9 Mark I with Leela on Gallifrey and K-9 Mark II with Romana in E-Space.
Notable Quotes: "Affirmative!"
"Optimism: the belief that everything will work out well. Irrational, bordering on insane."
Grade: B-
K-9 is a mechanical dog given to the Doctor as a gift by Professor Marius at the end of The Invisible Enemy.
For the second half of the Fourth Doctor's tenure, K-9 almost acts as the action man (or dog) for the show. While the Doctor rarely uses violence to accomplish his goals, K-9 is fully armed with a laser weapon that can be used to decimate enemies, cut through doors, and create force-fields. Although K-9 is a machine with all of their inherent advantages and limitations, he also has quite a bit of personality and occasionally reveals frustration or even a sense of humor. Examples of this include his one-sided definition of optimism and his delight upon finding a computer friend he can relate to in The Armageddon Factor.
On the down side, K-9 does not do well in rugged terrain, and when his power runs out his value is purely the sum of his electrical parts. As a character, some argue that he acts too much as a deus ex machina, and he is an "ace in the hole" card that can bail the Doctor out if the writers have written him into too messy of a situation.
The Doctor leave K-9 Mark I with Leela on Gallifrey and K-9 Mark II with Romana in E-Space.
Notable Quotes: "Affirmative!"
"Optimism: the belief that everything will work out well. Irrational, bordering on insane."
Romana I
Appearances: 6 (The Ribos Operation - The Armageddon Factor)
Grade: C+
Romana is a Time Lady who accompanies the Doctor as his assistant in his search for the Key to Time.
Romana is the first companion the Doctor has had who truly rivals him in intelligence. With a graduation score from the academy of a triple first (the Doctor managed a 51% on his second attempt) she views the Doctor as her intellectual inferior and constantly tries to get the better of him. She makes fun of his refusal to do things by the book and insults his TARDIS by labeling it an antique. However after their first few adventures, she begins to respect his experience and defer to his judgement, with an understanding that though his methods may not be conventional, they do seem (somehow) highly effective.
Romana is believed by many to be the most attractive companion the Doctor has ever had and is quite the fashion queen.
Notable Quote: "You have absolutely no sense of responsibility whatsoever! You're capricious, arrogant, self-opinionated, irrational, and you don't even know where we're going!"
Grade: C+
Romana is a Time Lady who accompanies the Doctor as his assistant in his search for the Key to Time.
Romana is the first companion the Doctor has had who truly rivals him in intelligence. With a graduation score from the academy of a triple first (the Doctor managed a 51% on his second attempt) she views the Doctor as her intellectual inferior and constantly tries to get the better of him. She makes fun of his refusal to do things by the book and insults his TARDIS by labeling it an antique. However after their first few adventures, she begins to respect his experience and defer to his judgement, with an understanding that though his methods may not be conventional, they do seem (somehow) highly effective.
Romana is believed by many to be the most attractive companion the Doctor has ever had and is quite the fashion queen.
Notable Quote: "You have absolutely no sense of responsibility whatsoever! You're capricious, arrogant, self-opinionated, irrational, and you don't even know where we're going!"
Romana II
Appearances: 10 (Destiny of the Daleks - Warrior's Gate)
Grade: C
The show does not give an in-story explanation for why Romana regenerates, and the whole affair can at best be described as strange; she casually changes bodily form several times rather like someone shopping for a new hat before settling on the likeness of Princess Astra from The Armageddon Factor.
Although this version of Romana is still not above bantering with the Doctor, their relationship is considerably more intimate. She is much more laid back than her predecessor from whom she has lost both her prissiness and bossiness. Following the Doctor has perhaps humbled and educated her; in fact in more than one way she now resembles him. In Destiny of the Daleks she has a feminine version of his outfit, she builds her own sonic screwdriver, and though she does not have the Doctor's off-beat sense of humor, she is more willing to play along. On the other hand, her character is somewhat disjointed as many of her stories were written for the previous Romana, and she has quite a lot of technobabble lines.
In perhaps an attempt to assert her independence away from the influence of the Time Lords, Romana decides to stay with the Tharils in E-Space instead of returning to Gallifrey at the end of Warrior's Gate.
Grade: C
The show does not give an in-story explanation for why Romana regenerates, and the whole affair can at best be described as strange; she casually changes bodily form several times rather like someone shopping for a new hat before settling on the likeness of Princess Astra from The Armageddon Factor.
Although this version of Romana is still not above bantering with the Doctor, their relationship is considerably more intimate. She is much more laid back than her predecessor from whom she has lost both her prissiness and bossiness. Following the Doctor has perhaps humbled and educated her; in fact in more than one way she now resembles him. In Destiny of the Daleks she has a feminine version of his outfit, she builds her own sonic screwdriver, and though she does not have the Doctor's off-beat sense of humor, she is more willing to play along. On the other hand, her character is somewhat disjointed as many of her stories were written for the previous Romana, and she has quite a lot of technobabble lines.
In perhaps an attempt to assert her independence away from the influence of the Time Lords, Romana decides to stay with the Tharils in E-Space instead of returning to Gallifrey at the end of Warrior's Gate.