Why is it always the mothers?

Having recently had to attend to a few domestic emergencies involving my own mother (I've reached the disconcerting point in life where you find yourself looking after your parents rather than vice versa) I've been thinking about the role of mothers in the Who family.

The Doctor's own mother of course remains a mystery.  There have of late been the odd enigmatic moments, most notably in The End of Time Part II where viewers are led to wonder about the identity of a female Gallifreyan, but nothing definite.

The classic series did not focus on companions' family backgrounds to any notable extent.  Sarah Jane had an Aunt Lavinia, Jo Grant had an (unseen) uncle who pulled strings to get her into UNIT, but mothers tended not to feature at all. Presumably the idea was that the companions needed to be free from family ties so that they could set off on adventures in time and space without having to worry about the folk back home.

When the series returned in 2005 it was a different matter.  The family background of the companions became part of the story and the first three companions all very definitely had mothers.  And they were not impressed by the Doctor.

Who can forget Jackie 'if you're a Doctor, stitch this!' Tyler making plain her views about the Ninth Doctor's role in Rose's life?  Admittedly she had mellowed a bit by the time of his regeneration, being ready with pyjamas and offers of tea and sandwiches.  Not to mention curiosity about his physiology 'what else has he got two of? Ultimately her reward was a reunion with her husband Pete (or at least the version from an alternate universe.)

Martha's mum, Francine, was also initially suspicious of the Tenth Doctor's relationship with her daughter, and expressed her feelings at the end of The Lazarus Experiment with a clip round the ear, leading the Doctor to ponder that 'it's always the mothers.' It was not until the family were rounded up and imprisoned by the Master that Francine realised she had got wrong.

The Doctor's relationship with the mother of his next companion was not much better, although she avoided physical violence. Sylvia Noble's first meeting with the Doctor occurred when he appeared with Donna at the reception after her mysterious disappearance from the wedding in The Runaway Bride. She was not particularly pleased to see him again in The Poison Sky. But at least she wielded her sledgehammer on the window of the car in which Wilf was trapped, rather than the Doctor. Unlike Francine and Jackie, her opinion of the Doctor didn't change that much over time.  'I think you'd better go' she says coldly after he brought an unconscious Donna home in Journey's End.

Is it any wonder that the Eleventh Doctor chose companions who did not have mothers? Although in a typically Steven Moffat timey-wimey turn of events, one of them did turn out to be his own mother-in-law.

The Twelfth Doctor's companion Bill also has no mother, only a rather disengaged foster mum.

Of the Thirteenth Doctor's companions, Ryan also has no mother, only a grandmother and an estranged father, but in Yaz's family we see a bit of a return to previous form with a mother who really, really wants to know who the Doctor is and how she knows her daughter.

It remains to be seen whether this theme will continue in the New Year Special.


.

March 2007: Enter Martha Jones

31 March 2007

Well, after a week of David Tennant on Graham Norton, John Barrowman on Charlotte Church and everyone on a Weakest Link special, it was finally time for the start of series 3.  Or, as it may become known, ‘The One with the Space Rhinos’.  A bit of a conflation of the previous two season starts – starting from the point of view of a new companion whose everyday existence is changed as a result of an encounter with the Doctor – and set in a hospital in an alien environment. Oh, and the Doctor once again gets to kiss his assistant, no, sorry, make that ‘genetic imprint’. Actually, I thought it was the best season start so far.  The villainess, an apparently sweet old lady who brings her own straw for sucking her victims’ blood is really rather chilling, and the prosthetic Judoon head is very convincing.

And yes, Martha, it IS bigger on the inside.