mom@sftri.UUCP (M.Modig) (12/19/84)
It's time to get a few things straightened out...
(1) If someone says "Nyssia" one more time in this newsgroup, that
noise you'll hear will be me screaming at the top of my lungs.
I don't usually mind spelling and typing errors, but this one
is driving me nuts.
(2) I don't think Nyssa was all that great of a companion, but that
was not really Sarah Sutton's fault. How much body can you put
into your character when her basic actions can be categorised as
follows:
-"I'll stay here in the TARDIS and wait for the Dcotor."
-"Doctor! What is it/What happened/Glad you're back!"
-"SSSSCCCCRRRREEEEAAAAAMMMM!"
The screenwriters really did not seem to know what to do with Nyssa;
Sarah Sutton has intimated as much in an interview of her that
I saw a while back. Nyssa's character was in some ways a poor
copy of Zoe, a companion from the Troughton era.
(3) People keep referring to companions being dropped. Much of the
time, it is really the other way round: one of the actors playing
companions decides they've had enough and leaves when their
contract is up.
(4) Someone made a point that Sarah Jane stayed on as a companion
for a long time and today they're dropping like flies. Well,
for your comparison, here is a list of most of the companions and
the number of stories they appeared in as companions:
Jamie 20
TEGAN JOVANKA 19
SARAH JANE SMITH 18
K9 Mark II 17
Romana 17 (Regenerated in 7th)
Barbara 16
Ian Chesterton 16
Jo Grant 15
NYSSA 13
ADRIC 11
(Romana II) 11
Susan 10
Vicki 10
Steven 10
TURLOUGH 10
Ben Jackson 9
Polly 9
Leela 9
Zoe 8
Victoria 7
Dodo 6
(Romana I) 6
Harry Sullivan 5
K9 Mark I 5
Liz Shaw 4
Katarina 2
Perpugilliam Brown 2 and counting
This is through Davison. So, yes, Sarah Jane has one of the
longest runs of all of the companions, but Tegan's is/will be
longer, and Adric, Nyssa, and Turlough all have been on for a
fairly respectable amount of time, and some of the older
companions have not been on very long.
(5) I have only seen Colin Baker as the Doctor in "The Twin
Dilemma". I thot he was most amusing as Commander Maxil
in "Arc of Infinity". Since the question of how good Colin
Baker will be as the Doctor appears to be of some interest, I will
take the liberty of re-posting my earlier article on "The Twin
Dilemma." He was an excellent choice in my opinion, and he shows
a wide range of emotions in "The Twin Dilemma". One problem
I have with him is that he may be so much of a dominating stage
presence that he overshadows everyone else, though Nicola
Bryant held her own in this particular story. The other worry
is the writing. I'm not sure if the writing team changed or not
after Davison left, but the story is not all that great. For
details, see my article.
(6) New Jersey Network is finishing up Davison right now (Alas! I will
miss the Daleks in January, but it is for a good cause). They
are then going to show K9 and Company and start over with 12 or
13 John Pertwee episodes, followed by Tom Baker, then Peter
Davison again (should take around 18 months). The last I
heard, there have been no plans set yet to bring Colin Baker
episodes here; they usually like to package the episodes for
syndication according to Doctor-- this suggests that it may be
a while before we get any Colin Baker episodes. I really would
like to see the Pertwee ones, anyway.
(7) Has any station showed any Hartnell or Troughton episodes?
(lucky dogs). I really would be interested in seeing some of them
(though there are only a very few Troughton stories intact,
worse luck). I am tempted to try to organise a letter-writing
campaign after the turn of the year to try to convince anyone
who will listen to show some of
these old episodes. Who cares if they're black and white? It
will all look the same to me, since I only have a black and white
set at the moment, and besides, they show old black and white movies
and even TV shows now (I Love Lucy, The Honeymooners).
Finis: exciting trivia question. What holidays are celebrated on
Gallifrey? Have any ever been mentioned?
Happy holidays, /-----attunix-----\
Mark Modig ihnp4! -----btlunix------!mom
\_____ sftri _____/