Susan Foreman

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"Susan Campbell" redirects here. For the Chairman of UK Sport, see Sue Campbell.
Doctor Who character

Susan Foreman
Susan Foreman
Affiliated with First Doctor
Race Gallifreyan
Home planet Gallifrey
Home era Rassilon Era
First appearance An Unearthly Child
Last appearance The Dalek Invasion of Earth (regular)
The Five Doctors (guest)
Portrayed by Carole Ann Ford
Roberta Tovey (film Susan)
Jane Asher (audio play)

Susan Foreman is a fictional character in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. She is played by actress Carole Ann Ford.

Contents

[edit] Background

Susan was the first ever on screen companion of the Doctor and she stayed on Earth after the Dalek Invasion in the 22nd century. Susan is the granddaughter and a companion of the Time Lord known as the Doctor. Her last name of Foreman is an alias taken from the junkyard, owned by an "I. M. Foreman" at 76 Totter's Lane, where she and the Doctor lived (in the TARDIS) during their time in London in 1963. The original outline for the series did not intend the pair to be related, but writer Anthony Coburn created the family tie as he was disturbed by the possible sexual connotations of an old man travelling alone with a teenage girl.

The Doctor explains in "An Unearthly Child" (the very first episode of Doctor Who and a title often used for the first four-part serial) that he and Susan are exiles from their own people. Susan adds, "I was born in another time, another world" (presumably Gallifrey). Susan claims to have coined the name for the TARDIS, the Doctor's time machine,[1] though later episodes seemed to indicate that it was a widely used term among Time Lords. (The non-broadcast pilot version of "An Unearthly Child" contained different dialogue, including a statement that Susan was born in the 49th century.) It is not known if Susan is the character's real name or an alias to make her appear more human. The series' treatment of Time Lords' names is slightly inconsistent, with some Time Lords using "titles" such as The Doctor, The Master, The Inquisitor and so on, and some Time Lords using more "normal" names such as Borusa, Flavia, Spandrel or Damon.

Susan's age is given as 15. In The Sensorites (1964), the Doctor, when encountering an unconscious young human woman, remarks that "she's only a few years older than Susan," suggesting that Susan is the age of a normal secondary school student.[2]

[edit] Character history

The Doctor and Susan had already been traveling for an unspecified amount of time, before they decide to settle in London to make repairs on the TARDIS; Susan states that she and her grandfather have been in London for five months. Susan also alludes to several previous adventures to Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright in the course of their shared adventures; both on various alien planets and on Earth in various past Time Periods (such as encountering a wrathful King Henry the Eighth). Susan begins to attend the Coal Hill School in Shoreditch, where her advanced knowledge of history and science attract the attention of schoolteachers Barbara and Ian. Attempting to solve the mystery of the "unearthly child," Ian and Barbara follow Susan back to the junkyard, where they hear her voice coming from what appears to be a police box. When they investigate further, they discover that the police box exterior hides the much larger interior of the TARDIS; and are whisked away on an adventure in time and space with the Doctor and Susan, against their will.

Susan continues to travel with the Doctor and her two teachers until the 1964 serial, The Dalek Invasion of Earth. During the events of that story, Susan falls in love with David Campbell, a young freedom fighter in the 22nd century. However, Susan feels that she has to stay with and take care of her grandfather. The Doctor, realizing that Susan is now a grown woman and deserves a future away from him, locks her out of the TARDIS and leaves after a tearful farewell.[3] Carole Ann Ford had expressed a desire to leave the series as she felt the character of Susan was too limiting. Ford reprised the role of Susan on television in the 20th anniversary special The Five Doctors (1983), but no mention of David, or what became of him, was made.[4]

In The Curse of Fenric (1989), the Seventh Doctor states that he does not know if he has any family, which may indicate uncertainty of Susan's whereabouts.[5] In 2005's "The End of the World" the Ninth Doctor states that his home world has been destroyed and that he is the last of the Time Lords.[6] Although Susan is not mentioned by name, the Doctor says in "Father's Day" that his "whole family" died,[7] and in "The Empty Child" some dialogue implies that he is no longer a father or grandfather.[8] In "The Age of Steel", Mrs Moore asks the Doctor if he has any family, to which he replies "Who needs family? I've got the whole world on my shoulders."[9] In "Fear Her," the Tenth Doctor states he "was a dad once," but does not elaborate further. In "The Sound of Drums", the Tenth Doctor discusses with the Master the fact that they each chose their own names.[10] In Susan's case, it is unknown where hers comes from. In "The Doctor's Daughter" the Doctor says that he had "been a father before" and is still hurt by their deaths.

[edit] Relationship to the Doctor

Susan is generally assumed to be Gallifreyan like the Doctor as well as his biological granddaughter. Her description of her home planet in The Sensorites (1964) matches the Tenth Doctor's much later descriptions of Gallifrey,[2] and she is fully familiar with the history and landscape of Gallifrey's Time Lord society when she and the First Doctor are transported to "the Death Zone" in The Five Doctors.[4] Although it has never been explicitly established whether she can regenerate, she does display telepathic ability on one occasion (The Sensorites).[2]

In the commentary to the BBC's DVD release of An Unearthly Child, actress Carole Ann Ford points out that these suggestions that Susan was not the Doctor's biological granddaughter were only first put forward in the 1990s. She reveals that little background information on Susan's character or past history was provided to her by the production team, and so to inform her performance, she would often discuss and invent ideas about Susan with co-star William Hartnell.

[edit] Appearances in other media

Terrance Dicks's novelisation of his serial The Five Doctors states that Susan has been taken from a point twenty years after The Dalek Invasion of Earth, and that she and David have three children. A marketplace scene was considered for the broadcast version of this story, but never filmed.

In 1983, Doctor Who's then-script editor Eric Saward wrote a short story dealing with the Doctor's departure from Gallifrey for the Radio Times Doctor Who 20th Anniversary Special. This story, "Birth of a Renegade", depicts Susan as a descendant of Time Lord founder Rassilon and the last surviving member of Gallifrey's royal family, unrelated to the Doctor. Later Doctor Who spin-offs have generally ignored this account, though the story depicts Susan collapsing the Master's TARDIS around him with his own tissue compression eliminator, leaving him in a state very similar to the one in which he is found in his next televised appearance, Planet of Fire (albeit with a throw-away line giving a different explanation of it).

A later script editor, Andrew Cartmel, had another explanation of Susan's origins. This account, part of the "Cartmel Masterplan", was not used in the programme, but was used as background for several of the Virgin New Adventures novels, most notably Lungbarrow by Marc Platt. In this version, Susan is the granddaughter of the mysterious Gallifreyan founder known as the Other, who may have been reincarnated as the Doctor. The Doctor had travelled back to the dawn of Time Lord civilisation and rescued Susan, who recognised him as her grandfather. The Doctor did not initially recognise her, but knew that this was somehow true. This version of Susan's origins is reflected in many other Doctor Who spin-offs.

On 9 July 1994, BBC Radio 4 broadcast Whatever Happened to Susan Foreman?, a humorous investigation into Susan's background. In this radio drama, Susan is portrayed by Jane Asher.

Ford herself reprised the role of Susan in the 1993 charity special Dimensions in Time. Ford also played an alternate version of Susan in the Big Finish Productions Doctor Who Unbound audio plays Auld Mortality and A Storm of Angels, in which Susan has become President of Gallifrey. In the Doctor Who Unbound play Exile, an alternative Doctor, whose latest regeneration was female (played by Arabella Weir), settles on Earth in 2003 using the identity and 1963 school records of Susan Foreman.

In a 1964 novelisation of the serial The Daleks, written by Doctor Who script editor David Whitaker, Susan's last name is changed from "Foreman" to "English".

A version of Susan, portrayed by Roberta Tovey and much younger than her television portrayal, appears in the two Doctor Who film adaptations: Dr. Who and the Daleks and Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 AD. The film Doctor (named "Dr Who") is a human inventor, so one may infer this Susan is also human. Rather than being her teacher, Barbara is her older sister. Ian Chesterton is portrayed as Barbara's somewhat comically inept boyfriend, and also not a teacher. No last name is given for this version of the character; some movie listings[citation needed] imply that her name is "Susan Who".

Big Finish Productions will release an audio drama in late 2009 titled An Earthly Child, that will see Susan (played by Ford) reunite with her grandfather, in the form of Paul McGann's Eighth Doctor; also appearing will be Jake McGann as Susan's son, Alex.[citation needed]

Susan appears twice during the course of IDW Comics' "Doctor Who: The Forgotten" series, first in a flashback to the First Doctor's lifetime, then at the end, as the TARDIS' matrix takes her form at The Doctor's request.

[edit] BBC Books

The Past Doctor Adventures novel The Time Travellers by Simon Guerrier gives an explanation for why the Doctor left Susan. During the events of that novel, the Doctor becomes involved in the British Army's time travel experiments, which risk him being noticed by the Time Lords. He then resolves to begin looking for a place where Susan can be safe and content so that if he is ever apprehended by their people, she will still be free.

Susan reappears in the Eighth Doctor Adventures novel Legacy of the Daleks by John Peel, which takes place after the events of The Dalek Invasion of Earth. At the end of that novel, Susan comes into possession of the Master's TARDIS after he tries to capture her, and is once again able to roam time and space.

In the Eighth Doctor Adventure Sometime Never... by Justin Richards, the Eighth Doctor's adopted daughter Miranda reappears with her own daughter Zezanne. At the novel's end, Zezanne and another character, Soul (who has duplicated the Doctor's identity), escape in a time machine which lands in 1963 London, taking the form of a police box. Zezanne, her memory hazy, accepts the "Doctor" as her grandfather. Whether this is the Doctor and Susan's origin story or that Soul and Zezanne have landed in an alternate universe is uncertain, even within the continuity of the novels.

[edit] Telos novellas

According to the Telos novella Frayed by Tara Samms (a pen name for Stephen Cole), which takes place prior to the serial An Unearthly Child, Jill, a young girl in a besieged human medical facility on the planet Iwa, meets and named the Doctor's granddaughter Susan, after Jill's mother.

The Telos novella Time and Relative by Kim Newman takes place just prior to An Unearthly Child. It involves Susan and several of her classmates from Coal Hill School trying to survive an alien invasion of Earth by a race of ice beings called the Cold and at the same time convince the Doctor to stop the attack.

[edit] List of appearances

[edit] Television

Serial Date of original broadcast

Season 1 (1963-64)
An Unearthly Child 23 November – 14 December 1963[11]
The Daleks 21 December 1963 – 1 February 1964[12]
The Edge of Destruction 8 – 15 February 1964[13]
Marco Polo 22 February – 4 April 1964[14]
The Keys of Marinus 11 April – 16 May 1964[15]
The Aztecs 23 May – 13 June 1964[16]
The Sensorites 20 June – 1 August 1964[17]
The Reign of Terror 8 August – 12 September 1964[18]

Season 2 (1964-65)
Planet of Giants 31 October – 14 November 1964[19]
The Dalek Invasion of Earth 21 November – 26 December 1964[20]

Season 20 (1983)
The Five Doctors 23 November 1983[21]

30th Anniversary Special
Dimensions in Time 26 - 27 November 1993[22]

[edit] Films

[edit] Radio Play

[edit] Audio dramas

Doctor Who Companion Chronicles
Doctor Who Unbound

[edit] Novels

Virgin New Adventures
Virgin Missing Adventures
Past Doctor Adventures
Eighth Doctor Adventures
Telos Doctor Who novellas

[edit] Short stories

[edit] Comics

[edit] References

  1. ^ An Unearthly Child. Writers Anthony Coburn, C. E. Webber, Directors Waris Hussein, Douglas Camfield, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC, London. 23 November 1963–14 December 1963.
  2. ^ a b c The Sensorites. Writer Peter R. Newman, Directors Mervyn Pinfield, Frank Cox, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 20 June 1964–1 August 1964.
  3. ^ The Dalek Invasion of Earth. Writer Terry Nation, Director Richard Martin, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 21 November 1964–26 December 1964.
  4. ^ a b The Five Doctors. Writer Terrance Dicks, Directors Peter Moffatt, John Nathan-Turner (uncredited), Producer John Nathan-Turner. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 23 November 1983.
  5. ^ The Curse of Fenric. Writer Ian Briggs, Directors Nicholas Mallett, John Nathan-Turner (uncredited), Producer John Nathan-Turner. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 25 October 1989–15 November 1989.
  6. ^ "The End of the World". Writer Russell T. Davies, Director Euros Lyn, Producer Phil Collinson. Doctor Who (Cardiff: BBC, BBC One). 2005-04-02. 
  7. ^ "Father's Day". Writer Paul Cornell, Director Joe Ahearne, Producer Phil Collinson. Doctor Who (Cardiff: BBC, BBC One). 2005-05-14. 
  8. ^ "The Empty Child". Writer Steven Moffat, Director James Hawes, Producer Phil Collinson. Doctor Who (Cardiff: BBC, BBC One). 2005-05-21. 
  9. ^ "The Age of Steel". Writer Tom MacRae, Director Graeme Harper, Producer Phil Collinson. Doctor Who (Cardiff: BBC, BBC One). 2006-05-20. 
  10. ^ "The Sound of Drums". Writer Russell T. Davies, Director Colin Teague, Producer Phil Collinson. Doctor Who (Cardiff: BBC, BBC One). 2007-06-23. 
  11. ^ An Unearthly Child. Writers Anthony Coburn, C. E. Webber, Directors Waris Hussein, Douglas Camfield, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC, London. 23 November 1963–14 December 1963.
  12. ^ The Daleks. Writer Terry Nation, Directors Christopher Barry, Richard Martin, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC, London. 21 December 1963–1 February 1963.
  13. ^ The Edge of Destruction. Writer David Whitaker, Directors Richard Martin, Frank Cox, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC, London. 8 February 1964–15 February 1964.
  14. ^ Marco Polo. Writer John Lucarotti, Directors Waris Hussein, John Crockett, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC, London. 22 February 1964–4 April 1964.
  15. ^ The Keys of Marinus. Writer Terry Nation, Director John Gorrie, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 11 April 1964–16 May 1964.
  16. ^ The Aztecs. Writer John Lucarotti, Director John Crockett, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 23 May 1964–13 June 1964.
  17. ^ The Sensorites. Writer Peter R. Newman, Directors Mervyn Pinfield, Frank Cox, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 20 June 1964–1 August 1964.
  18. ^ The Reign of Terror. Writer Dennis Spooner, Directors Henric Hirsch, John Gorrie (episode 3, uncredited), Producer Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 8 August 1964–12 September 1964.
  19. ^ Planet of Giants. Writer Louis Marks, Directors Mervyn Pinfield, Douglas Camfield, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 31 October 1964–14 November 1964.
  20. ^ The Dalek Invasion of Earth. Writer Terry Nation, Director Richard Martin, Producers Verity Lambert, Mervyn Pinfield. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 21 November 1964–26 December 1964.
  21. ^ The Five Doctors. Writer Terrance Dicks, Directors Peter Moffatt, John Nathan-Turner (uncredited), Producer John Nathan-Turner. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 23 November 1983.
  22. ^ Dimensions in Time. Writers John Nathan-Turner, David Roden, Director Stuart McDonald, Producer John Nathan-Turner. Doctor Who. BBC. BBC1, London. 26 November 1993–27 November 1993.

[edit] External links

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Companions of the First Doctor
Season Season 1 Season 2 Season 3 Season 4 →
Serial 001 002 003 004 005 006 007 008 009 010 011 012 013 014 015 016 017 018 020 021 022 023 024 025 026 027 028 029
Companions Susan Vicki Sara Dodo
Barbara Steven Polly →
Ian Katarina Ben →
v • d • e
Companions of the Eighth Doctor (Novels)
Series NA Eighth Doctor Adventures
Novels 61 1 - 9 10 11 - 18 19 - 24 25 - 26 27 - 36 41 42 - 59 60 61 62 - 65 66 67 68 - 72 73
Companions Bernice Sam Susan Sam → Miranda Anji Miranda Anji
Fitz Fitz
Compassion Trix Trix
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