Some people think she's a terrible companion, some think she's great. I was reading an article about the best and worst companions of New Who. Clara was at the bottom and a few people were saying she should be at the top! I've never seen so many mixed opinions on a companion before (apart from River Song)

I love Clara by the way. So why are there so much mixed opinions on her?

Because different people have different tastes.

I don't mind her, but I wouldn't be fussed if she wasn't around. Can't say the same for other companions, I don't think there's been enough character development for her to be thought of the same way as Rose or Amy for example

This really annoys me. People say they can't stand her and she's the worst companion ever and 'lack of character development' when she's only been in it for half a series. She hasn't given anyone a reason to dislike her yet. People just like to moan.

Indeed. Too much time has been spent making her a sassy, feisty, wonderful, impossible girl who only takes a break from firing-off quickfire quips on the occasions when she's a bit sad about her dead mum.

Clara reminds me of Melanie Bush in that she simply appeared fully-formed with a set of novelty characteristics and we're just supposed to accept how great she is.

It all depends what you want/like. Companions like Clara, Rory and Martha are stereotypically good girls/guys (except maybe Clara in Asylum). That's why some people (who evaluate companions by personality and characteristics) will see them as likeable and lovely people with whom they can identify with. While others (who evaluate companions by excitement and dynamism) will see Clara, Rory and Martha as boring and 'nothing special'. They will appreciate more hypersexualized, wacky and immature companions like Amy and Jack.

I am, of course, in the first group and my favorite companions are Martha, Rory and Clara. Companions like Amy and Jack are just irritating to me.


As for Clara, I think she will be much more popular after more develoment in season 8.


This too.

Doesn't annoy me, but I really agree with your half a series point. Let's see where the Capadi/Coleman combo takes us. (came over all alliterative there!)

Personally think she's been fine. After meeting two of the 'other' Clara's in AOTD and The Snowmen, we saw the 'real' Clara very much through the eyes of the Doctor for the rest of Series 7b...leading up to what I thought was a very good 'resolution' in TNOTD.

I think people dislike Clara due to her status as a plot device - the Impossible Girl. But now that that mystery has been resolved, the Doctor will actually start to simply enjoy her company. I agree that her character development in Capaldi's first season should make fans appreciate her for who she is. The regeneration will be interesting for two reasons. The Doctor will actually believe it's the final death (he's already used all 12 regenerations, as both Hurt and the Metacrisis count) and Clara, if she doesn't get her memory wiped like Donna, will know about regeneration already. However, she might not know about the Metacrisis Tenth Doctor, and so WILL be expecting a regeneration.

There hasn't been much character development for me to care for her. I like her but I haven't clicked with her yet. I'm sure S8 will go more smoothly now there isn't a mystery around her.

Indeed, there are mixed opinions about Rose, Martha, Donna, Donna, Amy, Jack, River….I could go on. Hardly unique to Clara.

I like Clara though (like a lot of other people) I do prefer Oswin and Victorian Clara to 21st Century Clara.


I'm curious to know how they will develop Clara going forward. Will she retain memories of all her other lives? Will she retain abilities her other lives learnt (one scene from one of the trailers certainly suggests this).


Of course if they make her into a Super Companion (Need a 92nd Century Spaceship flown, Defuse an Anti Matter bomb? No problem) I can see more people disliking her.

8 episodes is more than sufficient to develop a character in some way. Half a series is no excuse.

Having said that. I think part of it, is that in NuWho we're used to seeing the Doctor through the companion's eyes whereas due to her mystery she's been a puzzle we've had to solve through the Doctor's eyes. Really limited the potential to get to know her as a three dimensional character.

True.




Also true.



Her face looks about eight years old

That's a good point, I think. Clara has been a departure from the traditional companion story that we've had since Rose. Even Amy - who entered the series as a conundrum for the Doctor - maintained the position of being the PoV for the audience.

Clara has been kept intentionally distant and we've viewed her mostly through the Doctor's eyes. She's been a puzzle for us to solve, rather than a relatable character thrust into an extraordinary world. She's been a plot point rather than a character where we are allowed to see her depth. They couldn't reveal too much about her without removing the mystery surrounding her.

This will likely change as the series goes forward. Not only is that story now complete and we know who and what Clara is, but we also previously saw the writing team adjust some of Amy's characteristics between series 5 and 6, softening some of the character traits that some fans found abrasive.

It should be interesting to see where they go with her.

I personally love Clara. For me the 11th doctor has been at its best since Clara arrived as she has brought out a different side to the doctor.
I thought I couldn’t connect and enjoy the 11th doctor because of the change in the actor from Tennant to Smith, but since the Ponds have departed I realised that Amy in particular, and River, were the ones that put me off. I found Amy so irritating and was glad to see the back of her. Matt’s doctor has since become my favourite doctor from the new series.

Series 8 will be very interesting for Clara now that the mystery has been resolved.

Clara is my favourite companion from the new Who.

I don't know why there are so many mixed opinions as she's really quite bland. Not the sort of character you'd expect to be polarising.

I think one if the reasons I have become disengaged with DW in recent times is that Clara is a plot device, just as so much of Amy's story was tied up with telling an ongoing story. I couldn't really follow where those stories were going, and both characters baffled me as a result of it.

It put me in mind of Brookside in the mid-90s, when every new character had a melodramatic and OTT back-story, so the viewer didn't get the chance to assess them as characters in their own right. Those characters only existed as a medium through which to play out longwinded and ultimately unsatisfactory storylines, which required those characters to behave illogically and unnaturally. Characters were not allowed to step into the limelight on their own terms. Everything was played out through the prism of their Big Issue, and it all got a bit unreal and fake.

The whole reason that C21st DW has been a success is that it can draw in people who would not normally watch sci-fi through presenting "normal" characters in a sci-fi situation. In the same way, soap opera is not reality, but is a "version" of reality and needs to stay grounded by having characters that seem "everyday". 90s Brookie and the last couple of years of DW have moved away from that "normality" and "everydayness", and I feel that Clara and Amy both feel like "diagrams" rather than "people".

Amy and Clara have been required to behave in a very odd manner and have an air of mystery around them. As a result of that I feel that I have been kept at "arms length" from them. They can't engage with the story because that would destroy the mystery and the "story arc". It was managed far better with Rose and the Bad Wolf stuff: it's not something that dominated her entire run of stories. Amy and Clara are subservient to their storylines, and that makes them feel aloof.

Plus, they are only allowed to speak in zinging one-line witticisms, and ren't allowed to have a normal conversation like a normal person would. Again, this makes them seem unreal.

Rose was an ordianry woman who did ordianry things and spoke like a real person. Amy and Clara (to me) feel like they are made-up.

I'm struggling to find anything that makes her a rounded character. So far she seems more plot device than character in her own right.
I think that might be the issue in that no-one can quite get a bead on who she is.

Ohh that's a tad harsh. "Reminds me of Melanie Bush" is not a phrase I'd want to hear very often...

I actually like Clara up to a point, and find Jenna's performances to be strong, but I know exactly what you mean.

To me Clara seems to be more a 'Doctor Who Companion' than she is a fully rounded person. There seems to be little substance to her - for all the attempts to paint some kind of background (the kids she looks after, the sad story of her Mum etc) Clara still doesn't strike me as a real person in the way that Sarah, or Liz, or Ian, or Jamie did. Donna had a background, and a family, and they were believable and a means of identifying with her. Same with Victoria, and with Tegan or Jo or Martha and many others.

Somehow, and I'm not sure how, Moffat's companions come across as a little false, there's something not quite believable about them, Amy and Rory, much as I was fond of them, didn't seem to inhabit any world that I recognised (unlike the world that say, Jo or Ben 'n' Polly came from).
To me Clara seems like a culmination of this tendency, slightly divorced from 'our' reality, only existing as a fictional archetype. For all her faults, Rose was a more successful Companion character, because her Mum and her dopey boyfriend and her flat were things that most of us could readily identify with. And she was written in a way that we could empathise with. Somehow I don't get this from Clara. Which is a shame, as I do so want to like Clara more than I currently do.

edit - while I was writing this quite a few people have posted very similar points. Interesting that we all feel like this. Moffat please take note - we want real characters, not plot devices!!

You could say the same about Amy really many loved her but many hated her I thought she was the worse companion in the history of the show (Yes even worse than Adric and Mel combined)

I like Carla though maybe my favourite of NuWho

She had so much potential but IMO it has been wasted.

It's an interesting point! Mel was absolutely the ultimate DW companion. She's intelligent, capable, scientific, brave, adventurous, pretty, enthusiastic ... all to such an extrent that she seems like a parody of a Doctor Who companion. Clara also seems to be a "paint by numbers" construction.

I think this is rather the question: Why do certain characters work and others don't. Is it how the character was written? Is it how the character is played? Or is it a combination?

I liked Oswin. I remember thinking: "Oh good, I really look forward to getting to know Oswin/Clara". But when she was really there, she didn't quite...I don't know, just like I don't know why I don't care about Martha. I just simply never warmed to Martha, while I really wanted to like her. I have the same with Clara. I really want to like her, cause she seems like the kind of person I would like. Thing is, when I'm honest, I just don't care about her.

Same with Nyssa; I really wanted to like her, but she was wasted by the writers. I'm afraid that is what's happening with Clara.

She's better than Amy, who was the pits. Amy and Rory should have had their own programme, because they were incongruous in Who.