No, I'm not slagging off Billie's looks, I was just musing over the way Martha showed how much smarter than Rose she was today. She seems more of an equal to the Doctor rather than a drippy schoolgirl mooning over him. I loved Rose before anyone thinks otherwise, but I'm giving Martha a chance which many Rose-lovers aren't.
I think in tonight's episode, Rose would surely have been selected to become a pig-hybrid, meaning she wouldn't have been taken up to the lab to see the Final Experiment. Martha, being smart, made the grade as it were...

I think the opposite! I never really noticed Rose 'mooning over the doctor' however with Martha they are making it really obvious.

As for intelligence, well Rose never claimed to be a brainbox but she more than made up for it with courage, tenacity and quick thinking.

By mooning, I didn't mean the way Martha fancies him and is unrequited, I meant the way Rose was so obvously in love with him all the time. Watch the opening of "New Earth" and you can see how sickly it is!

Martha's a medical Dr, Rose is a shop assitant who lived in a flat. Though that hasn't really meant Martha has done anything different to Rose it just means that Martha ;seems' to say more itelligent stuff than Rose. The fact that she sounds the same as Rose and fancies the Dr doesn't mean they are the same character at all and it's just lazy writing.

still preferred rose. leave the intelligence to the doctor

I reckon the problem is trying to write for a character who may be described as intelligent but is to all intents and purposes a substitute for the young viewers at home so they can't really be too clever. Didn't they have this "problem" with Liz Shaw back in the Pertwee era?

Good point, Chicken. Martha can't be too smart, or else we'll have no Dr. Watson character. That said, Watson was never as thick in the books as during the basil Rathbone films, the Granada productions got the balance right. Watson was clever, but not even in Holmes' league or that of the criminal mastermind. It'd be nice to see that balance in Who. I liked it when the Doctor asked for her opinion tonight. I've also loved the way she'd challenged all the things Rose simply took for granted. Shame there was no mention of why Martha had just allowed herself to be whisked off to 1930's New York though when surely he was supposed to be taking her home?

I liked the Doctor asking for her opinion too and the first thing that crossed my mind was "Dana Scully"......would love it if they could write her in a similar way and in some scenes they seem to be trying to do that.

Top idea Chicken. Just hope Freema doesn't hate it as much as Gillian Anderson (see news story)!

Just seen that story on DS Funny though that she managed to curtail her hatred of all things TV to make BLEAK HOUSE!

I miss Rose its just not the same

Lol! And all the talk of an X Files movie sequel too! Does she not think they'll reconsider when they read what a terrible time she had, getting paid to dress up and play act and become famous and desired. What a harsh life!

I'll drag up and slap on the lippy for half of what she wants if she hates the idea of doing another X-Files so much!

I'd pay to see that and I've no idea what you look like!

By the way, you know the new movie is the one where Scully gets it on with the resurrected Lone Gunmen, AD Skinner, a grey alien, Eugene Tooms and the Cigarette Smoking Man don't you?

I demand a body double!.......Jade Goody will do! If she's not available(ha!) then Bella Emberg is my second choice!

She ran after the half pig thing(I can't remember his name) by herself and ended up getting captured. Not the cleverest thing. I think her crush on the Doctor is far more emphasised than it was with Rose.

Surely the intelligence scan didn't just register Martha as a doctor, I mean why would the daleks give a damn about that. I think Rose and Martha would have made it because that's why the Doctor picked them in the first place - that they asked questions most people wouldn't and looked at things in a different way!

there's all sorts of intelligence. You can be emotionally intelligent without being academically bright, artistic, creatively gifted and yet not be able to add up your cheque book ... Rose was always the emotional intelligence.

Martha - well I think we have still to see how she evolves

my favourite companion is the robot dog K9.at least you didnt get any sexual innuendos around it!

Precisely. Martha probably is more intelligent, and depending on where the Daleks placed the bar for superior intelligence, Rose may or may not have been selected, but she was no thicko. She was bored with her life before the Doctor came along, so it points to the fact that she would have been better off going to college than going straight to work etc.

More to the point, she taught the Doctor a lot from an emotional perspective and regularly challenged him. Her higher emotional intelligence is unlikely to be something the Daleks desired. I think one of the main reasons Rose appeared to ask less questions than Martha is because when Rose first came onto the scene it was a brand new series of Doctor Who and too many questions would spoil the flow. Now we have new assistant Martha and they want to keep a lot of the same qualities that made Rose so popular, but also need to make her different, so making her highly intelligent and in particular, well read, makes that possible.

I think i like martha more cause i can almost relate to her more. than rose.

There was Nyssa and dare I say it Adric and Turlough. All three were highly intelligent. Even if they could be annoying.

If you think about it Sarah Jane Smith must have been intelligent to be a journalist (Don’t Journalist’s need a degree).

Going further back The Doctor’s granddaughter Susan was able to operate the Tardis so she must have been fairly close to the Doctor in intelligence and the other two Ian and Barbara where schoolteachers so they both had degrees.

This all suggests that you do not need Doctor Who companions to be unintelligent.

People should give Martha a chance! I think she's really good and I am preffering this series to the last. Although S1 was the best!

You forgot Zoe who said the Doctor was 'almost as clever' as she was (or words to that effect).

I agree that Martha definitely has a touch of Liz Shaw about her, not just the intellegence but also the not being fazed by alien things and the touches of sarcasm.

I think Martha is designed to appeal more to the 'old school' fans whereas Rose was designed to draw in the new viewers, a job now redundant.

G

I totally agree with you.Although I loved Rose but she was a bit of a 'Mary-Sue.' I even started this series with the intent of hating Martha but I can empathise with her far more than I ever could with Rose.She may be flawed, but she's intelligent,fiesty and more mature.

GIVE HER A CHANCE!