MARTHA JONES

'Martha Jones' is a fictional character played by Freema Agyeman in the long-running British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', and reportedly will appear in its spin-off series, ''Torchwood''. She is a companion of the Tenth Doctor in the regular series, replacing Rose Tyler in the primary companion role. She made her debut in Series 3's "Smith and Jones", broadcast in the UK on 31 March 2007.

Contents

Conception

Character history

Ethnicity and racism

Appearances

Television

Other appearances

References

External links

Conception

The introduction of Martha as the next companion after Billie Piper's Rose Tyler was announced by the BBC in a 5 July 2006 press release.^[1][2] The character is a 23-year-old medical student.^[3][4] Like Rose, Martha has family members who are seen in the programme: Adjoa Andoh plays her mother Francine, with Trevor Laird as her father Clive (divorced from Francine), Gugu Mbatha-Raw as her sister Tish and Reggie Yates as her brother, Leo.^[5] Her cousin, Adeola Oshodi, is deceased, as Martha revealed to the Doctor in "Smith and Jones". Nevertheless, Agyeman notes that Martha is "very independent"; living alone and having almost completed her medical qualifications.^[6] She does not have an ex-boyfriend, but writer Russell T. Davies has stated that she is not a lesbian, as had been rumoured in some quarters.⁴ An article in ''The Times'' speculated that, since Agyeman has martial arts skills, she may have "a more physical approach" to the role.^[7]
Freema Agyeman told the school publication ''The Newspaper'' that Martha is older and more secure than Rose^[8] (whose paternal issues contributed to the subtext of her relationship with the Doctor, particularly in his ninth incarnation). Martha, by contrast, travels with the Doctor for the adventure, rather than because of a need for guidance or education (Agyeman also told ''The Newspaper'' that Martha hopes to eventually go back to Earth and finish her medical education).⁸ In addition, Martha's family appears to be of a higher social class than Rose; whereas Rose's family was fairly typically working class, Martha's family appears to be wealthier (her father owns a what appears to be a late model Mercedes-Benz convertible, and the clothes worn by her family are substantially more in line with fashion), probably middle to upper middle class.
Agyeman previously played Adeola Oshodi, a minor character who was killed in the Series 2 episode "Army of Ghosts". The resemblance of the two characters was acknowledged in "Smith and Jones" when Martha makes reference to her deceased cousin. The "Quick Reads" novel ''Made of Steel'', written by Terrance Dicks, which was released on 1 March 2007, also referenced their family connection.^8[9]
Martha and her family share the last name "Jones" with many other Russell T. Davies-penned characters. Foremost among them are Harriet Jones in ''Doctor Who'', Ianto Jones and Eugene Jones in ''Torchwood'', Yanto Jones in ''Mine All Mine'' and Stuart Allen Jones in ''Queer as Folk''. Recurring names are a common theme in Davies' work, with the names "Harper", "Harkness", "Smith", "Tyler" and "Jones" appearing frequently.
Following Martha's departure at the end of the Series 3 finale, "Last of the Time Lords", it was announced that she would be appearing in three episodes of Series 2 of ''Torchwood'' before rejoining David Tennant's Tenth Doctor alongside Donna Noble (Catherine Tate) in the middle of the fourth series of ''Doctor Who''.^[10] Executive producer Julie Gardner has stated that Martha will appear in five episodes of Series 4 of ''Doctor Who''.^[11]

Character history

A 23-year-old^[12] medical student from 2008,^[13] Martha meets the Doctor in the episode "Smith and Jones", when he poses as a patient to investigate strange anomalies in the Royal Hope Hospital. She subsequently saves his life whereupon he then saves her, everyone else in the hospital and half of Earth from imminent destruction. In need of a new friend, though not willing to admit it to himself, he invites Martha to join him for "just one trip" in order to thank her (this trip results in William Shakespeare addressing a sonnet to Martha as his "Dark Lady").
The Doctor initially displays a rather conflicted attitude to her presence, having clearly been impressed by her intelligence, intuition, resourcefulness and compassion in their first meeting and in their subsequent adventures, yet remaining unable to fully move forward from the loss of Rose. After extending her trip at least twice, the Doctor comes to appreciate her value and, when Martha finally calls him on his treatment of her, admits that she is more than "just a passenger". In "42", he gives her mobile phone the "Superphone" upgrade and also presents her with her own TARDIS key. The Doctor relies on Martha in numerous life-threatening situations and frequently thanks her for taking care of him, such as when she saves him and the crew of a future spacecraft during "42", and when he becomes the human John Smith in "Human Nature"/"The Family of Blood". She even takes a job in a shop to support him when they become trapped in 1969 during the events of "Blink".
During her travels with the Doctor, Martha's family also become embroiled in her new life, unknowingly as pawns in the game being played by Mr Saxon, Great Britain's Minister of Defence and a popular Prime Ministerial candidate for the 2008 elections. Tish Jones is employed by Professor Richard Lazarus, whose experiments on human cellular manipulation are funded by Saxon. In the same episode, one of Saxon's aides successfully turns Francine Jones against the Doctor, telling her who he "really is", and that he is dangerous and not to be trusted with Martha's safety. In "42", when Martha uses her phone's new trans-temporal capabilities to call her mother, Francine knowingly has her calls tapped by a "sinister woman" working for Saxon.
In "Utopia", the TARDIS travels to the end of existence, where Martha inadvertently causes the renegade Time Lord known as The Master to reclaim his identity after hiding from the Time War as a human being. When he regenerates soon afterward, Martha does not see him, but recognises his new voice as he taunts the Doctor and steals the TARDIS. Upon returning to 2008 London, Martha and the Doctor quickly realise that the Master is Saxon, who has been establishing his identity and setting traps for the Doctor and Martha for the past eighteen months during their visits to the period prior to their enabling of these events. Newly elected Prime Minister, the Master takes control of the Earth with the help of the Toclafane, captures the Doctor and Martha's family, and prepares to initiate war across the universe. Martha escapes and travels the Earth for a year on her own, speaking to the surviving humans as part of a plan that restores the incapacitated Doctor and rewinds time to reverse the Master's takeover. At the culmination of the 2007 season finale, Martha voluntarily departs the TARDIS to stay with her reunited but somewhat traumatised family, complete her medical education and come to terms with her unrequited feelings for the Doctor. She leaves her "superphone" with the Doctor, telling him that when she calls, "you'd better come running". An entry to Martha's blog, posted shortly after the season finale aired, mentions a job offer contingent on her passing her exams, but does not reveal who made the offer.^[14]
Martha has repeatedly expressed romantic interest in the Doctor, who either doesn't notice or does not share the affection. After the Doctor kisses her for the purpose of genetic transfer as a distraction during "Smith and Jones", she flirts with him in the TARDIS at the end of the episode, and makes subtle sexual advances towards the Doctor when they share a bed together in "The Shakespeare Code" using the phrase 'tongues will wag', only to be rebuffed when the Doctor (apparently oblivious to the flirtation) begins talking about Rose. By her third episode, Martha knows she is a "rebound" companion and finds the Doctor's repeated references to Rose frustrating and somewhat demeaning. In "Evolution of the Daleks", she states that the Doctor often seems to be remembering Rose instead of seeing her during their interactions. In "Human Nature", Martha expresses disappointment that the Doctor as John Smith falls for another woman. She admits her love for the Time Lord to his human persona in "The Family of Blood", although she later retracts it to avoid embarrassment when Smith becomes the Doctor again. She admits it again in "Last of the Time Lords", most particularly at the end of the episode when she decides of her own volition to leave the Doctor to avoid getting stuck in such a one-way relationship. Upon her return, according to Freema Agyeman in Dr Who Magazine 385, "She'll actually be in a relationship by that point, so that part of her soul is fulfilled," Freema hints, "so I think she'll look at her relationship with the Doctor with fresh eyes — older and much, much wiser. The last time they will have seen one another is after she's just saved the world, so she went out on a high. And then they meet up again... so I imagine that they'll be sizing each other up a bit!"
Between the events of "Last of the Time Lords" and her appearing in ''Torchwood'' and later returning to ''Doctor Who'' to join the Doctor and Donna, Martha fully qualifies as a doctor.^[15] She joins Torchwood for a while after she is called upon for help by her fellow former-companion, Jack Harkness, and 'continues to develop her knowledge of alien intelligence'.^[15]

Ethnicity and racism

Martha has been described in newspaper reports as the "first ethnic-minority companion in the 43-year television history of ''Doctor Who''" or the Doctor's "first black assistant"^[17] (Agyeman herself was born to Ghanaian and Iranian parents). Martha is not the first, however, as Mickey Smith, played by Noel Clarke, had been a recurring character in the first two seasons of the revived series and eventually travelled with the Doctor for three episodes. Clarke has commented in interviews about being the programme's first black companion character. Prior to this, although not considered a true companion of the Doctor, Chinese-American Chang Lee, played by Yee Jee Tso, appeared in the 1996 television movie. Since the character was tricked into helping the Master for most of the episode, and only 'travelled' in the TARDIS once, at the very end, this one-episode character is not generally considered a companion.
In addition to televised companions, many other types of ''Doctor Who'' media have included characters with different ethnicity: Sharon, who accompanied the Fourth Doctor in the late 1970s comic-strip adventures; Roz Forrester, an Adjudicator from the future who featured in the New Adventures novels; Anji Kapoor, the Eighth Doctor's companion for a number of print adventures; Alison Cheney, played by Sophie Okonedo in the webcast ''Scream of the Shalka''; and the comic-strip companion Destrii, an aquatic alien who later took the form of a black woman. As with all spin-off media, the canonicity of these characters is unclear.
In the episode "The Shakespeare Code", Martha wonders if she is safe in an era before emancipation, but the Doctor is blasé – when she prompts: "[I'm] not exactly white, if you hadn't noticed", he is nonplussed, ethnicity being irrelevant to him. Martha soon reacts with surprise and possible offence to Shakespeare's use of Elizabethan terms for black people such as "blackamoor" and "ethiop". For a moment, she thinks these terms could be racist (the Doctor quips that it is "political correctness gone mad"), but realises Shakespeare is actually enamoured of her. At the end of the episode, he refers to her as his "Dark Lady" – to whom the real Shakespeare dedicated a number of his sonnets. Other episodes such as "Human Nature"/"The Family of Blood", set in 1913, depict the racism that Martha encounters in different eras – here, public school boys exhibit casual bigotry, which she is forced to rise above, and even decent people are seen to be products of their time.
When the TARDIS crew are nationally branded as terrorists in "The Sound of Drums", the Master says that the Doctor's current companions "tick every demographic box" – referring to Martha's ethnicity and Jack's sexual orientation. He later refers to Jack and Martha as "the girlie and the freak", adding to the insult by claiming he is not sure which is which.

Appearances

Television

'Doctor Who: Series 3'

★ "Smith and Jones"

★ "The Shakespeare Code"

★ "Gridlock"

★ "Daleks in Manhattan"/"Evolution of the Daleks"

★ "The Lazarus Experiment"

★ "42"

★ "Human Nature"/"The Family of Blood"

★ "Blink"

★ "Utopia"/"The Sound of Drums"/"Last of the Time Lords"

★ ''The Infinite Quest'' (2007 animated serial)
'Torchwood: Series 2'¹⁰

★ 3 episodes
'Doctor Who: Series 4'¹¹

★ 5 episodes

Other appearances

;New Series Adventures

★ ''Sting of the Zygons'' by Stephen Cole

★ ''The Last Dodo'' by Jacqueline Rayner

★ ''Wooden Heart'' by Martin Day
These books have also been released on audiobook, narrated by a ''Doctor Who'' cast member. Three further books, presumably the second wave of Series 3 releases, have also been announced. These will be out on September 6th.

★ ''Wetworld'' by Mark Michalowski

★ ''Forever Autumn'' by Mark Morris

★ ''Sick Building'' by Paul Magrs
Another set of three novels has been announced as being intended for publication on December 26 2007:

★ ''Peacemaker'' by James Swallow

★ ''The Pirate Loop'' by Simon Guerrier

★ ''Wishing Well'' by Trevor Baxendale
Martha has appeared in the ''Doctor Who Magazine'' comics from #381 and the ''Doctor Who Adventures'' comics from #28.
Battles in Time

★ ''Exhausting Evil'' (Issue 17)

★ ''Wrath of the Warrior'' (Issue 18)

References

1. Freema Agyeman confirmed as new companion to Doctor Who
2. Doctor's next assistant is named
3. Who's new .
4. BRAVE NEW WORLDS, , Benjamin, Cook, Doctor Who Magazine,
5. Meet the Joneses
6. Lone Jones
7. Sidekick whose time has come
8. Who's that girl? Huw Turbervill
9. It's more than I ever dreamed, , , , Doctor Who Magazine,
10. More Martha!
11. Exclusive interview: 'Doctor Who' & 'Torchwood' series producer Julie Gardner teases next seasons of each show
12. According to Martha Jones' MySpace profile written by the BBC.
13. Martha notes that she met the Doctor four days before the 2008 election in "The Sound of Drums". Please see Chronology of the Doctor Who universe for more information.
14. My name is Martha Jones. You don’t know who I am.
15. A new face for Torchwood and a new look for Martha
16. A new face for Torchwood and a new look for Martha
17. Doctor Who gets first black assistant

External links

★ Martha Jones on the BBC's ''Doctor Who'' website

★ Martha Jones on FreemaAgyeman.com

★ Martha Jones' Myspace page