Paying the Bill with a Pearl

Trying to be clever with blog post titles can be tricky so I apologise now for this one... But I couldn't let this moment pass without posting it. On Thursday, it was announced that the new companion would be revealed during half-time in Saturday's FA Cup semi-final match. Well there's an odd thing to do! The tabloid and gossip press were already ahead of the game as it turns out, which is why I hate them. If something is supposed to be a surprise when it's announced then keep it to yourself until then. But I digress. There seemed to be no connection between football and Doctor Who so why had they chosen this moment to make the announcement? It would be approximately 6pm and possibly the biggest audience of the evening but apart from that it risked being missed by those who don't care about football (I'm sorry, but that includes me) and being overshadowed by the football. It would be an odd juxtaposition when the pundits wanted to talk about the match and it could easily have been missed by viewers taking a toilet break or putting the kettle on! The only connection I could come up with, other than a former footballer taking the role, was that Doctor Who traditionally followed the Final Score so they were kind of broadcast neighbours.

Anyway, I decided that the only way the new companion could be announced mid-match was if it were done as a trailer type film - Chat about the match, "we'll be back in a moment", play the film, "so there we go, more on the football". And I was spot on! In what has been described as a trailer as well as a special stand alone scene, Pearl Mackie has been introduced as the new companion, named Bill. She was seen running down corridors and asking the Doctor about Daleks, all very staple. Almost disappointing in content, but I like her already and in a way it was a reassurance of continued tradition at a time when Doctor Who fans feel very vulnerable - we've just lost our companion (one of the best), the lead writer/show runner has announced his departure (though not until the end of the next series), we won't have a new episode until Christmas and its about a year before the next series begins.

So who is Bill? Of course, at this stage we don't really know but there is a possible tease from the Doctor. Towards the end he says "We have to get back to the future. 2017 needs us!"... Now, there are three interpretations of this. Firstly, and probably most likely if I'm honest, it could just be a nod to the fact that the new series won't be with us until 2017 so in narrative terms they've came back to April 2016 to tease us and now they are returning to 2017 where they belong. Alternatively, the scene takes place somewhere in the past (it's a pretty nondescript set of corridors that may or may not be on Earth (probably aren't if it is in the past) and so 2017 is the relative future. Thirdly, my creative interpretation is that Bill is from our past (we can't really say the Doctor's past since traversing time is standard practice for him) and so 2017 is the future to her, even if that's where they've come from before encountering the Daleks. I came up with this idea because there is something very 80s/90s about her costume and there is the added fact that she doesn't know what Daleks are. It has been established within the series that everyone on Earth knows the Daleks after the battle with the Cybermen at Torchwood One. Donna Noble was the only person who seemed to miss it, conveniently bringing back some mystery to them when it was needed, so for Bill to not know either it would make sense for her to have been picked up before it happened. This would make her the first companion picked up in the past (from a contemporary viewers perspective) since Victoria in 1967 (she was a Victorian girl).

Finally for now, a quick update for the blog... This year is the twentieth anniversary of Paul McGann's TV Movie, 12^th May to be precise. To mark the occasion I will be watching the episode, completely out of scheduled review sequence and writing a retrospective editorial in an attempt to get myself back into watching and reviewing regularly (I am over a year behind after all!) So watch out for that. In essence, I'll be asking "Was it really as bad as I remember?" and I may spin off into a pair of additional posts about what it got wrong and what it got right to settle once and for all in my mind where it belongs in the annuls of my fanship.

Update: It came to light in the hours that followed Bill's introduction, that the t-shirt that contributed to her 80s/90s vibe featured artwork from Prince's Purple Rain album. Sorry, I've never been a fan so I didn't recognise it, but it was quite a coincidence given that the man had died just two days earlier (with the filming having taken place some time before that)