Doctor Who: 5 Mistakes The Revived Series Is Making (And How To Fix Them)

2. Too Many Character Deaths

When Rose was first investigating the Doctor, her research led her to Clive, a man who had spent years tracking the Doctor's movements. Clive warned her that the Doctor was a dangerous man, stating that his constant companion in all of his travels was Death. The modern series has certainly done its best to fulfill this warning. During the classic series, companion deaths were rare events. In fact, only two companions actually shuffled off their mortal coils, Katarina in The Daleks' Master Plan and Adric in Earthshock (Peri's apparent death in The Trial of a Time Lord was one of the Valeyard's many deceptions). In the modern series, however, it seems as though companions are dying every other series (Astrid and Danny are two examples of this phenomenon) and sometimes they manage to come back to life, too (case in point, poor Redshirt Rory!). Even some brave, quasi-companion characters who were around for only one or two episodes have met untimely demises (the Stewardess in Midnight, Rita in The God Complex, Osgood in Death In Heaven...). In terms of companions and quasi-companions, the body count in NuWho is rising much more rapidly than it did in the classic series. As such, fans have come to expect that their favourite characters will meet unpleasant and unfortunate ends, so much so that it's actually starting to lose its impact. Why not hold off on the deaths for a little bit? That way when they do start killing characters again, it will come out of nowhere and go back to providing a shock factor.