10 Most Useless Doctor Who Characters
The Doctor doesn't always travel with the best, as this lot sufficiently proved.
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00:00 It's been said that the Doctor only travels with the best.
00:03 However, as River Song was so fond of reminding everyone, the Doctor lies.
00:07 So with that in mind then, I'm Ellie with WhoCulture, here with the 10 most useless
00:12 Doctor Who characters.
00:14 10.
00:15 Susan Forman
00:16 Now this might be a controversial choice, but in retrospect, the Doctor's granddaughter
00:20 is a bit useless.
00:21 When Doctor Who was first conceived by Sidney Newman in the early 60s, he envisioned a 740-year-old
00:27 senile alien time traveller who whisked two school teachers and a teenage girl across
00:32 all of time and space.
00:33 In essence, this is what happens in the very first episode, but with one key difference.
00:37 Susan.
00:38 In the finished version of Doctor Who's pilot episode, Susan isn't a contemporary
00:42 teenage girl.
00:43 She's the Doctor's granddaughter and therefore also an alien time traveller with superior
00:48 knowledge.
00:49 The problem is that many of the people who wrote for Susan mostly forget this key detail
00:53 and wrote her as an ineffectual teenage girl.
00:56 Therefore, rather than continuing to dazzle and intrigue her school teachers Ian and Barbara
01:00 with her advanced knowledge of science, history and technology, Susan instead rolls her ankle
01:05 at regular intervals.
01:06 She also frequently loses her head in the face of various intergalactic terrors, as
01:10 if she hasn't been travelling to alien worlds with her grandfather for ages prior to the
01:14 show starting.
01:15 It's hardly surprising that Carol Ann Ford left the role at the start of Doctor Who's
01:19 second season.
01:20 She was replaced by Vicky, an orphan from the future who was generally written as a
01:24 far more savvy character, one who essentially became the Doctor's surrogate granddaughter.
01:29 9.
01:30 Mickey Smith
01:31 Mickey Smith, or Mickey the Idiot, is a character so useless that he lost a fight with a wheelie
01:36 bin.
01:37 Originally written by Russell T Davies as mundane, ordinary and cowardly, Mickey represented
01:41 everything that Rose Tyler wanted to leave behind.
01:44 In Doctor Who's 2005 pilot episode, Rose, Mickey is so useless that he can be convincingly
01:49 replaced by a plastic replica who can barely string a coherent sentence together.
01:54 In what Clark brought to the character as a performer, Russell T Davies gave Mickey
01:58 more depth as Doctor Who continued into its second series.
02:01 However, he's still pretty pointless.
02:03 He risks detection by screaming at a cupboard full of rats in school reunion, and while
02:06 the Ninth Doctor is impressed by Mickey in World War 3, he's only really been following
02:11 the Doctor's orders the whole time rather than thinking for himself.
02:14 It's only when he's presented with a parallel universe doppelganger that Mickey decides
02:18 to stand up for himself, becoming an action hero and resistance fighter against John Leumick's
02:23 Cybermen.
02:24 It's this more heroic version of Mickey that appears in the series 2 and series 4
02:28 finales, where he fights again against the Daleks and the Cybermen.
02:32 However, it doesn't change the fact that for the first few years of his time on Doctor
02:35 Who, he was pretty darn useless.
02:38 8.
02:39 Victoria Waterfield
02:40 After Fraser Hines' historical companion Jamie McCrimmon became a big success, the
02:45 Doctor Who production team attempted to repeat the feat by introducing another historical
02:49 companion, Victoria Waterfield.
02:52 The only problem was that she didn't have any notable skills beyond screaming and just
02:56 having a terrible time of it.
02:58 The original plan was to make Pauline Collins' Samantha a full-time companion, but she turned
03:02 down the role.
03:03 Investigating her brother's disappearance in The Faceless One, Samantha proved herself
03:07 to be a much more independent and forthright companion than Victoria.
03:11 When she's introduced in Evil of the Daleks, Victoria is literally a damsel in distress.
03:15 This comes to define the character throughout her time with the Second Doctor and Jamie.
03:19 While Deborah Watling is an incredibly likeable actor, she's rarely given any substantial
03:24 material to sink her teeth into, and whenever she does take some initiative, she ends up
03:28 in deadly danger and needs to be rescued by the Doctor or Jamie.
03:32 Victoria's screaming became such a key part of her character that it played a crucial
03:36 role in her final story.
03:38 Attempting to defeat an outbreak of deadly sentient seaweed, the Doctor realises that
03:41 sound is the perfect weapon, and so he weaponises the screams of his companion.
03:46 It's an ending that's either a celebration of or an insult to Victoria, depending on
03:51 your outlook.
03:52 7.
03:53 Katerina
03:54 When futuristic space orphan Vicky left Doctor Who, the production team decided to go in
03:59 the opposite direction for her replacement.
04:01 Enter Katerina, a handmaid from ancient Greece who joined the TARDIS to tend to Stephen's
04:06 wounds.
04:07 However, either the limitations of a historical companion or the writer's imaginations led
04:11 to her being swiftly, brutally written out of the show.
04:15 In some ways, Katerina was one of the most realistic Doctor Who companions.
04:19 Her complete inability to wrap her head around the fantastical worlds she travelled to with
04:23 the Doctor and Stephen is reflective of how contemporary audiences may lose their own
04:27 minds when confronted by the far future.
04:30 The problem is that it doesn't make for particularly good drama.
04:33 The far future is one thing, but wouldn't Katerina respond in a similar fashion if the
04:37 TARDIS landed in the present day?
04:39 This propensity to be dazzled by the future made her a fairly useless travelling companion.
04:44 She may have healed Stephen's wounds from the previous story, but the rest of her scenes
04:47 find her dazzled by futuristic technology, leaning on the fantastical myths of ancient
04:52 Greece to make sense of everything.
04:54 Poor Katerina is so unfamiliar with the future that when held hostage, she opens an airlock
04:59 door, ejecting herself and her captor into the vast emptiness of space.
05:03 6.
05:04 The Justice Department
05:05 Tasked with punishing history's greatest monsters with their Tesserlacta, the Justice
05:09 Department is actually pretty bad at its job.
05:12 The Doctor, Amy and Rory meet them when Melody Pond, or River Song, takes them back to Berlin
05:16 to kill Hitler.
05:17 However, the Tesserlacta has arrived at the wrong point in time and could have easily
05:21 changed the whole course of history.
05:23 The Justice Department shows the failings in Stephen Moffat's rather glib take on
05:27 the killing Hitler dilemma.
05:29 While the Doctor smartly orders Rory to put Hitler in a cupboard so that Doctor Who doesn't
05:33 have to deal with him, the presence of the Justice Department does highlight the impotence
05:37 of the Doctor and others in stopping Hitler's crimes.
05:40 While it appears that Hitler will be punished later on, the Justice Department is moments
05:44 away from killing him before they realise they have the wrong date, which is hardly
05:48 the level of due diligence you'd expect from law enforcement.
05:50 It's a good job that Hitler's guilty of the deaths of millions, but with such a glaring
05:55 oversight it doesn't give much hope for them as Time's judge, jury and executioner.
05:59 They did prove to be of some use, however, when their Tesserlacta aided the Eleventh
06:04 Doctor in faking his own death, so they're not completely useless.
06:08 5.
06:09 Krasko Rosa is one of Doctor Who's best historical
06:12 stories.
06:13 It shows that recent history can be just as dangerous to the TARDIS team as medieval times
06:17 or hostile alien planets.
06:19 It also has one of the show's absolute worst villains in the form of Krasko, a racist time
06:24 traveller who's dressed for an amateur dramatics production of Grease.
06:28 Krasko represents the problem with modern Doctor Who's need for a villain.
06:31 The racism of the time is a dangerous antagonist as it is, without hammering the point home
06:36 via Krasko.
06:37 While the idea of commercial time travel being used to spread racist rhetoric is a strong
06:42 one, especially given the trajectory of how humans have used the internet, Krasko is such
06:46 an ineffective presence that the character loses his thematic heft.
06:49 While it's certainly a huge, powerful moment in history and provides strong character work
06:54 for the TARDIS team, Krasko is a Doctor Who villain who's essentially beaten by some
06:58 people sitting on a bus.
07:00 Krasko's uselessness and small-scale messing with the local bus timetables could be seen
07:04 as a takedown of the petty, small-mindedness of racists, but it fundamentally doesn't
07:09 work in terms of Doctor Who villainy.
07:11 4.
07:12 Turlo Anyone who says that Adric is the fifth Doctor's
07:15 worst companion is willfully ignoring Turlo.
07:18 Adric is a passable TARDIS pilot who's really good at maths, while Turlo is an overgrown
07:23 schoolboy who starts his time in the TARDIS by trying to murder the Doctor on the instruction
07:27 of the Black Guardian.
07:28 And yet, despite the multiple opportunities presented to him throughout his first serial
07:33 Mordrin Undead, he relents.
07:34 Charitably, Turlo's reluctance to kill the Doctor in Mordrin Undead could be compared
07:39 to Hamlet, but writer Peter Grimwade is no William Shakespeare, and actor Mark Strickson
07:43 is no Laurence Olivier.
07:45 Once Turlo finally rejects the Black Guardian in Enlightenment, he goes from being a useless
07:49 assassin to being a useless Doctor Who companion.
07:52 He's more cowardly than Mickey, more prone to fright than Victoria, and generally spends
07:57 most of his time smugly winding up Tegan.
07:59 It's also not entirely certain that he's given up on his mission to kill the Doctor
08:03 either.
08:04 Memorably, in Warriors of the Deep, Turlo pronounces that the Doctor has drowned to
08:07 death mere seconds after the unfortunate Time Lord hits the water.
08:11 Speaking of drowning, Turlo does save Perry from a watery grave at the start of his final
08:16 story, so he's not 100% useless.
08:18 That being said, looking back across his time with the Doctor and Tegan, it's hard to
08:22 discern exactly what Turlo brought to the TARDIS, aside from a nice sketch of the Eye
08:26 of Orion.
08:27 3.
08:28 Adam Mitchell
08:29 Adam Mitchell had one job; to be an expert on the alien technology held in Henry Van
08:34 Staten's underground facility.
08:36 And he wasn't very good at it.
08:37 Then once the Dalek gets loose in the facility, he even leaves Rose for dead.
08:41 And yet the Doctor still agrees to Rose's request to let him travel with them.
08:45 Didn't the Doctor learn his lesson with Turlo?
08:47 Adam doesn't improve when he takes his first trip in the TARDIS to Satellite 5, putting
08:51 the Doctor and Rose's lives at risk.
08:54 While those two investigate the strange goings on at Satellite 5, Adam swans off and gets
08:58 his brain upgraded in a craven attempt to profit from future knowledge.
09:01 The guy's a total liability.
09:03 Now, while this knowledge may have actually helped him in his role with Henry Van Staten,
09:08 it actually informs the Editor and the Jagrafess about the Doctor and Rose.
09:12 As a result, Adam experiences the righteous fury of the Doctor, who throws him out of
09:16 the TARDIS.
09:17 Quite right, too.
09:18 As a self-obsessed and cowardly figure, Adam is a fundamentally useless Doctor Who character,
09:23 who only makes things worse for those around him.
09:26 2.
09:27 Chameleon
09:28 Chameleon is essentially the fifth Doctor equivalent of when the eleventh Doctor shaved
09:31 his head out of boredom, or when the twelfth Doctor constructed a clockwork squirrel.
09:35 The legend goes that the Chameleon prop caught the attention of 1980s Doctor Who producer
09:40 John Nathan-Turner, who was focused on taking the show into the future with a properly robotic
09:45 companion.
09:46 The only problem was the automated prop's substantial limitations.
09:49 K-9 may have struggled to traverse anything other than a smooth studio floor, but Chameleon
09:54 struggled to achieve even that, and was regularly propped up against a wall.
09:58 These limitations were further exacerbated when, tragically, the only person who knew
10:02 how to operate Chameleon, Mike Power, was killed in a boating accident.
10:06 This needn't have been a problem, however.
10:08 Chameleon may have been a robot, but he also had the ability to assume any form.
10:13 For notoriously publicity-hungry producer John Nathan-Turner, this could have been an
10:17 ideal opportunity for a rolling cast list of special guest stars in the role of Chameleon.
10:22 Instead, the robot was stuffed into a TARDIS cupboard and rarely seen again.
10:26 He made one last appearance in Planet of Fire when he was taken over by his original owner,
10:31 the Master.
10:32 So that's yet another fifth Doctor companion who conspired against him.
10:35 Come back, Adrick!
10:36 All is forgiven!
10:38 1.
10:39 Sniper Bots
10:40 I mean, the clue's in the name.
10:42 Sniper Bots.
10:43 Sniper.
10:44 Bots.
10:45 Their sole purpose is to be exceptional snipers.
10:48 Created by the Stenza, the Sniper Bots appeared in both The Ghost Monument and The Battle
10:52 of Ransgor Av Kolos, and were completely, utterly useless in both appearances.
10:57 It's something of a sci-fi cliché that the villains can't shoot straight, but it's
11:01 particularly galling in this case.
11:03 These robot assassins are supposed to be the best snipers in the universe, but they can't
11:07 even withstand a challenge from Ryan Sinclair.
11:10 Despite Ryan's difficulties with coordination and riding a bike, he can gun down a whole
11:14 army of specially designed snipers because he's played Call of Duty.
11:18 Take that, Stenza weapon specialists.
11:20 It's hardly surprising that the Sniper Bots are useless, especially given that the Stenza
11:24 also created the evil Sentient Bandages which warn the Doctor about their hidden past.
11:29 When the Sniper Bots return for the Battle of Ransgor Av Kolos, a Doctor Who story that
11:33 writer Chris Chibnall doesn't even like, they are once more swiftly dispatched by Ryan
11:38 and Graham with a well-timed duck.
11:40 Of the Stenza's many crimes against the universe, their Sniper Bots should get them
11:44 hauled up in front of the courts for breaching the Trade Description Act.
11:48 And that concludes our list.
11:49 If you think we missed any, then do let us know in the comments below.
11:52 And while you're there, don't forget to like and subscribe and tap that notification
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11:59 Also, head over to Twitter and follow us there, and I can be found across various social medias
12:03 just by searching Ellie Littlechild.
12:05 I've been Ellie with WhoCulture, and in the words of River Song herself, goodbye,