Charley's final story with the Eighth Doctor was in the play The Girl Who Never Was,[3] however, this play ended with the Sixth Doctor's version of the theme tune. The play The Condemned confirmed that Charley was rescued by the Sixth Doctor, and she continued to travel with this incarnation until Blue Forgotten Planet. Big Finish continued Charley's later travels in her own audio series, Charlotte Pollard, which had two volumes released in 2014 and 2017.
Background
Charley was born on 15 April 1912, the day the Titanic sank, and first appears in the play Storm Warning (2001). Storm Warning takes place in 1930, making her 18 years old at the time.
She was born into a well-to-do family; her mother was Lady Louisa Pollard. Charley has two sisters, Margaret "Peggy" Pollard and Cecelia "Sissy" Pollard., Charley and her siblings grew up in a manor house in Hampshire, looked after by servants.
However, in Storm Warning, Charley rebels against this existence; she styles herself as an Edwardian adventuress and runs away from home, seeking excitement. Making an appointment to meet a young man she fancied in Singapore on New Year's Day 1931, she stows away on board the Airship R101 disguised as a male member of the crew. There, she meets the Eighth Doctor and together they discover the secret mission the airship is on. At the conclusion of the story, she is rescued from the fated crash of the R101 by the Doctor and taken on board the TARDIS as his newest companion.[4]
There are consequences to the Doctor taking Charley on board, however. According to history, Charley was intended to die in the R101 crash and the Doctor's rescue of her causes a temporal paradox.[4] After a while, the web of time begins to break down as anachronisms seep into history and "anti-time" starts to infect the universe, with Charley as both the focus and the gateway. The Time Lords of Gallifrey take notice, and Lord President Romana gives orders to arrest Charley and the Doctor. Charley is willing to sacrifice herself to save the universe, but the Doctor is unable to sacrifice her, taking the forces of anti-time into himself instead. History is then altered so that the paradox of Charley's continued existence became part of established history – in other words, the paradox and the resulting consequences, including the change in the timeline, were meant to happen.
However, having absorbed anti-time, the Doctor now is a danger to the universe, and so has to exile himself into a parallel universe where time does not exist. He intended to do so alone, but Charley stows away aboard the TARDIS and follows him into exile. Eventually, the Doctor discovers he is free of the anti-time infection and he and Charley manage to find their way back, accompanied by C'rizz, a native of that other universe.
It is the later death of C'rizz that prompts Charley's decision to leave the TARDIS. She quickly changes her mind but due to a series of events involving Cybermen as well as temporal shifts and memory loss, she ultimately parts company with the Doctor. While he believes she has voluntarily left him, Charley actually ends up marooned on an island in the year 500002, believing that the Doctor had died in his confrontation with the Cybermen. She builds a makeshift crystal telegraph and sends an SOS repeatedly into space, hoping that anyone, particularly the Doctor, would rescue her. When her message is finally answered, it turns out to be the Sixth Doctor who saves her. Charley chose to continue travelling with this earlier incarnation, keeping the circumstances of her past and his future a secret from him. This leads the Doctor to grow suspicious of her secrecy and poorly devised lies.
Eventually she runs afoul of a secret TARDIS inhabitant named Mila, who swaps places with her. Charley is infected with a virus rendering her invisible and non-corporeal while Mila pretends to be her. Of the dozens of companions Mila has secretly encountered, Charley is the only one she could infect, because she's the only companion the TARDIS refused to protect from infections. It is implied that the TARDIS hates Charley because of her multiple temporal paradoxes. Charley is cured by the mysterious Viyrans and she spends years helping in their mission to rid the universe of certain viruses. Finally, she finds the Sixth Doctor again, still traveling with Mila who is still pretending to be Charley. But Mila dies saving the Doctor's life and Charley takes the opportunity to finally set the web of time straight. She asks the Viyrans to alter the Doctor's memories so that all the adventures they shared would be remembered with Mila's name and true appearance. This way, years later, when the Eighth Doctor meets Charley, he'll believe it to be their first encounter. What happens to Charley after she leaves the Sixth Doctor is unclear, but it seems she continues to work for the Viyrans.
Charley's exuberant personality matched the Eighth Doctor's well. She embraced the wonders of the universe that traveling with the Doctor showed her and helped the Doctor fight the evils he encountered with courage. She was not only loyal to the Doctor, but also developed romantic feelings for him and eventually confessed them. The Doctor was very fond of Charley, and admitted later that she was his friend and he loved her, but what that meant for a virtually immortal Time Lord was unclear, as the relationship between the two was not a physical one.
Other appearances
Charley has also appeared in the short story Repercussions... by Gary Russell in the anthology Short Trips: Repercussions, set a short time after she began travelling with the Doctor.
Members of Charley's family have also appeared in Doctor Who stories. Her mother, Lady Louisa (voiced by Anneke Wills) featured in Zagreus, The Next Life, and Memory Lane. Her sister, Cecilia, (also voiced by India Fisher) featured in Gallifrey: A Blind Eye, where she is presented as a member of the League of English Fascists; Cecilia ultimately commits suicide after a complex encounter with Leela and Romana forces her to recognize the monster she has become. Charley's other sister, Margaret, appears– along with Lady Louisa and Charley's father– in the short story collection The Centenarian.
In the third issue of the ongoing Doctor Who comic book series from IDW Publishing (2009), Charley is mentioned by the Shadow Architect and the Tenth Doctor as an instance where the Doctor has interfered with a static point in time.
In the bonus tracks to the Companion Chronicle Solitaire, it was revealed that Charley would get her own series picking up from the events of Blue Forgotten Planet. Charlotte Pollard was released in two series, in 2014 and 2017. A third series was announced,[5] but as of 2024[update], it is yet to be released.
Before regenerating into the War Doctor in "The Night of the Doctor", the Eighth Doctor mentions Charley, marking the first time that any of the Big Finish audio series has been directly referenced in the television show.[6]
She is also in the Big Finish 50th-anniversary multi-Doctor special The Light at the End, briefly meeting the Fourth Doctor and Leela before the current threat temporarily erases the Fourth and Eighth Doctors both from history.
Romana, short for Romanadvoratrelundar, is a fictional character in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. A Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey, she is a companion to the Fourth Doctor.
The Master, or "Missy " in their female incarnation, is a recurring character in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who and its associated spin-off works. They are a renegade alien Time Lord and the childhood friend and later enemy of the title character, the Doctor. They were most recently portrayed by Sacha Dhawan.
Sarah Jane Smith is a fictional character played by Elisabeth Sladen in the long-running BBC Television science fiction series Doctor Who and two of its spin-offs. Sarah Jane is a dogged investigative journalist who first encounters alien time traveller the Doctor while trying to break a story on a top secret research facility, and subsequently becomes his travelling companion on a series of adventures spanning the breadth of space and time. After travelling with The Doctor in four seasons of the show they suddenly part ways, and after this she continues to investigate strange goings-on back on Earth. Over time, Sarah Jane establishes herself as a committed defender of Earth from alien invasions and other threats, occasionally reuniting with The Doctor in the course of her own adventures, all the while continuing to work as a freelance investigative journalist.
K9, occasionally written K-9, is the name of several fictional robotic canines in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who, first appearing in 1977. K9 has also been a central character in three of the series' television spin-offs: the one-off K-9 and Company (1981), The Sarah Jane Adventures (2007–2011) and K9 (2009–2010). Although not originally intended to be a recurring character in the series, K9 was kept in the show following his first appearance because he was expected to be popular with younger audiences. There have been at least four separate K9 units in the series, with the first two being companions of the Fourth Doctor. Voice actor John Leeson has provided the character's voice in most of his appearances, except during season 17 of Doctor Who, in which David Brierley temporarily did so. The character was created by Bob Baker and Dave Martin, to whom rights to the character still belong; consequently, Baker's spin-off series K9, which is not BBC-produced, could not directly reference events or characters from Doctor Who, though it attempted to be a part of that continuity.
Tegan Jovanka is a fictional character played by Janet Fielding in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. An Australian airline stewardess and a native of Brisbane who was a companion of the Fourth and Fifth Doctors, she was a regular in the programme from 1981 to 1984. Tegan appeared in 20 stories.
Adric is a fictional character played by Matthew Waterhouse in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. He was a young native of the planet Alzarius, which exists in the parallel universe of E-Space. A companion of the Fourth and Fifth Doctors, he was a regular in the programme from 1980 to 1982 and appeared in 11 stories. The name Adric is an anagram derived from the physicist Paul Dirac.
Ace is a fictional character played by Sophie Aldred in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. A 20th-century Earth teenager from the London suburb of Perivale, she is a companion of the Seventh Doctor and was a regular in the series from 1987 to 1989 and returned in 2022. She is considered one of the Doctor's most popular companions.
Zoe Heriot is a fictional character played by Wendy Padbury in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. A young astrophysicist who lived on a space wheel in the 21st century, she was a companion of the Second Doctor and a regular in the programme from 1968 to 1969. Zoe appeared in eight stories.
James Robert McCrimmon, usually simply called Jamie, is a fictional character played by Frazer Hines in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. A piper of the Clan MacLeod who lived in 18th-century Scotland, he was a companion of the Second Doctor and a regular in the programme from 1966 to 1969. The spelling of his surname varies from one script to another; it is alternately rendered as Macrimmon and McCrimmond. Jamie appeared in 20 stories.
Melanie "Mel" Bush is a fictional character played by Bonnie Langford in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. A computer programmer from the 20th century who is a companion of the Sixth and Seventh Doctors, she was a regular in the programme from 1986 to 1987 and returned in 2022, 2023, and 2024. Mel appeared in eight stories, and is the penultimate companion of the classic series.
India Fisher is a British actress, narrator and presenter. Her father is the ex-MP Mark Fisher. She is also the stepsister of musician Crispin Hunt and of actress Francesca Hunt, who appears with her in the play Other Lives.
The Eighth Doctor Adventures are a series of spin off novels based on the long running BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who and published under the BBC Books imprint. 73 books were published overall.
The Fifth Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the protagonist of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. He is portrayed by Peter Davison.
The Sixth Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the protagonist of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. He is portrayed by Colin Baker. Although his televisual time on the series was comparatively brief and turbulent, Baker has continued as the Sixth Doctor in Big Finish's range of original Doctor Who audio adventures.
Zagreus is a 2003 Big Finish Productions audio drama based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. This audio drama was presented on three compact discs, and was made by Big Finish as their primary release to celebrate forty years of Doctor Who. As of February 2015, it is being sold as a download.
The Ancestor Cell is a novel by Peter Anghelides and Stephen Cole, based on the science fiction television series Doctor Who. It features the Eighth Doctor, Fitz Kreiner, Compassion, and Romana III, as well as a brief appearance of the Third Doctor in a ghost-like state due to the Faction's manipulation of the Doctor's timeline, and features the last appearance of Faction Paradox in the Eighth Doctor Adventures.
The Eighth Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the protagonist of the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. He is portrayed by Paul McGann.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
