Moderator's Note: This is Mike's original Vicki summary:

Vicki was the first in a line of uninteresting companions. She was supposed to be from the 25th century, but apart from a few comments, you'd never know. Vicki also looked like she was somewhat anorexic.



I know that today's science fiction writers will soon become dated--such is the neture of sci-fi. But some projections into the future are simply cornier than others. Vicki is a prime example of one of the cornier ones, with her complaints about having to spend a whole hour in school and not realizing that the Bealtes played classical music. Puh-lease!

What about the line that Earth is supposedly full of castles in the 25th century?

Oi! Stop making fun of the best companion ever. She happens to be better than all the Hartnell companions and should have had her own spin off series. Thank you very much you sad sad people.

H, don`t be such a fool - she was a complete cow.

H (who can blame you for wishing to remain anonymous?) - I respect your willingness to stick up for an unpopular companion (I do for Adric, god knows why) but you'd better elaborate a bit. In what way was Vicki so great? I remember her doing something really clever and technical in The Space Museum, but the reason that's stuck in my head is because it was so completely untypical.

Emily, you really should stop admitting to sticking up for Adric in public.

I just can't help sticking up for the underdog. (Except when it's Bonnie Langford, of course.)

That`s fair enough - but ADRIC!?

Well, there's no point in defending a popular underdog, is there? Assuming that such a creature is not a contradiction in terms. Anyway, Adric does not scream or wear scanty clothing, and has even shown vague signs of having a brain. Which makes him better than most companions.

Is there such a thing as a popular underdog? Sounds like an oxymoron.

I'm very glad Adric didn't wear scanty clothes. The very thought of it makes me queasy.

If Adric had a brain, please explain to me why it always seemed that he was having trouble remembering his lines?

_I_ didn't think he had any trouble remembering his lines. And anyway, that would only indicate that Matthew Waterhouse was thick - not Adric. Any hesitations (and I want examples) would be the result of cultural difficulties owing to Adric coming from another universe.

I was trying to imply that Matthew Waterhouse was a bad actor - surely you can`t deny that.

Perhaps, Zorro, but that's the real world. We can't have messy reality intruding into our nice, neat Whoniverse. ;)

Nice and neat? Hmm...it seems a bit messed up, if you ask me - do I have to start ranting on about continuity?

Oh, sure, go ahead. Just don't start bringing up reality. As far as these message boards are concerned, there is no one named "Matthew Waterhouse", but there once was an annoying polymath named Adric.

Okay, then, fine by me.

Why on earth is everyone going on about Adric? Does it not cross your little tiny minds that this is VICKI's bit? If ya wanna moan about dull companions then moan on their page type things. Vicki is not dull on the other hand so stop wasting all the presious space. SHE RULES ALL DO YOU HEAR????? Susan was a complete twolly, Dodo lived up to her name, Polly was a complete and utter bimbo.... and Barbara well apart from the wig... why on Earth couldn't she STOP BLINKING??? Anyway I've said my peice. LONG LIVE VICKI!! (she should have got her own spin off series.) Thank you very much.

H, you`re still not giving examples - WHY was she so good? I`ve seen no evidence so far. Oh, and I agree with you`re coments on the other companions, apart from Polly - I liked her. Barbara REALLY must stop blinking!

Right listen to me you complete and utter Vickiphobic. She was so good because Maureen O'Brien was such a good actress. She was way better than the others because at most times she knew what the Doctor was on about instead of all the time wating •••• conversations that the other thick companions had to go through. Also she killed that dude in THE ROMANS did she not? Well could you see Babs doing that? Noooooooooo! Vicki was well hard. Ian was a wimp compared to her. Does this satisfy you Zorro you peice of yippity ••••.

Okay, H we`ll agree to differ. By the way, if you find any padded wallpaper coming through the post, it`ll be from me.

And of course Babs couldn`t have killed That Guy - she would be so busy blinking that she wouldn`t be able to see him.

H, Barbara isn't afraid to kill people, well, monsters anyway: she smashed in those brains in Keys of Marinus, and she wiped out that Manop - er - thing in Web Planet.

I think 'a bit young and silly' would be a more accurate description of Vicki than 'well hard'.

H - are you also known as The Reign Of Terror?

Vicki was no better or no worse than a teenage girl and Susan's replacement in the series. I actually liked her, as I did Susan.
But she was a little naive, considering she lived with a mass murderer and thought he was a nice guy until before the Doctor and Co. came along. Why was she spared? I have my theories, but I will keep them to myself as they are of somewhat, shall I say, better left unmentioned and definately not for children's (such as H) ears.

It just occured to me that we need a Whovian word for "troll." Any ideas?

Galatronian?

Steven, how about troll? If it's good enough for RADW it's good enough for us. H, you are a troll, and I claim my five pounds.

I found myself watching the Chase the other day (a complete accident, I swear, it won't happen again) and came across Vicki declaring 'I am a useless person.' At last, a companion with some self-knowledge...she has gone up immensely in my estimation.

Emily, as a plot progressor, Vicki is indeed fairly useless. She does, however, provide eye candy for those who are attracted to women who pretend they are post pubescent with even less brains than said post pubescent. Unfortunately, and I do apologise for a major faction of the male sex, this kind of attraction is fairly prevalent.
I like Vicki, personally, but I always felt that the actress really didn't care for this role. And maybe, that is the reason I like her. The things we do for money....sigh....I am sure she is not the only one who had to do degrading or dehumanizing things for the capitalist God, the Greenback. (And no, I am not thinking of the Dangermouse villian, though come to think of it, maybe they were trying to tell us something.)

IM BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And my opinion havent changed probably because V was the first companion I ever saw. I was a WHO virgin until I saw THE CHASE so please dont be so bloody nasty about her!

The first story you saw was The Chase!? Dear God...

It wasnt my fault. My useless friend told me it was one of the best and let me borrow it! Actually I found it alright until the haunted house part. It makes no sence!

Your friend said it was one of the best? EVIL DEMON!

Tell me about it! Quite queer... he dosnt even like V

Oh, he`s starting to sound more sensible now...

Hardy har! Ive just thought. Wouldnt it be great if V and the Doctor met up again?

I think Maureen has stated on a number of occasions that she didn't like the role and that she was keen to move on.
Personally, though I thought she was much better looking than Susan, she really was nothing more than replacement for her. I don't think any serials were written with Vicky in mind until Galaxy 4 and Myth Makers.
What is it about those early who female companions?? They all nicked off after only a short while. What's the matter? Couldn't they handle it? Sarah Jane Smith stuck around for a while despite the countless hypnotisms and possessions she suffered, then of course there was Jo and Tegan.
Wussbags those 60's women.....CUTE wussbags mind you...

Ah, here we are. According to the books (well, Byzantium! at any rate), Vicki's surname is Palliser. Dunno if that means the moderator wants to add it to the board title, but there ye are.

Don't do it, Mike! Whilst I consider the novels to be canon, I'm prepared to make an exception for anything by Keith Topping. Palliser, indeed!

I did once try & write a piece of fanfic which would have revealed Vicki's surname to be Golding (I got this by randomly selecting a page of the 1994-5 South Manchester Phone Book & randomly pointing at a name.) I never got past a basic storyline Idea as I was far too busy with college work at the time. It was going to be a 2 part adventure, with the first doctor for the first part, & the fourth for the second.

Rescue:

Vicki is certainly acting her heart out. In her first couple of episodes alone, she experiences more loneliness, terror, heartbreak, determination, defiance etc etc than most Companions achieve in a lifetime. And she's awfully sweet.

This doesn't alter the fact she's wearing the most STUNNINGLY short dress that even I find myself trying to peer up it every time she bends over.

Still, that Sandy stuff is devastating. Old Who's answer to The First Bad Wolf Bay Scene.

I can't BELIEVE Vicki actually APOLOGISES to Barbara for being a bit cross WHEN BARBARA MURDERS POOR DARLING SANDY. In Vicki's place Barbara wouldn't have heard the last of it from ME till she desperately tried to flee in a Dalek TARDIS.

Vicki seems remarkably happy to yell her head off at Barbara when an alien maniac from whom Barbara's existence MUST be kept top-secret might be in the next room.

Pretty thick of Vicki to completely fail to notice that Ian and Barbara are prehistoric. I'm pretty sure I'd spot it if someone dropped in from a few centuries earlier.

Poor old Vicki has waited a YEAR for rescue, trapped with a nutter (two nutters, depending on whether you count Koquillion and Bennett twice)?? She gets over the ordeal remarkably quickly. By the next story she's whinging that Ancient Rome just isn't INTERESTING enough for her.

Marueen O'Brien in DWM: ''Nine tenths of my pleasure in this world is just looking at people and observing and enjoying what goes on. I couldn't do that because I had to keep my eyes down or otherwise I was going to be accosted. And not because of anything to do with you - but only because you were playing this amoeba every week on people's television screens' - blimey. SOMEONE is heretically ungrateful for the Supreme Honour of BEING VICKI...

Myth Makers:

'I'm nobody of any importance. I'm just somebody from...the future' - she REALLY should have thought up a better cover story.

'She's some drab of Agamemnon' - blimey, to think I assumed End of the World was the first time a Companion got called a prostitute to her face.

So...Cassandra tries to have her burnt alive as a spy, Priam practically adopts her, Paris fancies her, Troilus falls in love with her, they all credit her as the witch who made the Greek army disappear...Vicki is the centre of more attention than when she was leading a Xeron revolution. Typical that it's only her first and last stories where she REALLY holds people's attention.

Vicki doesn't know better than to yell 'Steven!' the moment he's dragged in as a captive?

Vicki is shocked that a 17-year-old is a soldier. Which bit of PREHISTORIC TEN-YEAR WAR has she not quite grasped?

Why the hell doesn't Vicki get a goodbye scene? She obviously tells the Doctor at SOME point that she's jumping headfirst into the rape of Troy to find some teenager she fancies and he's obviously completely cool with that and personally I'd've liked to have SEEN this bizarre little scene.

About Time: 'The contract O'Brien signed had "Susan" on it' - oh. Dear. They really DIDN'T put much thought into her character, did they.

'The first sign that she's enjoying time-travel is when she sees Rome burning. She's a hellraiser, this one' - in her defence, it wasn't exactly a big, scary-looking fire...

Troilus 'never finds out that Vicki and friends were partly responsible [for his brother's death]. Will she ever tell him?' - bloody good point. Sadly never addressed by her Companion Chronicles.

It's no state secret that Maureen O'Brien was not happy during her time on Who.

In the decades since, I guess she's softened a bit on that, since she agreed to do a Companion Chronicle.

Several Companion Chronicles and Early Adventures.

Yep, she's definitely softened her stance.

Imagine if Vicki had been a Susan regeneration.

Actually at one point, Jackie and Anneke (who play Dodo and Polly) were both supposed to play Susan, so maybe Dodo and\or Polly would have been, Susan regenerations.

Anyway, playing Europa Universalis, I've turned various Doctor Who companions into countries. Vicki unified Britain (which was composed of first doctor companions) and became a marittime empire, even colonizing Anatolia among others. They're allied with Jamie McCrimmon!Kurdistan, both sharing a rivalry with the Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart!Timurids. Also, Hi-Fi's there and he's a Grand Republic in Ukraine\South Russia. Vicki, Jamie, and the Brig all want to annex it. Vicki specifically wants to Unify Europe, she's even influenced the Eighth Doctor into unifying all of the Australian continent, meanwhile the First Doctor is colonizing South America.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRxXe4FP_IA