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Post by Deleted on Dec 8, 2020 7:11:02 GMT
I was intrigued to learn more about the origins of the character of Susan Foreman thanks to Toby Hadoke’s Too Much Information podcast.
It appears that not only was she originally a space princess rescued and on the run with the Doctor but her name was also ‘Finn Doo Lay’!
I actually rather like this origin. It appears there were concerns about the relationship between the Doctor and his friend being misconstrued. However Anthony Coburn’s changes were not popular with Sydney Newman (?) Perhaps like their origins, he preferred their relationship to be vague.
The original remit appears to describe the Doctor as a Lord on the Princess’ home planet having escaped with their first time machine.
I wonder if this characterisation might have made the character of Susan work better? Carole Anne Ford I think was frustrated with the character for various reasons. Perhaps she might have even stayed longer in the role?
I often found Susan to be an annoying fourth wheel. My wife does a good impersonation of her yelling ‘Grandfather! Grandfather!! GRANDFATHER!!! ‘ Ford strikes me as an excellent actor. This may have made the relationship between the Doctor and his young ward a little more balanced as well as making Susan or Suzanne or Finn Doo Lay a little more intriguing and less predictable (?).
Her answer in Dalek Invasion of Earth to the question ‘What do you do?’ May have been ‘I rule’ rather than ‘I eat’.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 8, 2020 11:57:37 GMT
Going a bit further forward, the two characterisations of her between the original pilot version of An Unearthly Child and the one that eventually aired are rather interesting.
It's a good insight into how little differences build up to a greater picture. They softened her quite a bit in the final version. In the original, she's just as dangerous and hostile as her grandfather. She seems to fully understand the implications of Ian and Barbara's presence aboard the TARDIS. In the unbroadcast version, the impetus behind the TARDIS's departure stems from a problem that would become crystallised much later on in the series. The Doctor and Susan discuss Ian and Barbara coming to realise the danger of such a thing as comprehending that the Ship is possible. Not just that it exists, but that technology like theirs is capable of existing. Susan tries to get them to understand why it's important they go. In the final version, the reasons are a lot more... well, human. The Doctor doesn't want to lose Susan on some primitive alien world, so he sets the TARDIS to dematerialise with Ian and Barbara onboard.
The reason for the change... Unfortunately has to do with adjusting characters to fit a specific demographic. Specifically, in Susan's case, children. It was thought by Sydney Newman that she was too alien for kids to empathise with her, so they modified her characterisation into what appeared in the series. I get the impression that the script editor, David Whitaker, never entirely let go of that first characterisation. In The Edge of Destruction, she has moments that are much closer to the pilot. The same is true in The Sensorites and the novelisation of The Daleks (written by him). It's nice those personality traits seem to have been taken on in legacy stories set in the expanded universe.
You know... Looking at it, I wouldn't even necessarily say that Coburn's idea is necessarily a closed book for Susan. After all, if Ian can become a knight in Palestine; Barbara, a living god in Mexico; and the Doctor, a demon in England; why not Susan a princess in an otherworldly land?
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Post by polly on Dec 8, 2020 21:44:29 GMT
I think it's an interesting alternative, but I like the idea that Susan is the Doctor's grandchild. It automatically gives him an unspoken backstory. It's just enough to keep his origins hidden, yet tease the imagination. Outright being a space princess isn't quite as much fun.
I do agree that she was mishandled, and the more spacey version of the character was better. Susan was usually at her best when given the opportunity to play alien, as in the otherwise dull "Sensorites," where she got the chance to develop her telepathy, and gave us our first description of Gallifrey.
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Post by grinch on Dec 8, 2020 21:54:18 GMT
I think it's an interesting alternative, but I like the idea that Susan is the Doctor's grandchild. It automatically gives him an unspoken backstory. It's just enough to keep his origins hidden, yet tease the imagination. Outright being a space princess isn't quite as much fun. I do agree that she was mishandled, and the more spacey version of the character was better. Susan was usually at her best when given the opportunity to play alien, as in the otherwise dull "Sensorites," where she got the chance to develop her telepathy, and gave us our first description of Gallifrey. Thankfully we have the likes of Big Finish to play damage control when it comes to Susan’s character. They’ve really fleshed her out wonderfully over the years and retroactively (mainly in the First Doctor Adventures) sown the seeds of her growing increasingly independent from her grandfather. Tick-Tock World is a great example of that in my opinion. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 9, 2020 12:58:26 GMT
I get the impression that the script editor, David Whitaker, never entirely let go of that first characterisation. In The Edge of Destruction, she has moments that are much closer to the pilot. The same is true in The Sensorites and the novelisation of The Daleks (written by him). It's nice those personality traits seem to have been taken on in legacy stories set in the expanded universe. One does get the feeling that there is a kind of creative tug of war going on in this formative period and the character of Susan is one of the most contested factors. |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 9, 2020 13:00:43 GMT
I think it's an interesting alternative, but I like the idea that Susan is the Doctor's grandchild. It automatically gives him an unspoken backstory. It's just enough to keep his origins hidden, yet tease the imagination. Outright being a space princess isn't quite as much fun. I do agree that she was mishandled, and the more spacey version of the character was better. Susan was usually at her best when given the opportunity to play alien, as in the otherwise dull "Sensorites," where she got the chance to develop her telepathy, and gave us our first description of Gallifrey. Its ironic that Susan's best moments are those in The Sensorites or The Edge of Destruction when she is acting less like 'Susan'! |
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Post by polly on Dec 9, 2020 20:04:29 GMT
Its ironic that Susan's best moments are those in The Sensorites or The Edge of Destruction when she is acting less like 'Susan'! You'd think that might have given them a hint, eh? |
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Post by grinch on Dec 9, 2020 20:43:54 GMT
I suppose there’s nothing stopping Big Finish from using Susan’s original backstory for a future release. Wouldn’t even need to have be an Unbound story. You could just have her arrive in the main universe as an alternate version of her.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2020 4:00:56 GMT
I get the impression that the script editor, David Whitaker, never entirely let go of that first characterisation. In The Edge of Destruction, she has moments that are much closer to the pilot. The same is true in The Sensorites and the novelisation of The Daleks (written by him). It's nice those personality traits seem to have been taken on in legacy stories set in the expanded universe. One does get the feeling that there is a kind of creative tug of war going on in this formative period and the character of Susan is one of the most contested factors. Yeah, all part of the show feeling its way. Evolving from a story focussed on Ian and Barbara to one almost unilaterally about the Doctor himself. I think that's why Susan (and Vicki and Dodo, too), irrespective of her characterisation, still ended up serving an invaluable element for his first incarnation, in particular. Namely, the unearthly child grounded him. Earthed him. Took a character who could to all appearances be often crotchety, sometimes untrustworthy and unshakeably alien, and gave him an emotional anchor. Someone to share his secrets with. However their travels transpired, you could never question the Doctor's love for Susan and hers for him. The TARDIS was more precious than platinum, but I could see him giving it away -- with agonising difficulty -- to ensure the safety of his granddaughter. (In fact, I think in Marco Polo he did...) From their sense of family came his compassion, his gentle kindness, his sense of fun, and a willingness to do good for others. His letting go of her meant that he had to take those better parts of himself within him. That spark which made him, unhesitatingly, turn to an isolated Vicki and say: "Why not come along with us?" The more I think about it... It hasn't really gone away. Alongside the lessons from Ian and Barbara, that initial dynamic of trust has kind of amalgamated itself into what the Doctor/companion team is. She taught him how to care about his friends and how to let go of them when the time came. |
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Post by J.A. Prentice on Dec 10, 2020 5:48:49 GMT
I get the impression that the script editor, David Whitaker, never entirely let go of that first characterisation. In The Edge of Destruction, she has moments that are much closer to the pilot. The same is true in The Sensorites and the novelisation of The Daleks (written by him). It's nice those personality traits seem to have been taken on in legacy stories set in the expanded universe. One does get the feeling that there is a kind of creative tug of war going on in this formative period and the character of Susan is one of the most contested factors. I think Vicki works much better than Susan for this reason. Susan was always torn between the "alien princess" and the "screaming schoolchild." She had some good moments, but the character was clearly the weak link in the original cast. Carole Ann Ford is incredibly talented, but she was cast to play an odd alien who could do martial arts like Emma Peel, not the muddled character who ended up on screen. Vicki, OTOH, was consistently characterized from her first episode, in part because they knew where they'd gone wrong with Susan. I do wish we'd gotten to see that original Susan on screen. She sounds like a much more interesting character. |
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