Rose Tyler
When Rose met
the Doctor in
Rose, she was working as a shop assistant at Henrik's
department store in
Regent Street, London. She also had a boyfriend named
Mickey Smith and lived in a
council flat with her mother
Jackie. Rose left school without taking her
A-levels but did win the
bronze medal in an under-sevens
gymnastics competition at her
junior school. Her father,
Pete Tyler, died in 1987 in a car accident, the year after Rose was born.
One night after the shop closed she encountered mannequins coming to life in the basement of the building. The
Autons were about to dispose of her when the Doctor saved her life, although he went on to destroy the building in the process, depriving Rose of her job. She went on to aid the Doctor in tracking down the hiding place of the Nestene Consciousness that was animating the Autons and subsequently helped defeat its plans of world conquest. She then joined the Doctor on his travels in the
TARDIS.
In her travels with the Doctor, Rose (among other things) saw
the end of the world, encountered the Doctor's
oldest enemy and learned about the consequences of
tampering with history. The Doctor even modifed her
mobile phone to be able to communicate across time and space, among other functions. She nicknamed it the "
Superphone".
During the
2005 series, the words "
Bad Wolf" followed the Doctor and Rose around, the phrase being scattered like clues through the places that they visited. In
The Parting of the Ways, it was revealed that Rose was the Bad Wolf — the words were a message that she had left to herself in time and space when she absorbed the energies of the
time vortex to save the Doctor and the Earth from the
Daleks. The Doctor had just returned her home to place her out of harm's way, but "Bad Wolf" was a reminder that it was possible to get back to him. This led her to the point where she would absorb the energies, creating a
predestination paradox and making it possible not just to destroy the Daleks but to leave those clues.
However, the energies she absorbed were destroying her body. The Doctor took those energies into himself, sacrificing his ninth incarnation and
regenerating before Rose's eyes into the
Tenth Doctor.
Rose was initially disconcerted at the Doctor's transformation, and was even more distressed when the Doctor fell into a post-regenerative coma, unable to stop the threat of a
Sycorax invasion. However, when the Doctor recovered and defeated the Sycorax, Rose happily accepted his new face and manner (
The Christmas Invasion).
In
Tooth and Claw she was created a
dame by
Queen Victoria, making her Dame Rose of the Powell Estate. Immediately afterwards, however, Victoria banished the two from the
British Empire. When the Doctor, Rose and Mickey accidentally travelled to a parallel Earth, Rose met an
alternate version of Pete Tyler, who had become a success (
Rise of the Cybermen and
The Age of Steel). At the end of that story, Mickey elected to stay on that parallel Earth to fight their
Cybermen, and Rose thought she would never see him again.
However, in the 2006 series finale,
Army of Ghosts and
Doomsday, the Cybermen managed to invade Rose's universe along with the Daleks. Although Rose and the Doctor managed to remove both enemies from Earth, Rose ended up being trapped on the parallel Earth, albeit reunited with Pete, Mickey and Jackie, who had also followed. The Doctor managed to send one last signal through the cracks between universes, sharing a tearful farewell with her. He told Rose that she had been declared dead in the invasion. Rose in turn revealed that she was working for that universe's version of the
Torchwood Institute due to her experience with aliens.
Rose was the only companion to stay with the Doctor throughout an entire incarnation on screen, the single
television movie with the
Eighth Doctor and
Grace Holloway notwithstanding. Prior to Rose,
Jamie McCrimmon had appeared in
all but one of the
Second Doctor's stories.
Rose was the first television companion of the Doctor with a fully fleshed-out personal life and background that the audience actually saw on screen in her debut story, as opposed to something developed over time. For the first time since the first
Doctor Who episode "
An Unearthly Child",
Rose (and indeed, much of the 2005 season and the 2005 Christmas special) was told largely from the companion's point of view. It was also the first time the television series has examined the consequences of a companion leaving with the Doctor; for the year she was away, she was considered a missing person and Mickey was briefly suspected of her murder (
Aliens of London).
She is also unique among on-screen companions in that she has not been cut off from her family and world she once knew. Mickey was aware of her new occupation and tracked her movements through his
website. Jackie found out about the life her daughter was leading in
Aliens of London, and despite pleading for her to stay, Rose continued to travel with the Doctor. Rose was able to communicate with her family if she wanted to via her "Superphone", and numerous episodes saw Rose returning to visit with her mother and Mickey, rendering them recurring "pseudo-companions" along the same lines as
Captain Mike Yates,
Sergeant Benton and
Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart from the
Third Doctor's era.
Rose showed herself to be a quick-witted, inquisitive and compassionate young woman, who despite the strange events she was thrown into was quick to adapt to them. She fell easily into the role of the Doctor's latest companion and showed both determination and courage while facing various
alien threats. It became obvious that she cared deeply about the Doctor, although she denied any infatuation or romantic feelings towards him. In
Doomsday, Rose finally told the Doctor she loved him; he began to reply but only managed to say her name before his signal was cut off.
Rose is featured in the first nine
New Series Adventures novels. (Three additional books have been announced but it not been confirmed whether Rose will appear). She also appears in the Quick Reads Initiative release,
I am a Dalek.
The
Doctor Who Annual 2006, published by
Panini Comics in August 2005, gives further biographical information on Rose in an article written by the programme's chief writer and executive producer
Russell T. Davies.
[Davies, Russell T: "Doctor Who Annual 2006", page 38, "Meet Rose". Panini Books, 2005; ISBN 1904419739] The piece includes the address of the flat she and Jackie lived in (Flat 48, Bucknall House, Powell Estate,
SE15 7GO). Jackie supported them by working from home as a
hairdresser, and prior to Rose meeting the Doctor her only travelling experience was a school trip to
France and an annual week's holiday to
South Wales with her mother.
Rose (whose middle name is given as Marion) began seeing Mickey at the age of 14, and at 15 she was suspended from her school, Jericho Street Comprehensive, for persuading the choir to go on strike. After doing well in her
GCSE exams, she left school to live with a 20 year-old musician, Jimmy Stone, but the affair ended in tears and with Rose £800 in debt. She subsequently returned to Jackie and Mickey, and her mother called in a favour from an ex-boyfriend to get her the job at Henrik's.
The Doctor states that Rose is 19 years old in the episodes
The Unquiet Dead and
Dalek. Also in
Dalek, the Doctor mentions that the year is 2012, and Rose indicates that this makes her 26.
Aliens of London establishes that she met the Doctor on
March 6 2005. However, the
Annual article states that Rose was born on
April 27 1987, making her just under 18 years old at the time. Although this contradicts the age as initially stated on screen, it is consistent with the appearance of the baby Rose in
Father's Day, set in November 1987, where the baby is clearly no more than a few months old. Also, in the 2006 series episode
Rise of the Cybermen, the Doctor reminded Rose that her father died when she was "six months old", apparently
retconning her previous age. In
Army of Ghosts, Rose states that her life was normal for 19 years, and then she met the Doctor.
The
April 27 birthdate is, however, not consistent with a
statement on the BBC's website: during the lead-up to the episode
Bad Wolf, the website was altered to tie in with the story's
Big Brother theme, and a "contestant portrait" for Rose stated that she was an
Aries in the sidereal zodiac. If she were born on
27 April she would be a
Taurus.
As with all non-televised
Doctor Who, the
canonicity of both the website and the
Annual article, despite its authorship, is open to question.
*Actress
Georgia Moffett, daughter of
Fifth Doctor actor
Peter Davison, auditioned for the role of Rose.
*Writer/producer
Russell T. Davies frequently uses the surname "Tyler" in his work. The Tyler family are featured heavily in his
Virgin New Adventures Doctor Who novel
Damaged Goods, and Davies has created characters named Tyler in other series he has written, including Ruth Tyler in
Revelations (1994), Vince Tyler in
Queer as Folk (1999), and Johnny Tyler in
The Second Coming (2003). It has not been stated if the Tylers from
Damaged Goods are related to Rose's family.
*Sam Tyler, the lead character in the BBC's other time travel drama
Life on Mars, was named after Rose. This came about when
Life on Mars co-creator
Matthew Graham asked his young daughter to suggest a surname for the character, later discovering that she had chosen the name because of Rose. Graham later went on to write the
Doctor Who episode
Fear Her.
*
Rose (2005 series)
*
The End of the World *
The Unquiet Dead *
Aliens of London /
World War Three *
Dalek *
The Long Game *
Father's Day *
The Empty Child /
The Doctor Dances*
Boom Town *
Bad Wolf /
The Parting of the Ways *
The Christmas Invasion (2005 Christmas special)
*
New Earth (2006 series)
*
Tooth and Claw*
School Reunion*
The Girl in the Fireplace*
Rise of the Cybermen /
The Age of Steel*
The Idiot's Lantern*
The Impossible Planet /
The Satan Pit*
Love & Monsters*
Fear Her*
Army of Ghosts /
Doomsday
