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Dodo
(1966) |
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Jackie
Lane |
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Born
in Manchester Jackie Lane spent 2 years working
at the Manchester Library Theatre. She then moved
to London in 1962 to work for the BBC acting in
small parts in television programmes including Z
Cars and in 1963 in the soap opera Compact. She
also appeared in a number of various films. In 1963
she was considered for the part of Susan but this
part was eventually given to Carole
Ann Ford. After leaving Doctor Who she
gave up acting and after working, as a secretary,
for the Australian Embassy in Paris and then running
an antiques business she joined a theatrical management
company.
Unfortunately Jackie Lane died in June 2021 at the age of 79. |
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 When
the TARDIS materialises
on Wimbledon Common in 1966 a young schoolgirl named Dorothea
'Dodo' Chaplet mistakes it for a real police telephone box and
runs inside, seeking to escape the mysterious being called Joseph.
So concerned with escaping Joseph, she was initially seemingly
unconcerned about the futuristic console room that she has found
herself in ("The
Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Eve"), simply believing
the TARDIS to be an advanced aircraft when it only travelled
to
New York while remaining in Dodo’s present ("Salvation").
Although The Doctor initially contemplated sending her home
- although Dodo quickly told him that her parents were both
dead and her great-aunt couldn’t be bothered with her
(The only actual lie; her great-aunt was a strict disciplinarian
who forced Dodo to abide by several rules rather than allowing
her to travel like she wanted) - after spending time with her
as he investigated the presence of the so-called ‘Gods
of Myth’ - of which Joseph was a member, his bond with
Dodo providing The Doctor with important assistance in deducing
the true nature of the 'Gods' - The Doctor invited her to join
him in his travels on a more full-time basis.
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| The Celestial Toymaker |
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Still
initially unaware of the TARDIS’s abilities as a time
machine, when the TARDIS materialises in a jungle, after leaving
New York, Dodo is convinced that they are still on Earth and
that Whipsnade Zoo is the most likely location especially when,
while exploring, they come across an elephant. She only accepts
what The Doctor and Steven have
been telling her about the TARDIS when they realise that are
in fact on a large spacecraft which is on a seven hundred year
journey from a dying Earth to the planet Refusis ("The
Ark").
Like Vicki it
turns out that she is an orphan so The Doctor sees her as
someone who he can look after and make a fuss of. The Doctor
also treats her as a replacement for his granddaughter and
he even confesses to Steven of how much she reminds him
of Susan despite
her initial Cockney accent and her liberal use of sixties
slang. Although The Doctor disliked her use of her nickname,
Dodo insisted on being referred to as such, their initial
encounter with the Gods helping her recognise that she should
be her own person rather than what other people defined
her as. Dodo was a very fashionable and trendy young companion
and she took full advantage of the extensive TARDIS wardrobe.
She even wore outlandish cowboy clothes when she found herself
in the Wild West. She even persuaded Steven to do likewise.
She was also the first companion to wear a miniskirt!
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| The Gunfighters |
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Dodo
was the essence of the mid-Sixties British schoolgirl trying
to find her place in the World. She was always cheerful
despite being fallible and inexperienced, seeking desperately
to travel and escape the confines of her old life with her
restrictive great-aunt. Dodo though had a tendency to get
in everybody's way despite doing her utmost to try and help
The Doctor, such as when she was captured by the god-like
Joseph ("Salvation") or when she was forced to
work with a group of actors in an altered version of the
nineteenth century while The Doctor was thrown in prison
("The
Man in the Velvet Mask").
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| The War Machines |
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She
and Steven made a good and effective team even though they
had very little in common with each other. They had a good
rapport and there was plenty of gently sparring between
them. Steven saw and treated Dodo as a small child and this
is well demonstrated when he warns the Guardians on the
Ark, when shown the statue that is being constructed, that
she will have 'the whole lot down' as she clambers over
the building blocks. Following Steven’s departure,
The Doctor and Dodo’s relationship, although initially
close, went through some rough patches, such as when The
Doctor was forced to erase an altered Earth created as a
result of an alien experiment despite Dodo’s own attachment
to the people of that world; she even lost her virginity
to an actor called Dalville before her departure ("The
Man in the Velvet Mask").
When
the TARDIS returned again to 1966 London, Dodo back in her own
time, decided to stay behind so that she can recover from her
encounter with a revolutionary new computer called WOTAN which
had exerted a hypnotic influence on her. However, rather than
face The Doctor directly she sent a message to him via Ben and Polly ("The
War Machines"). It was later revealed that the experience
was so traumatic that it left Dodo with serious psychological
damage, unable to fully recall her travels with The Doctor as
anything other than inexplicable hallucinations, being shunted
from various hospitals and forced to endure everything from
near-rape to electroshock therapy until she was transferred
to the Glasshouse, a facility run by the currently-undercover Master who
interrogated her for information about The Doctor. Although
she eventually escaped, becoming the assistant and lover of
journalist James Stevens - who was being manipulated by The
Master to believe that UNIT was a corrupt threat to the general
population and had discovered the existence of the Glasshouse
- and achieving some degree of peace, she was later murdered
by an agent of The Master when Stevens’ actions threatened
to reveal The Master’s roll in the plot to discredit UNIT.
As a result, Stevens to mourn both her and their unborn child
- Dodo was pregnant when she was killed - being left in even
further despair when he learned of UNIT’s fundamentally
benevolent agenda and how essentially pointless his actions
had been, requiring a pep talk from the Third
Doctor to regain his old spirit ("Who Killed Kennedy").
Despite
her short time with The Doctor, and her equally tragic death,
it is clear that The Doctor still remembers her with great affection
and regret for her final fate. Although never expressly identified,
a description of a ‘small, dishevelled man with an air of
sadness’ who attended her funeral suggests that the Second or Seventh
Doctor were present (Most likely the Seventh due to
his greater control of the TARDIS and his more frequent lack of
companions while acting as a free agent; it is unlikely the Time Lords would allow the Second Doctor time off to attend a funeral
when he was forced to work for them prior to his exile, to say
nothing of it being unlikely for the Third Doctor to do nothing
to help an old companion if he had the chance), and when the Tenth
Doctor and his current companion Martha Jones rescued a dodo from an
obsessed collector, The Doctor named the dodo ‘Dorothea’ after
Dodo (Although he never told Martha why he chose the name) ("The
Last Dodo").
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