You're listening to Imaginary Worlds, a show about how we create them and why we suspend

their disbelief, American Malinsky, and this is part two of my mini-series on Doctor Who.

Now, my last episode I talked about the Doctor, but there's another big aspect of the show,

which is that the Doctor always has traveling companions. And the origin of these characters usually

goes something like this. The Doctor arrives in the UK, and it's the year the show is broadcast,

which is worth mentioning because he is a time traveler. He discovers there's an alien plot

that needs to be foiled. In the meantime, he meets a human. Usually, it's a woman who lives in London,

and she helps the Doctor save the world. He's impressed and asks if she wants to join him on the

TARDIS, his spaceship slash time machine. Now, the most ingenious twist on this formula was the

introduction of Amy Pond, who is played by Karen Gillan. The Doctor, played by Matt Smith,

has just regenerated into this body, so he's really disoriented. He accidentally lands in her back

yard when she's a child, which blows her mind. He steps back in the TARDIS for what he thinks is

about five minutes, and accidentally comes back 12 years later. She is both thrilled and furious to see

him. You made me with a cricket bat. 12 years. A cricket bat. 12 years. I'm for a psychiatrist.

I can't fight in them. Why? I said you weren't real. Of course, Amy helps the Doctor save the world

from an alien invasion, and then comes the pitch. So what do you think? What? Are the planets

want to check some out? What does that mean? It means, well, it means. Can we meet? Where?

Wherever you like. What's so brilliant about this episode is that the showrunner,

Steven Moffett, has taken the experience of Doctor Who fans, who wished when there were children

that the Doctor would land in their backyard, and asked them to be his companion, and he made it

actually part of Amy's character. And as I was interviewing people for this mini series,

I discovered that almost every one of them had seriously considered at one point in their life,

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