30 greatest Doctor Who companions of all time

29. Peri Brown

Another companion who accidentally became a companion, Peri Brown traveled with both the fifth and sixth doctor.

Peri encountered The Doctor when he was paying a visit to Lanzarote. It’s not the typical place you would find The Doctor paying a visit to, so it was a bit of a surprise for Doctor Who fans to find him there.

Back to Peri and her time with The Doctor. When Peri started traveling with five, it was only supposed to be for the remainder of her holiday. Like most companions, Peri ended up travelling with The Doctor for longer than she initially intended. So when the fifth Doctor became the sixth, Peri saw him through his regeneration but did not stay for very long afterwards as it was too much for her to handle.

Interestingly, what makes Peri really fascinating is that there are several versions of the character thanks to interventions in time by Time Lords. I might point out that’s something that could only ever happen in Doctor Who.

Of course, one of these variations of Peri is of the companion that helped the sixth Doctor through his regeneration, which was a difficult time for him. It might have ended very differently if Peri was not there to help him through it. Peri herself even needed convincing that he indeed was The Doctor. So while she helped him, he in turn helped her.

You have to wonder if this story line was created in a way to help viewers accept the new Doctor.  We had to be convinced that the sixth Doctor really was The Doctor, and so to convince us, they wrote Peri’s storyline to help us accept our new Time Lord.