Mickey Smith

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Doctor Who character

Mickey Smith
Mickey
Affiliated with Tenth Doctor
Rose Tyler
The Preachers
Race Human
Home planet Earth
Home era Early 21st century
First appearance "Rose"
Portrayed by Noel Clarke (adult)
Casey Dyer (child)

Mickey Smith is a fictional character in the British science fiction television series Doctor Who, played by Noel Clarke.

Mickey is the boyfriend of the Ninth and Tenth Doctor's companion Rose Tyler, and a recurring character on the programme. He first appears in the 2005 series episode "Rose". In that story, he is caught up in the events of the Auton invasion when Rose meets the mysterious Doctor. He later briefly joins the TARDIS crew as the Tenth Doctor's second companion in the 2006 series.

A typical working-class young man, Mickey lives on the same South-East London council estate as Rose and works as a mechanic at the local garage. Mickey is the first non-white human companion of the Doctor ever seen on screen (although others had previously appeared in various spin-off media of undetermined canonicity).

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[edit] Character history

Mickey's father, Jackson Smith, left for Spain when he was very young. Mickey's mother could not cope with raising him alone and left him to be raised by his blind grandmother. A few years prior to the events of "Rose", Rita-Anne died after slipping on a damaged carpet and falling down the stairs. Mickey feels responsible for her death as he did not repair the carpet, despite frequent reminders.

When Rose, while investigating the Doctor, goes to visit a conspiracy theorist named Clive, Mickey is captured by the Nestene Consciousness, which creates a living plastic facsimile of him to gather intelligence about the Doctor. Kept a captive by the Nestenes to maintain the duplicate, he is overwhelmed by the revelation that alien life exists and is in a state of paralysed panic throughout most of the Doctor and Rose's final confrontation with the Nestenes.

Mickey's initial cowardice (and his panicky description of the Doctor as an "alien... a thing") does not impress the Doctor, and when the Doctor offers to take on Rose as his newest companion, he pointedly states that Mickey is not invited. While mere days pass for Rose in the TARDIS, a year had passed in London when she returns in "Aliens of London". In the interim, she has been declared missing. Mickey was suspected of Rose's murder and interviewed by the police on five occasions but was not arrested due to lack of evidence. Mickey has spent the year unearthing information about the Doctor and waiting for Rose to return, taking over the www.whoisdoctorwho.co.uk website formerly run by Clive (see Doctor Who tie-in websites).

Although still dismissive of Mickey (deliberately calling him "Ricky" and terming him "Mickey the Idiot"), the Doctor relies on him when the Doctor and Rose are trapped inside 10 Downing Street during the events of "World War Three". Mickey's actions in that story, bravely defending Rose's mother Jackie from the Slitheen and helping end the alien threat, earn him a degree of the Doctor's respect. At the conclusion of the story, the Doctor offers Mickey a place aboard the TARDIS but he declines, asking the Doctor not to tell Rose that he has done so. The Doctor in turn gives Mickey a compact disc containing a computer virus that will wipe out all mention of him on the Internet, but according to his website, Mickey is undecided whether or not to use it.

A younger (around six years old) version of Mickey appears in the episode "Father's Day" (played by Casey Dyer), where he meets the time travelling Rose in 1987, although he is not made aware of the role she will play in his future. The present-day Mickey reappears in "Boom Town", where he tells Rose that he has started dating Trisha Delaney, although whether this is true or merely to make Rose jealous and return to him is uncertain. Although he bitterly walks away from Rose at the end of that episode, he is willing to help Rose get back to the Doctor in the 2005 series finale "The Parting of the Ways".

Mickey returns in the 2005 Christmas special, "The Christmas Invasion", and also briefly appears at the beginning of "New Earth". After "The Christmas Invasion" he takes a more proactive stance in investigating extraterrestrial threats to Earth, alerting Rose and the Doctor to strange events at a local secondary school in "School Reunion". At the end of that episode, he joins the TARDIS crew as a regular companion, although he expresses the worry that he is a third wheel and taken for granted, comparing himself to "the tin dog" (K-9).

When visiting a parallel Earth in "Rise of the Cybermen", he is mistaken for and meets his counterpart, Ricky Smith, leader of the resistance group called the Preachers. He also meets the parallel version of his grandmother, who has not died. Ricky is killed by the Cybermen before Mickey's eyes, and something inside him changes as a result. Mickey goes on to become instrumental in defeating the Cybermen.

As the Doctor and Rose are about to leave, Mickey announces he is staying behind to assist the Preachers in mopping up the remaining Cybermen and look after the parallel version of his gran now that Ricky is gone. As the Doctor states that travel between parallel universes is impossible, it seems that Mickey will be stuck in this alternate reality, never to meet the Doctor or Rose again. However, he reappears in "Army of Ghosts", having infiltrated the Torchwood Institute under an assumed name. The Cybermen of the parallel Earth, on the verge of defeat, have followed an interdimensional craft through to Mickey's own universe, and he is the first member of the Preachers to follow them, armed with parallel Torchwood technology. He appears more confident and self-assured than previously, but he still does not expect the Daleks to emerge from the void ship. He soon becomes part of the fight against the Dalek and Cyberman armies. At the conclusion of "Doomsday", Mickey returns to the parallel universe and the breach is sealed. Mickey is currently living with Rose, Jackie, and the Pete Tyler of that world.

It is confirmed that Mickey will return in the finale of series 4.

[edit] Ricky Smith

Doctor Who character
Ricky Smith
Affiliated with The Preachers
Race Human
Home planet Parallel Earth
Home era Early 21st century
First appearance Rise of the Cybermen
Last appearance The Age of Steel
Portrayed by Noel Clarke

Ricky Smith (also played by Noel Clarke) is the parallel universe counterpart to Mickey, first appearing in "Rise of the Cybermen" (although prior to broadcast he appears in the online TARDISODE prequel to the episode). Unlike Mickey's perceived status as the "tin dog", Ricky is seen to be in control of the situation, tough and decisive. He is the leader of the Preachers, a gang of freedom fighters fighting against John Lumic's Cybus Industries and claims to be London's "Most Wanted" (although he later admits this is for parking tickets).

Ricky is electrocuted by a Cyberman (on the foot) when trying to climb over a fence, while Mickey watches helplessly from the other side. After helping to defeat the Cybermen in London, Mickey decides to take on the role of his parallel counterpart, partly to look after Ricky's blind grandmother Rita-Anne, and partly to aid Preacher Jake Simmonds (portrayed by Andrew Hayden-Smith) in eliminating the Cybermen threat in other countries.

Russell T Davies originally intended Ricky to be gay and in a relationship with Jake.[1] Despite no mention being made of this in the episodes as broadcast, on the Series Two DVD Box Set Deleted Scenes, a deleted scene from the end of "The Age of Steel" shows Mickey and Jake in the van and when Mickey mentions how he may be different from Ricky, Jake mentions how Ricky was his boyfriend before he died, to which Mickey replies "OK, definitely not replacing him."[2] The canonicity of deleted scenes is unclear.

[edit] Other appearances

Mickey appears in three New Series Adventures novels. In Winner Takes All by Jacqueline Rayner, Mickey becomes involved in an alien war being fought by remote control. The "soldiers" in the war are abducted humans controlled by other humans who thought they were playing a video game. Under the Doctor's instruction, Mickey organises the controllers to keep the abducted humans alive.

In The Stone Rose, Mickey has been volunteering to take schoolchildren round the British Museum. It is his discovery of a statue of Fortuna that looks exactly like Rose which sets the chain of events in motion.

In The Feast of the Drowned, Mickey helps when the Doctor and Rose investigate the mysterious sinking of a naval vessel and the apparent ghost of the brother of Rose's friend Keisha. It is revealed that, at some point between "Rose" and "Aliens of London", Keisha propositioned Mickey but was rebuffed. In revenge, she encouraged the idea that he had murdered Rose, even sending people to beat him up. Mickey himself was unable to remember what had happened that night, and she told him he had made the advances.

The Doctor Who Magazine comic strip The Lodger (DWM #368) focuses on Mickey being increasingly annoyed by the Tenth Doctor when the latter lodges with him for a few days, particularly since the Doctor is able to outdo Mickey at everything without effort.

Mickey also appears as the webmaster for the tie-in website "Defending the Earth!" (formerly "Who is Doctor Who?")

[edit] Episodes

2005 series
2005 Christmas special
2006 series
2008 series

[edit] References

  1. ^ Kilkelly, Daniel (May 7th, 2006). Davies wanted 'Doctor Who' gay kiss. digitalspy.co.uk.
  2. ^ Russell T Davies. (2006). Doctor Who (New Series 2): Complete Series 2 Box Set (6 Discs) [DVD]. Retrieved on 2007-01-03. More information from bbc.co.uk

[edit] External links

The TARDIS Index File has information related to:


v • d • e
Companions of the Tenth Doctor
Series Specials Series 2 Specials Series 3 Specials Series 4
Serials CIN 171 172 - 173 174 - 176B 177 - 181B 182 183 - 190 191A - 191C 192 193 - 195 196A - 197 198 - 200 201 202A / B
Companions ← Rose Donna Martha Astrid Donna
Mickey (←) Jack Martha Rose Martha