Warning: spoilers ahead for Doctor Who season 15, episode 1, "The Robot Revolution."

Belinda Chandra is great, but Doctor Who season 14's ending, Varada Sethu's Belinda Chandra takes over from Millie Gibson's Ruby Sunday as the show's primary companion, while Ruby is scheduled to make sporadic appearances as the season continues.

Sethu, of course, is no stranger to Doctor Who companions, the mystery girl trope remains alive and well.

Belinda Chandra Doesn't Want To Travel As The Doctor's Companion

The TARDIS Life Isn't For Everyone

A big, refreshing difference between Belinda and other companions is her staunch reluctance to travel. Typically, and especially in Doctor Who's modern era, the companion enters the TARDIS to escape their ordinary life in modern-day Britain by exploring time and space with a total stranger. The classic series offered a little more variety in this regard - the likes of Ian, Barbara, and Tegan stowed onto the Doctor's ship by accident - but the vast majority of companions were willing participants.

Belinda, presumably, will now have a very different perspective on the Doctor's adventures.

One strength of Belinda Chandra's character is not being a willing participant. Despite Fifteen extending an open invitation, Belinda insists on being taken back to 2025 Earth, back to her parents, back to her job, and back to a very awkward conversation with her neighbor about a cat.

Belinda's ability to look at what the Doctor is offering and say "no, thanks" immediately throws a new ingredient into the Doctor Who pot. This isn't a character who wishes to break away from their everyday life - they cherish what they already have, and that gives Belinda so much more to lose after she's forced to remain on the TARDIS.

Belinda, presumably, will now have a very different perspective on the Doctor's adventures compared to past companions. She will be approaching each situation with a skeptical, grounded mindset, as opposed to the excited optimism companions usually exude when they're dazzled by the Doctor's tricks. Not only will Belinda's attitude challenge the Doctor, it will add more depth to the murky gray area Gallifrey's last Time Lord often operates within.

Belinda Is Great At Calling Out The Doctor's Ego

The Fifteenth Doctor Has Met His Match

The fact that Belinda would rather spend her evenings eating refrigerator leftovers in front of Netflix than sparking revolutions on distant planets isn't the only departure from Doctor Who's normal formula. While other companions have sympathetically pointed out the Doctor's flaws - Clara trying to make the Twelfth Doctor more tactful, for instance - Belinda is particularly good at seeing through the protagonist's charismatic waffle. The two have barely met before Belinda chastises the Doctor for taking her DNA sample without permission, while the death of Sasha 55 also proves a sticking point.

The cherry on top is Belinda asking Fifteen, "do you say that to all the girls?" after he makes an attempt to change her mind about riding the TARDIS. The Doctor laughs, but Belinda isn't joking - she can already see the Time Lord's modus operandi and is refusing to fall for the usual recruitment speech about destiny and cosmic wonders.

Doctor Who season 15's premiere makes clear from the outset that Belinda will hold the Doctor to better than any other modern companion. For all his virtues, the Doctor is prone to ego, hubris, and the occasional god complex. Belinda is going to shut that kind of nonsense down with a level of brutal honesty the Doctor perhaps isn't used to.

Belinda Is Yet Another "Mystery Girl" Companion After Amy, Clara & Ruby

It's Hard To Find A Normal Companion These Days

Belinda Chandra's absolute refusal to entertain the Doctor's shenanigans is a promising sign for her character. "The Robot Revolution" does, unfortunately, revert to a trope Doctor Who has recycled too many times in recent years. Belinda, it seems, is not just a companion to the Doctor, but a mission. Fifteen hopes to unravel the coincidence of meeting both Mundy Flynn and Belinda Chandra in quick succession, as well as the startling resemblance between them. He also wants to uncover how Belinda's star certificate ended up in the Missbelindachandrabots' possession.

The mystery girl concept needs an extended break.

It feels like the forces of fate are pulling the Doctor and Belinda together. Alas, the forces of fate have played this tune before. The entirety of Doctor Who season 14 was spent unraveling the mystery of Ruby Sunday - her parentage, her cosmic significance, etc. The Eleventh Doctor had a similar experience with Clara too. Just like the Mundy/Belinda parallel, Eleven met different versions of Clara Oswald on his travels, and adopted her as a companion largely just to crack the case.

Before Clara, it was Amy Pond. With a crack in her wall, Amy held a deeper importance that the Doctor desperately wanted to demystify. By the time of Doctor Who season 15, the mystery girl concept needs an extended break - especially after season 14 leaned so heavily on the questions surrounding Ruby Sunday. While Belinda's anti-companion characteristics are very welcome, Doctor Who would be better off allowing her to be a reluctant enger without making her an enigma at the heart of the narrative.