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locker_monsterI really hate it when shows give away the plot of an episode in the title. Doctor Who has always been really bad with their titles. Just look at any serial involving the Daleks. The Sarah Jane Adventures seems to be keeping up that tradition. The three episodes that have aired so far? Plot totally given away in the title. But I guess it sort of reflects the old school-ness of SJA.
So, first half of the season round-up, mainly because of a certain episode with a certain guest star.
- "Prisoner of the Judoon". See what I mean? Right away you know the episode involves a Judoon and the prisoner he's carrying. Not much to say about this one. Sarah Jane gets to be evil due to a body possessing alien. There's a bizarre side plot with Rani's parents who also run into the Judoon. I'm not sure if the writers are planning to have Rani's parents find out about their daughter fighting aliens. Probably not. They did it with Maria already so really no point in repeating that.
- "The Mad Woman in the Attic". Ending's a bit of a cop out but it's also an interesting story about loss and loneliness. I think three things made this episode for me. We get a mention of the Time War. Eve's planet and her people were wiped out during the war because they could read the timelines. Makes you wonder who wiped them out: the Daleks or the Time Lords. Flashbacks to Classic Who! We get four clips while Eve's ship looks into Sarah Jane's mind. I like that they included a clip from her intro story and her final story, but the clip from "Planet of the Spiders" is so random. We also get a random clip of Sarah Jane and K-9 from "The Five Doctors". But it was cool to see actual footage from the classic series. So far it's only happened once, during "The Next Doctor". Stuff like that helps to tie everything together, reminding the viewer that this is just one big universe and SJA is one part of it. And the return of K-9! No more guarding that black hole from him. I like that they brought him back, though probably only for the season. Stupid other K-9 show messing with K-9's rights. The interaction between K-9 and Mr. Smith just cracks me up. Mr. Smith is so not impressed with the tin dog. You see it more in the next episode, but it feels like both of them are trying to vie for Sarah Jane's attention and K-9 is totally winning because he's: a) dog-shaped and thus cute and b) he's been with Sarah Jane for a lot longer than Mr. Smith. Oh, and there was also a flashforward to the next episode, something with a blue box... Actually, to be serious, the look on Sarah Jane's face after she sees the future is a nice moment. She's clearly disoriented but there's a little smile on her because she knows the Doctor is coming back. And speaking of the Doctor...
- "The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith". Gee, I wonder what this episode is about? This is the annual "Sarah Jane storyline where the Trickster also makes an appearance" episode. Or, really, an excuse to have the Doctor show up before he regenerates. You go the entire episode waiting for the Doctor to show up and while you do hear the TARDIS throughout the episode, he doesn't show up until the end, naturally. We get some more awesome K-9 vs Mr. Smith action. Seems the kids are deferring more to K-9 and Mr. Smith is so not happy. I like that K-9 can be civil about it but Mr. Smith gets really annoyed. And K-9 has mastered stairs! He's got a hover mode. Take that door sills! I was actually wondering how K-9 got around the house, from the attic, to Luke's bedroom, to the main floor. We actually don't see him hovering but at least the writers remembered to address the matter. I don't know why, but watching K-9 roll around just makes me grin. Even with 21st century technology he still rolls around unsteadily. I laughed when Clyde reveals he snuck K-9 into the wedding. And another Classic Who reference: Sarah Jane mentions Metebelis III while joking about where to send the Doctor's invitation for the wedding. While it is a reference to her last episode with the Third Doctor, it also shows that Sarah Jane did want the Doctor at her wedding. And she also wanted him to give her away. It figures the only time the Doctor makes it to a wedding is because he's there to stop an alien. :-)
And while I love crossovers, there is one inherent problem with them. When your heroes meet, one has to be the hero and the other just gets to stand there. So the Doctor is a hero but he's not the hero of the story. Since this is Sarah Jane's show, Sarah Jane has to save the day. I did like that the Doctor got to hang out with the kids, but I'm kind of disappointed he didn't get to look around the attic or talk with Mr. Smith. And his role in the story was mainly to run around and then get stuck in the TARDIS. I think the problem was there were too many characters. When you have too many, most of them just end up standing around. So hence lines about why Maria and the Brig weren't there. That would have been way too many characters.
So it was angst all around. I like that Sarah Jane's wedding didn't get erased from time. That would be the easy way out. She has to deal with the fallout, which sucks, but at least she can remember Peter. I don't get why the Trickster keeps targeting Sarah Jane though. Do UNIT and Torchwood do a crappy job of protecting the Earth? Is it really up to Sarah Jane and the three high school kids?
At least the kids got to see the inside of the TARDIS. I'm sure the writers were scrambling for reasons why the Doctor wouldn't take them through time and space. I kind of wish the Doctor would have made a comment about Rani's name, since one of his enemies was called Rani, too. And speaking of names, the Doctor has an odd line. So it's Rani's mother who's always getting Sarah Jane's name wrong, calling her just "Sarah". But yet the Doctor uses just "Sarah" throughout the episode and when Rani calls him on it, "She doesn't like it when people call her Sarah", the Doctor replies back with "She didn't mind when I called her that." Wha? I can't recall if Three and Four just used "Sarah" frequently or not. And yes, I'm getting hung on a tiny detail, but I'm a continuity freak. :-) Typically, the Doctor takes the quick route back to Bannerman Road and it reminded me of Sarah Jane and her time with Four. He was always trying to take her back to London through the "quick route" but it never did work out. And their exchange at the end. A nice echo of Sarah Jane's departure from the TARDIS with Four, only the lines are reversed. Does the Doctor really think he's going to die instead of regenerate? The way he delivers his lines, it really feels like he's expecting the end. Odd that he doesn't say anything to Sarah Jane. Anyway, it was good to see the Doctor in action again after going six months without anything. But it's weird to think that David Tennant's appearance here as the Doctor was the last time he got to play the character, rather than his last episode of Doctor Who.
I'm really kind of indifferent about the rest of the season now. I saw this episode and it was the highlight of the season. Doesn't mean I won't watch though. ;-)
So, first half of the season round-up, mainly because of a certain episode with a certain guest star.
- "Prisoner of the Judoon". See what I mean? Right away you know the episode involves a Judoon and the prisoner he's carrying. Not much to say about this one. Sarah Jane gets to be evil due to a body possessing alien. There's a bizarre side plot with Rani's parents who also run into the Judoon. I'm not sure if the writers are planning to have Rani's parents find out about their daughter fighting aliens. Probably not. They did it with Maria already so really no point in repeating that.
- "The Mad Woman in the Attic". Ending's a bit of a cop out but it's also an interesting story about loss and loneliness. I think three things made this episode for me. We get a mention of the Time War. Eve's planet and her people were wiped out during the war because they could read the timelines. Makes you wonder who wiped them out: the Daleks or the Time Lords. Flashbacks to Classic Who! We get four clips while Eve's ship looks into Sarah Jane's mind. I like that they included a clip from her intro story and her final story, but the clip from "Planet of the Spiders" is so random. We also get a random clip of Sarah Jane and K-9 from "The Five Doctors". But it was cool to see actual footage from the classic series. So far it's only happened once, during "The Next Doctor". Stuff like that helps to tie everything together, reminding the viewer that this is just one big universe and SJA is one part of it. And the return of K-9! No more guarding that black hole from him. I like that they brought him back, though probably only for the season. Stupid other K-9 show messing with K-9's rights. The interaction between K-9 and Mr. Smith just cracks me up. Mr. Smith is so not impressed with the tin dog. You see it more in the next episode, but it feels like both of them are trying to vie for Sarah Jane's attention and K-9 is totally winning because he's: a) dog-shaped and thus cute and b) he's been with Sarah Jane for a lot longer than Mr. Smith. Oh, and there was also a flashforward to the next episode, something with a blue box... Actually, to be serious, the look on Sarah Jane's face after she sees the future is a nice moment. She's clearly disoriented but there's a little smile on her because she knows the Doctor is coming back. And speaking of the Doctor...
- "The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith". Gee, I wonder what this episode is about? This is the annual "Sarah Jane storyline where the Trickster also makes an appearance" episode. Or, really, an excuse to have the Doctor show up before he regenerates. You go the entire episode waiting for the Doctor to show up and while you do hear the TARDIS throughout the episode, he doesn't show up until the end, naturally. We get some more awesome K-9 vs Mr. Smith action. Seems the kids are deferring more to K-9 and Mr. Smith is so not happy. I like that K-9 can be civil about it but Mr. Smith gets really annoyed. And K-9 has mastered stairs! He's got a hover mode. Take that door sills! I was actually wondering how K-9 got around the house, from the attic, to Luke's bedroom, to the main floor. We actually don't see him hovering but at least the writers remembered to address the matter. I don't know why, but watching K-9 roll around just makes me grin. Even with 21st century technology he still rolls around unsteadily. I laughed when Clyde reveals he snuck K-9 into the wedding. And another Classic Who reference: Sarah Jane mentions Metebelis III while joking about where to send the Doctor's invitation for the wedding. While it is a reference to her last episode with the Third Doctor, it also shows that Sarah Jane did want the Doctor at her wedding. And she also wanted him to give her away. It figures the only time the Doctor makes it to a wedding is because he's there to stop an alien. :-)
And while I love crossovers, there is one inherent problem with them. When your heroes meet, one has to be the hero and the other just gets to stand there. So the Doctor is a hero but he's not the hero of the story. Since this is Sarah Jane's show, Sarah Jane has to save the day. I did like that the Doctor got to hang out with the kids, but I'm kind of disappointed he didn't get to look around the attic or talk with Mr. Smith. And his role in the story was mainly to run around and then get stuck in the TARDIS. I think the problem was there were too many characters. When you have too many, most of them just end up standing around. So hence lines about why Maria and the Brig weren't there. That would have been way too many characters.
So it was angst all around. I like that Sarah Jane's wedding didn't get erased from time. That would be the easy way out. She has to deal with the fallout, which sucks, but at least she can remember Peter. I don't get why the Trickster keeps targeting Sarah Jane though. Do UNIT and Torchwood do a crappy job of protecting the Earth? Is it really up to Sarah Jane and the three high school kids?
At least the kids got to see the inside of the TARDIS. I'm sure the writers were scrambling for reasons why the Doctor wouldn't take them through time and space. I kind of wish the Doctor would have made a comment about Rani's name, since one of his enemies was called Rani, too. And speaking of names, the Doctor has an odd line. So it's Rani's mother who's always getting Sarah Jane's name wrong, calling her just "Sarah". But yet the Doctor uses just "Sarah" throughout the episode and when Rani calls him on it, "She doesn't like it when people call her Sarah", the Doctor replies back with "She didn't mind when I called her that." Wha? I can't recall if Three and Four just used "Sarah" frequently or not. And yes, I'm getting hung on a tiny detail, but I'm a continuity freak. :-) Typically, the Doctor takes the quick route back to Bannerman Road and it reminded me of Sarah Jane and her time with Four. He was always trying to take her back to London through the "quick route" but it never did work out. And their exchange at the end. A nice echo of Sarah Jane's departure from the TARDIS with Four, only the lines are reversed. Does the Doctor really think he's going to die instead of regenerate? The way he delivers his lines, it really feels like he's expecting the end. Odd that he doesn't say anything to Sarah Jane. Anyway, it was good to see the Doctor in action again after going six months without anything. But it's weird to think that David Tennant's appearance here as the Doctor was the last time he got to play the character, rather than his last episode of Doctor Who.
I'm really kind of indifferent about the rest of the season now. I saw this episode and it was the highlight of the season. Doesn't mean I won't watch though. ;-)
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Date: 2009-10-31 11:36 pm (UTC)So that's cool. And yeah, I was hoping for a Rani reference. I also wanted to see him offer to take Sarah (and possibly the others) and say "I can have you back almost before you left," only to have her point out how he kept missing London when she travelled with him before, not to mention getting in trouble with Daleks, Sontarans, and others along the way, so, no thank you, she's got to look out for the kids. :)
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Date: 2009-11-01 12:33 am (UTC)A quick, "Interesting name" to Rani would have been nice. It would have been funny if the Doctor had said, "You'll be back before you know it" and it would have been a nice callback, too. I kind of wish the Doctor and Sarah Jane had more scenes together though. They really didn't get to interact until the end, which kind of defeats the purpose of a crossover.
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Date: 2009-11-01 04:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-11-01 05:05 am (UTC)God, I'm such a geek. I just went over the transcripts for "School Reunion", "The Stolen Earth" and "Journey's End" and Ten totally does call her Sarah throughout all of them. Whoo, continuity!