SJA #15 : The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith

"And I know the legends of the Doctor! The man of ice and fire, who walked among gods. Once held the key to time in his hands! Now, he is surrounded by children!"

Episode #15:        The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith.
Companions:        Sarah Jane Smith, the 9th Doctor, K9, Luke Smith, Rani Chandra and Clyde Langer.
Air Date:               29th to 30th October 2009.

After Sarah Jane starts acting suspiciously, Luke, Clyde, Rani and K9 investigate. They discover she has a boyfriend, Peter Dalton, and they are going to get married. Clyde suspects Peter may be an alien. At the wedding, an old enemy returns. As the gang find themselves trapped in a time loop in Limbo, can a very special friend from the past save Sarah Jane, her friends and the entire planet Earth from the wrath of the Trickster?


It has taken three seasons but we finally get the much anticipated appearance of the Doctor in an episode of the Sarah Jane Adventures. It isn't his best as even once he turns up it is still a show about Sarah Jane and her friends, and they solve the adventure with him as the effective companion. Still, it's about time that he showed up in the show.

The story itself is okay. The Trickster has tricked Sarah Jane and her chums into becoming trapped within a second in time unless she agrees to be married and have her memory of saving the Earth erased. The Doctor tries to rescue her but first must use the TARDIS to break through that second barrier. Clyde becomes charged with Artron energy (temporal energy basically) and uses it to defeat the Trickster. As plots go it is fairly basic but worth a watch just for the Doctor.

This episode features another well known British actor, Nigel Havers. Havers was a household name in the 1970's and 80's. The first time I saw this adventure I was quite impressed as he's another actor who I wouldn't have pegged as the sort to appear in a show like the Sarah Jane Adventures. 

However, sitting here writing this I am finding it difficult to write anything interesting about this story. It is fun to have the Doctor on the show but the story is otherwise average with little to really talk about or get excited about. It's him that makes it. Without the Doctor it would have been a fairly bland SJA story. Watch it just for the appearance of the Doctor.

SJA #11 : The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith

"Luke, I have saved the lives of so many people, people I didn't even know, I don't know – miners on Peladon, all the people drinking BubbleShock, without a second thought, but this is my mum and dad!"

Episode #11:        The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith.
Companions:        Sarah Jane Smith, Luke Smith, Rani Chandra and Clyde Langer.
Air Date:              17th to 24th November 2008.

When Sarah Jane returns a boy who has slipped through a time fissure to 1951, she realises she has found a way to meet the parents she never knew. Is it a trap? Sarah Jane and Luke fall victim to a revenge plot by the Trickster.

The Sarah Jane Adventures finally gets a time travel story and long overdue too it is. The story continues with the references to Sarah Jane's parents and this time the Trickster draws her back in time with the temptation of meeting, or rather saving her parents. By preventing their deaths Sarah Jane causes the downfall and eventual enslavement of humanity by the Trickster.

Elements of the story are very similar to the Doctor Who story "Father's Day". Both stories deal with wanting to go back in time to see a deceased parent only for the companion to mess it up and cause some pretty terrible damage to the time line which only the death of the parent can fix. This adventure is different enough though for it to be a good story in it's own right.

This is an entertaining story that uses the expected tropes for the subject matter. I think it rather good though it could always have been better. The only real disappointment for me is the Trickster himself. He doesn't get enough screen time and he's the sort of SJA villain that I want to see more of.

SJA #5 : Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?

"You were never forgotten, never! What I saw that day, it changed me forever. I saw how precious life is, and it made me fight to defend it across all these years, because of you, Andrea! It was all because of you! My best friend."

Episode #5:       Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?.
Companions:     Sarah Jane Smith, Luke Smith, Maria Jackson, Clyde Langer and Mr Smith.
Air Date:            29th October to 5th November 2007.

One day, Sarah Jane Smith exists. The next, only Maria Jackson knows of her. Andrea Yates takes her place, but Maria knows that Andrea has done something to remove Sarah Jane from the space/time continuum. It is up to Maria to uncover the identity of the "Trickster" if the human race is to survive. But with Sarah Jane and Luke wiped from existence and Clyde having lost all knowledge of his former adventures, Maria must save the world single-handedly. But she finds it may be time to tell her father about her secret life with Sarah Jane if the whole world is to survive.

I thoroughly enjoyed this episode. It was, for children's television a little darker than expected which made it much better in my eyes. Essentially some strange alien device protects Maria from alterations in the time line when a mysterious figure called the Trickster decides to alter the past so that thirteen year old Sarah Jane is killed and her best friend, who should have died, survives in her place. Maria has to resolve things in time to prevent an asteroid from striking the Earth and killing everyone.

It is a good story but suffers from the usual time alteration story line issue... ignoring what went before. The Trickster removes Sarah Jane so she wasn't around to help the Doctor and UNIT during the 1970's defeat all those alien invasions.We know the Doctor is good but there doesn't appear to be any real changes to the time line and since Sarah Jane was important to those events, surely something should have been referenced? However, there is a nice reference where the Trickster decides to see what things would have been like without the Doctor about to stop them, which leads into the upcoming Turn Left story.

The Trickster is an interesting villain though I can't help feeling that he is superfluous when you have an almost identical figure in the Black Guardian. Perhaps it was decided that it would require too much of an introduction for children? Either way, it gives the show it's own nasty otherworldly recurring villain so I can't complain. Alongside the Trickster the episode introduces a creature called a Grask which serves the Trickster in some way. I'm sure he'll make an appearance as well in the future.