Sunday, October 15, 2017

The Sarah Jane Adventures: 405-406 – “Death of the Doctor” (2010)



One of the warmest, fuzziest, most delightful classic Who homages in the modern Who era.  Just a lovely combination of past and present wrapped in a wonderfully-fun Whovian package.  The villains are a bit hokey, and some aspects of the script could’ve used another pass, but the good stuff definitely overwhelms any minor complaints (one mild, incredibly obvious spoiler.)

UNIT troops descend on Sarah Jane’s house with a sad piece of news:  the Doctor’s body has been recovered from an alien battlefield by the avian Shansheeth, intergalactic carers of the dead, and brought to Earth.  Much to Clyde and Rani’s dismay, Sarah Jane flat-out refuses to accept that the Doctor is really dead – in their minds, she’s denying the awful but evident truth before her eyes.  Still, she agrees to attend the funeral at a UNIT base in the hopes of discovering what’s really going on, and there, she finds a friend and accomplice in another former companion:  one Jo Grant.

There are no words for how fantastic Elisabeth Sladen and Katy Manning are together in this story.  Bright, bubbly, hippy-dippy grandma Jo makes such a great foil for Sarah Jane, and I love watching them bond over their experiences with the Doctor.  There are classic Who references galore – Sarah Jane and Jo swapping notes on Peladon is too fun, and Sarah Jane’s description of other past companions she’s found online is just beautiful – and the strong plot emphasis on the importance of memory is altogether too fitting for a story like this.

And when the Eleventh Doctor comes along (because, of course, he’s not actually dead,) it gets even better.  Fast and funny, big and exciting, gorgeously emotional – it’s all good.  My personal favorite scene features two heart-to-hearts, first between the Doctor and Sarah Jane (discussing his recent regeneration) and then, stupendously, the Doctor and Jo (talking about why he doesn’t “look back” after a companion leaves.)  As I’ve said before, even though Eleven looks so young – which Jo comments on hilariously – you 100% buy him as having the same avuncular dynamic with Jo that Three did.

It’s Clyde and Rani’s first experience with regeneration, and they both acquit themselves pretty well.  To be fair, things have already kicked up quite a bit before either of them meets Eleven, so there’s not a huge amount of time to react, but still, they respond both well and believably to the new-to-them Doctor.  Rani has the briefest “Who on earth are you?” moment that, in context, is more than appropriate, and Clyde is more fascinated than anything about the physical side of regeneration.  I absolutely adore the scene of the Doctor and the kids crawling through a ventilation shaft (because of course they are,) where Clyde is cheerfully asking question after question about how regeneration works.  I especially like that he asks if the Doctor can change his race.  1) The relevance of that question is exponentially increasing these days, 2) it’s totally something that Clyde would think of, and 3) it’s one that carries more weight when asked by a character of color.  Race along rarely factors into The Sarah Jane Adventures, but whenever it does, they do a nice job with it.

Like I said, it’s not perfect.  The villains’ motivations are a bit murky, the Shansheeth very clearly look like giant puppets, and Sarah Jane, Jo, Rani, and Clyde all act a little more, “Doctor, what do we do?!” than they ought to.  However, it’s such a fun, sweet love letter to Who that I really don’t mind.

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