"Come along Smith!" Sarah Jane meets yet another Doctor in this penultimate season of The Sarah Jane Adventures, and the story which features the Doctor has to be one of the highlights of this season. More on this later.
The season starts strongly with a terrifying (honestly for kids tv his is bloody creepy!) story called The Nightmare Man. Julian Bleach guest stars as said Nightmare Man which I think makes him one of the only actors to have appeared in all three shows of Doctor Who, Torchwood, and The Sarah Jane Adventures. He gave a suitably manic portrayal of Davros in Doctor Who and he plays an even creepier character who haunts Luke's dreams.
As a kid I was always terrified of Freddy Krueger, and whilst the man in this story is not horribly disfigured nevertheless some of the dream imagery used still gives mes shivers. As well as creeping out I must admit that this story made me cry a little as this is effectively Luke's goodbye story as he leaves to go off to university. The scenes between him and Sarah Jane are fantastic and beautiful and you really feel how much both characters have developed over the last few years, Luke growing as a human and Sarah Jane finally discovering what is is like to have a family.
As mentioned previously, the other highlight of the season is the third story called Death Of The Doctor. There are so many moments in these two episodes to please the geeky fans like myself, the main one being the return of Jo Grant! (I've met Katy Manning who plays Jo, I may have mentioned this before..)
Seeing Jo and Sarah Jane together on screen is fantastic enough as it is but then the Doctor himself turns up! This is the first time Jo has seen him for nearly 40 years and when she discovers that he is now travelling with Amy and Rory, a married couple, she is a little hurt as she only ever left the Doctor because she got married. Its interesting to see what happens to the people whose lives have been touched by the Doctor and seeing Jo and the Doctor together again is great.
The season finale is a little bit of a let down. A new woman appears on the street who seems to be fighting aliens just like Sarah Jane is but seems to be much better at it as Sarah Jane starts to discover her memory and abilities are fading. It's really quite poignant as Elizabeth Sladen who played Sarah Jane must have been quite sick herself at the time, she died about a year after this, so when Mr Smith scans her and tells her she is very sick indeed you can't help but feel a little emotional. Of course it turns out this new woman is an alien and actually there is nothing wrong with Sarah Jane.
However, the series ends with Sarah Jane saying how fit and well she feels and how she feels like she can go on forever...sadly this is not the case and the next season of The Sarah Jane Adventures would be cut short by the tragic loss of it's star Elizabeth Sladen.
Well I'm thoroughly depressed now! Matt Smith's first Christmas special to look forward to tomorrow at least!
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