Sarah Jane Smith.html



Doctor Who universe character
Sarah Jane Smith
Affiliated with	Third Doctor Fourth Doctor Tenth Doctor1 Pharos Institute UNIT K-9
Race	Human
Home planet	Earth
Home era	20th century, 21st century
First appearance	The Time Warrior
Portrayed by	Elisabeth Sladen Jessica Ashworth Jessica Mordridge

Sarah Jane Smith is a fictional character played by Elisabeth Sladen in the long-running British BBC Television science fiction series Doctor Who and its related spin-offs. An investigative journalist, Sarah Jane is a regular companion of the Third and Fourth incarnations of the Doctor, on the programme from 1973 to 1976 (seasons 11 – 14), and returns in the Fifth Doctor story "The Five Doctors" (1983), the 30th anniversary story Dimensions In Time (1993), and most recently in the episodes "School Reunion" (2006), and "The Stolen Earth"/"Journey's End" (2008), alongside the Tenth Doctor, David Tennant and other companions of his era.

One of the longest serving companions, she appears as a regular character in 18 stories over four seasons, and is the first companion to appear in a spin-off, the 1981 television pilot K-9 and Company. She is the central character in the ongoing series The Sarah Jane Adventures.

Appearances

Television

1973-1976, 1983; introduction and classic run

A younger Sarah Jane in a publicity photo from Planet of Evil (1975)

Sarah first appears in the Third Doctor serial The Time Warrior, where she has managed to infiltrate a top secret research facility by posing as her aunt, Lavinia Smith, a famous virologist. Sneaking into the TARDIS while the Doctor is preparing to follow the trail of a kidnapped scientist through time, she becomes embroiled in the subsequent adventure in the Middle Ages.

Sarah then finds herself working with the Third Doctor and UNIT on a number of occasions. She is present when he regenerates into the Fourth Doctor at the end of Planet of the Spiders, and continues to accompany him on his journeys through time and space.

As a companion she is confident and inquisitive, and possesses a sharp mind as well as a sharp tongue. She is also a feminist — in her first appearance she is infuriated when the Doctor asks her to make coffee, and she often verbally spars with fellow companion Harry Sullivan, who has an old-fashioned and unintentionally patronising attitude towards her. However, this does not get in the way of forming a close friendship with him. In The Monster of Peladon, the Doctor advises Sarah to share concepts of Women's Lib with Queen Thalira, whose power is limited on her planet because of her sex. In later episodes, Sarah's views become less vocalised, but she never gives the impression that she is less than capable. In spite of the dangerous and frightening situations she often finds herself in, she loves adventure and risk, and in spite of her outward complaints, is always thrilled to go off in search of more adventure. She shares a rapport with the Third and Fourth Doctors, and is consistently one of the Doctor's most popular companions among fans.²

The exact placement of Sarah's adventures with the Doctor is part of the UNIT dating controversy. In Pyramids of Mars she states (more than once) that she was "from 1980", which implies that her adventures with the Doctor took place in the near future with respect to the time of broadcast.

During her time with the Doctor, Sarah encounters Daleks (and is the first companion to meet their creator Davros), Cybermen, antimatter creatures on the most distant planet in the universe, android mummies in 1911 England, ancient evils in 15th century Italy and other dangers, until she is returned to Earth at the end of The Hand of Fear.

Her departure from the TARDIS coincides with the Doctor's summons to his home planet, Gallifrey, to which he was forbidden to take humans at that point. However, his attempt to materialise the TARDIS near her flat in South Croydon falls short of the mark. Thirty years later, when she encounters the Tenth Doctor in "School Reunion", she reveals that he had in fact abandoned her in Aberdeen, Scotland. Between being dropped off by the Fourth Doctor and meeting the Tenth Doctor, Sarah was herself summoned to Gallifrey where she was reunited with the Third Doctor, and met the First, Second and Fifth Doctors (in The Five Doctors). In the period after she was returned to Earth, she tells the Tenth Doctor, she gave up waiting for him to return and concluded that he had died.

2006-present; revived series and spin-off

At the time of "School Reunion"', Sarah is still single, and suggests to the Doctor that she found it difficult to hold down a lasting relationship with any man following her experiences with him. At the episode's conclusion, he leaves her a new K-9 model, to replace the destroyed K-9 Mark III he sent her as a gift in K-9 & Company.

In the lead-up to the broadcast of "School Reunion", Sladen was quoted in The Daily Mirror being somewhat critical of the characterisation of Sarah Jane in the original programme: "Sarah Jane used to be a bit of a cardboard cut-out. Each week it used to be, 'Yes Doctor, no Doctor', and you had to flesh your character out in your mind — because if you didn't, no one else would." She spoke more favourably of the characterisation in the new series.³

The popularity of Sarah Jane led to the development of a spin-off following her special guest appearance in "School Reunion". The Sarah Jane Adventures, starring Sladen as Sarah Jane, is produced by BBC Wales for CBBC. It began as a 60-minute special, "Invasion of the Bane", written by Russell T Davies and Gareth Roberts shown on 1 January 2007 with a weekly series of ten episodes beginning on 24 September.

In the time between "School Reunion" and "Invasion of the Bane" (at least a year and a half), K-9 has left Sarah Jane to close off a black hole but occasionally passes close enough to contact her. Although K-9 appeared in the special and in a scene in one episode, he will not appear as a recurring character: ⁴ the rights to the character of K-9 are owned by writer Bob Baker, who is developing a separate Australian TV show entitled K-9, an independent production with no other ties to Doctor Who.⁵⁶⁷

Sarah Jane drives an emerald green Nissan Figaro⁸ and investigates alien interactions with Earth aided by a sentient supercomputer named Mr Smith. A watch that scans for alien life and a lipstick-shaped sonic screwdriver were, according to the show's website, gifts from the Doctor, hidden inside K-9 Mark IV when it was left for her at the end of the events shown in "School Reunion". Her low-key methods of investigation have helped protect the Earth from alien attack, which contrast to the more abrasive and militaristic approaches of UNIT and the Torchwood Institute, who, according to Sarah Jane, tend to go in "all guns blazing". Her investigations are covert and remain unknown to her neighbours in Bannerman Road, Ealing which has encouraged her reputation for being formidable and reclusive.

In "Invasion of the Bane", she adopted a son, Luke Smith, and befriended neighbour Maria Jackson during her investigation of the Bubble Shock! manufacturing plant, remarking that since meeting them she is no longer content to live alone. When asked why she never married, she replies that there was only one man for her, to whom no one could ever compare.

During the course of the first series she learns how to be a mother to Luke and starts to become more "mumsy" as she puts it. She and Maria share a close friendship to the point where Maria is the person Sarah "trusts the most". Along with Luke and his friend Clyde Langer they defeat various threats to Earth such as the Bane, the Slitheen, the Gorgon and General Kudlak.

The 13-year old Sarah Jane

In Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane? we meet thirteen year old Sarah Jane, played by Jessica Ashworth, in 1964. In that year, Sarah Jane witnessed the death of her friend Andrea Yates who fell from a pier they were both playing upon and who Sarah Jane was unable to rescue. It was this event that gave Sarah Jane a thirst for justice, and a strong desire to fight against loss of life.

Sarah Jane crosses back over to Doctor Who in the two-part fourth series finale "The Stolen Earth"/"Journey's End", along with Luke, Mr. Smith, and K-9. Here she encounters Davros again, who still recognizes her. She plays a major role in the episodes, temporarily rejoining the Doctor as a companion. Once she helps summon him with the subwave network and Mr. Smith, she heads out to meet up with him but is stopped by two Daleks who go to kill her. Before they can however, Mickey Smith and Jackie Tyler teleport in and kill them. With Jackie and Mickey she is taken prisoner but manages to escape into a side room in the Crucible before she can be killed by the Reality Bomb. She, Jackie, Mickey and Jack Harkness try to threaten Davros (who recognised her from Genesis of the Daleks and was surprised) into stopping the Reality Bomb with a Warp Star she owned, but are captured once again. She witnesses the disarming of the Reality Bomb, the destruction of all the Daleks and the presumed death of Davros. During the towing of Earth home she pilots the TARDIS herself alongside the Doctor, Mickey Smith, Rose Tyler, Martha Jones and Jack Harkness but after it lands runs home to Luke. She is also able to shorten the process of transferring the TARDIS base code numerals to Mr. Smith by summoning K-9 to do it.

The second series of The Sarah Jane Adventures reveals new backstory about Sarah Jane's family. Her parents, Eddie Smith and Barbara Wilson Smith, died in a car accident in 1951, leaving Sarah to be raised by her Aunt Lavinia. As a girl in her Aunt Lavinia's house, Sarah was frightened by a clown doll.

Literature

Sarah appears in several Doctor Who novels and short stories, notably in the Eighth Doctor Adventures novels Interference: Book One and Interference: Book Two by Lawrence Miles; and the Past Doctor Adventures novel Bullet Time by David A. McIntee, all taking place after she stops travelling with the Doctor.

Interference and the Virgin New Adventures novel Christmas on a Rational Planet, also by Miles, suggest that Sarah married someone named Paul Morley sometime between 1996 and 1998 and took his name. In the short story Lily by Jackie Marshall, in Big Finish's Short Trips: A Christmas Treasury, the Fifth Doctor pays a visit to an older Sarah, who has a daughter, Lauren, and an autistic granddaughter, Lily; Lauren's father is named Will.

In the Past Doctor Adventure Bullet Time, Sarah is apparently killed in 1997, contradicting her other spin-off appearances. However, the novel takes place during a story arc where enemies of the Doctor were attempting to eliminate his companions from the timeline, and Sarah's death may have been reversed when those enemies are defeated. In any case, other stories have shown her alive after 1997.

Sarah was mentioned in the prologue of the Virgin Publishing novelisation of The Power of the Daleks by John Peel. It revealed that Sarah was working as UNIT's official chronicler and that in 1986 (although the novel says 1996) she covered the aftermath of the Cybermen's failed attempt to drain Earth of its energy and the technology left behind in their wake (The Tenth Planet).

The continuity of Sarah's appearances in the novels, like all Doctor Who media, is unclear, and they may not even take place in the same continuity as one another. For example, the novels' mention of Sarah as having been married is contradicted by the Sarah Jane Smith audio play Dreamland, and the Sarah Jane Adventures episode "Invasion of the Bane".

Audio drama

Between seasons 13 and 14, Sladen appeared as Sarah, with Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor, in the audio play LP The Pescatons (1976). She also appeared with Baker in "The Time Machine", episode three of the BBC Radio series Exploration Earth on 4 October 1976.

Sarah also appears in two audiobook stories based on the Sarah Jane Adventures (released in November 2007) on CD: The Glittering Storm by Stephen Cole and The Thirteenth Stone by Justin Richards, with both stories read by series star Elisabeth Sladen. This is the first time that BBC Audiobooks have commissioned new content for exclusive release on audio.⁹.

The canonicity of Sarah's appearances in the audio dramas like all Doctor Who spin-off media, is unclear, and they may not even take place in the same continuity as one another. For example, the novels' mention of Sarah as having been married is contradicted by the Sarah Jane Smith audio play Dreamland, and the Sarah Jane Adventures episode "Invasion of the Bane".

Reprising the role

Elisabeth Sladen has returned to the role of Sarah ten times since she left Doctor Who in 1976:

1. In a 1981 pilot for a proposed spin-off television series titled K-9 and Company where Sarah was given K-9 Mark III. She was also said to have worked for the Reuters news agency. However, the planned series never materialised.
2. Sladen played Sarah again in the 1983 20th anniversary special The Five Doctors, appearing alongside Jon Pertwee once more (K-9 also made a brief appearance, directly referring to the events of K-9 and Company).
3. Sladen also appeared as Sarah in the 1993 charity special Dimensions in Time.
4. In 1993 Sladen voiced the character of Sarah in BBC Radio audio play The Paradise of Death (Radio 5) together with Pertwee as the Doctor and Nicholas Courtney as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart.
5. Another BBC Radio drama, The Ghosts of N-Space, was made in 1994 (although not broadcast until 1996, on Radio 2), again featuring Sladen with Jon Pertwee's Doctor and Nicholas Courtney's Brigadier.
6. In 1995 Sladen appeared as Sarah in the Reeltime Pictures' video production Downtime, together with Courtney as the Brigadier and Deborah Watling as Victoria Waterfield.
7. Big Finish Productions has also produced a series of nine Sarah Jane Smith audio adventures set in the present day.
8. In the third episode of the 2006 series of Doctor Who, "School Reunion", Sladen reprised the role of Sarah on television. K-9 also appeared.
9. In 2007, Sladen received her own series again in The Sarah Jane Adventures, of which the second series is now airing.
10. In 2008, Sladen reappears in the Doctor Who episodes "The Stolen Earth" and "Journey's End", for which she received star billing in the opening titles.

List of appearances

Television

Doctor Who

Season 11 (1973-74)

• The Time Warrior
• Invasion of the Dinosaurs
• Death to the Daleks
• The Monster of Peladon
• Planet of the Spiders

Season 12 (1974-75)

• Robot
• The Ark in Space
• The Sontaran Experiment
• Genesis of the Daleks
• Revenge of the Cybermen

Season 13 (1975-76)

• Terror of the Zygons
• Planet of Evil
• Pyramids of Mars
• The Android Invasion
• The Brain of Morbius
• The Seeds of Doom

Season 14 (1976)

• The Masque of Mandragora
• The Hand of Fear

20th anniversary special (1983)

• The Five Doctors

30th anniversary special (1993)

• Dimensions in Time

Series 2 (2006)

• "School Reunion"

Series 4 (2008)

• "The Stolen Earth" / "Journey's End"

K-9 and Company(1981)

• "A Girl's Best Friend"

The Sarah Jane Adventures

New Year's Day special (2007)

• "Invasion of the Bane"

Series 1 (2007)

• Revenge of the Slitheen
• Eye of the Gorgon
• Warriors of Kudlak
• Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?
• The Lost Boy

Series 2 (2008)

• The Last Sontaran
• The Day of the Clown
• Secrets of the Stars
• The Mark of the Berserker
• The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith
• Enemy of the Bane

Video

• Downtime (novelised by scriptwriter Marc Platt as part of the Virgin Missing Adventures line)

Audio dramas

Argo Records

• The Pescatons (novelised by scriptwriter Victor Pemberton as part of the Target Books novelisation line)

BBC Radio

• Exploration Earth: The Time Machine
• The Paradise of Death (novelised by scriptwriter Barry Letts as part of the Target Books novelisation line)
• The Ghosts of N-Space (novelised by scriptwriter Barry Letts as part of the Virgin Missing Adventures line)

Big Finish Productions

Series One

• Sarah Jane Smith: Comeback
• Sarah Jane Smith: The TAO Connection
• Sarah Jane Smith: Test Of Nerve
• Sarah Jane Smith: Ghost Town
• Sarah Jane Smith: Mirror, Signal, Manoeuvre

Series Two

• Sarah Jane Smith: Buried Secrets
• Sarah Jane Smith: Snow Blind
• Sarah Jane Smith: Fatal Consequences
• Sarah Jane Smith: Dreamland

BBC Audiobooks

• The Sarah Jane Adventures: The Glittering Storm by Stephen Cole
• The Sarah Jane Adventures: The Thirteenth Stone by Justin Richards

(both Sarah Jane Adventures audiobook CDs were read by Elisabeth Sladen)

Novels

The Companions of Doctor Who

• Harry Sullivan's War by Ian Marter

Virgin Missing Adventures

• Evolution by John Peel
• System Shock by Justin Richards
• Managra by Stephen Marley
• A Device of Death by Christopher Bulis

Virgin New Adventures

• Christmas on a Rational Planet by Lawrence Miles (Sarah does not appear, but her writings are quoted)

Eighth Doctor Adventures

• Alien Bodies by Lawrence Miles (cameo appearance in prologue)
• Interference: Book One by Lawrence Miles
• Interference: Book Two by Lawrence Miles

Past Doctor Adventures

• Bullet Time by David A. McIntee
• Amorality Tale by David Bishop
• Wolfsbane by Jacqueline Rayner
• Island of Death by Barry Letts

Short stories

• "The Duke of Dominoes" by Marc Platt (Decalog)
• "Scarab of Death" by Marc Stammers (Decalog)
• "Housewarming" by David A. McIntee (Decalog 2: Lost Property)
• "Moving On" by Peter Anghelides (Decalog 3: Consequences)
• "Old Flames" by Paul Magrs (Short Trips)
• "Rights" by Paul Grice (Short Trips)
• "The Sow in Rut" by Mike Tucker and Robert Perry (More Short Trips)
• "The Android Maker of Calderon IV" by Miche Doherty (Short Trips and Sidesteps)
• "Balloon Debate" by Simon A. Forward (Short Trips: Companions)
• "The Discourse of Flies" by Jeremy Daw (Short Trips: A Universe of Terrors)
• "An Overture Too Early" by Simon Guerrier (Short Trips: The Muses)
• "Eternity" by Jonathan Blum (Short Trips: Steel Skies)
• "All Done with Mirrors" by Christopher Bav (Short Trips: Past Tense)
• "To Kill a Nandi Bear" by Paul Williams (Short Trips: Past Tense)
• "Primitives" by John Seavey (Short Trips: Life Science)
• "The Republican's Story" by Andy Russell (Short Trips: Repercussions)
• "Categorical Imperative" by Simon Guerrier (Short Trips: Monsters)
• "Observer Effect" by Lance Parkin (Short Trips: 2040)
• "Lily" by Jackie Marshall (Short Trips: A Christmas Treasury)
• "UNIT Christmas Parties: Ships That Pass" by Karen Dunn (Short Trips: A Christmas Treasury)
• "Suitors, Inc." by Paul Magrs (Short Trips: Seven Deadly Sins)
• "The Last Broadcast" by Matthew Griffiths (Short Trips: A Day in the Life)
• "Neptune" by Richard Dinnick (Short Trips: The Solar System)
• "The Lampblack Wars" by Matthew Sweet (Short Trips: The History of Christmas)
• "Numb" by Dave Owen (Short Trips: Defining Patterns)
• "Generation Gap" by Lou Anders (Short Trips: Transmissions)

Comics

• "Doomcloud", artist unknown (Doctor Who Holiday Special 1974)
• "Perils of Paris", artist unknown (Doctor Who Holiday Special 1974)
• "Who's Who?", artist unknown (Doctor Who Holiday Special 1974)
• "Death Flower!" by Gerry Haylock (TV Comic 1204 – 1214)
• "Return of the Daleks!" by Martin Asbury (TV Comic 1215 – 1222)
• "The Wreckers!" by Martin Asbury (TV Comic 1223 – 1231)
• "The Emperor's Spy!" by John Canning (TV Comic 1232 – 1238)
• "The Sinister Sea!" by John Canning (TV Comic 1239 – 1244)
• "The Space Ghost!" by John Canning (TV Comic 1245 – 1250)
• "The Dalek Revenge!" by John Canning (TV Comic 1251 – 1258)
• "Virus" by John Canning (TV Comic 1259 – 1265)
• "Treasure Trail" by John Canning (TV Comic 1266 – 1272)
• "Hubert's Folly" by John Canning (TV Comic 1273 – 1279)
• "Counter-Rotation" by John Canning (TV Comic 1280 – 1286)
• "Mind Snatch" by John Canning (TV Comic 1287 – 1290)
• "The Hoaxers" by John Canning (TV Comic 1291)
• "Dredger" by John Canning (Mighty TV Comic 1305-1311)
• "Woden's Warriors" by John M. Burns (TV Comic Annual 1976)
• "The Tansbury Experiment" by John Canning (TV Comic Annual 1977)
• "Jackals of Space!" by John Canning (TV Comic Annual 1978)
• "The Psychic Jungle" by Paul Crompton (Doctor Who Annual 1976)
• "Neuronic Nightmare" by Paul Crompton (Doctor Who Annual 1976)
• "The Body Snatcher" by Paul Crompton (Doctor Who Annual 1977)
• "Menace on Metalupiter" by Paul Crompton (Doctor Who Annual 1977)
• "The Rival Robots" by Paul Crompton (Doctor Who Annual 1978)
• "The Traitor" by Paul Crompton (Doctor Who Annual 1978)
• "Train-Flight" by Andrew Donkin, Graham S. Brand and John Ridgway (Doctor Who Magazine 159 – 161)
• "Black Destiny" by Gary Russell, Martin Geraghty and Bambos Georgiou (Doctor Who Magazine 235 – 237)
• "Ground Zero" by Scott Gray and Martin Geraghty (Doctor Who Magazine 238 – 242)
• "Doctor Who and the Fangs of Time" by Sean Longcroft (Doctor Who Magazine 243)
• "City of Devils" by Vincent Danks and Gary Russell (1992 Sarah-Jane Holiday Special)
• "The Naked Flame" by Warwick Gray and Charlie Adlard (Doctor Who Yearbook 1995)

References

External links

• Sarah Jane Smith on TARDIS Index File, an external wiki
• Sarah Jane Smith on the BBC's Doctor Who website ("New Series")
• Sarah Jane Smith on the BBC's Doctor Who website ("Classic Series")
• Online TV Interview on Liverpool Reporter hosted by Jonathan Thompson with Elisabeth Sladen in 2006
• BBC Norfolk Kids: The Sarah Jane Adventures
• BBC Norfolk: Interview with Elisabeth Sladen regarding Sarah Jane Smith