OK, so it doesn't have the same theme music (which is a shame, as the one it does have would make Delia Darbyshire cry), but The Sarah Jane Adventures is basically old skool Doctor Who with money thrown at it. Which makes it a very very wonderful thing indeed. 2-part stories so we get a cliffhanger! An older person hero who is brainy and a bit mental! Actual skience! AND I used to walk past her house on the way home from school every day, which makes me practically her companion. (Ahem.)
They have traded in the eggbox spaceships and chromakey in favour of prettier explosions and people who can act, which is a touch radical. And it suffers a little from forelock-tugging to New Who (not to mention prop-borrowing, which is presumably the sole reason for the return of the still-not-at-all-interesting-or-funny Slitheen). But there remains something relentlessly uplifting about the mere existence of a kids' show which centres on a MILF who saves the world by being quite clever.
When I am a lady of a certain age, I would like to have a big attic full of space junk, a computer for a husband, and to fight crime. I'll pass on the tin dog, though.
Of course, this is not Sarah Jane's first foray into spin-off land, so for your delectation here's the opening credits for K9 and Company (scroll ahead to 3.52, unless you want to sit through an awful lot of diddly-dums). Warning: unintentional hilarity within.
the three Rs:
Philip Reeve's Larklight. Victorian space pirates ahoy!
editing, editing, editing
Scrabbling around YouTube looking for Garth Marenghi's Darkplace clips. Can't imagine what put it into my mind...
4 comments:
So, where is her house then? I saw about 1m of SJ yesterday (which is about as much of the last series of DW as I got) and yes, was also struck by how great it is to have something for kids with a strong female character who is older than 15. It made me think about the comment someone made once about Dr Doolittle: that it challenges the assumption people sometimes make that books for children have to be about children.
I've seen the hilarious k9 credits before, bizarrely. I especially like the 'typewriter and wine outside pub' scene. She was obviously waiting a decade or three until Starbucks opened with a wireless hotspot.
BTW, had to look up MILF. Euch! My feminist sensibilities are offended. Surely the advantage of getting older/being a mum is that (hopefully) people start looking at your face instead of your boobs, no?
Corner of Clinton Road, I believe.
It's like that bit in A Child In Time where he writes a memoir about his childhood, and the publisher assumes it's a children's book because it's about a kid. Silliness. Doctor Who is a pretty good example too, where even the supposed POV characters are adults too (even if I assume that only came about because child actors are expensive/often shite).
All lady journos of the 70s carted their typewriters outside to contemplate some drizzle with a glass of Chardonnay, shortly before balancing their robot dogs precariously on a wall. FACT.
MILF is horrid, yes, sorry, etc.
Aha, I think I must have seen it being filmed in March then, when we were househunting. There were vans. And people dressed as nuns. (Or nuns, possibly.)
Post a Comment