Episode One
This is the third episode of series two, and already it feels like
there’s something of a soft reboot, since the cast has changed, and there needs
to a slight restating of what the shows rules are. But since none but the biggest
Maria Jackson fans are really going to care one way or the other that there’s a
new girl in town, neither will we for just the moment, and instead concentrate
on the fact that a CBBC show going out on British TV at 4.45 in the afternoon
has straight up decided to remake Stephen King’s It.
It’s not even as if the allusion is particularly subtle: the opening
sequence has a young child chasing after a lost toy – for the resident of Derry
it was a paper boat, here it’s just a football – but when a creepy clown with
scary teeth rocks up (offering red balloons, no less), it’s safe to say that we
know where inspiration has been found. The paintjob of this episode’s vehicle
is straightforward (scary clowns gonna be scary) and clever (scary clown is
also an alien, while being the original Pied Piper), but the really impressive
thing – again, considering that this is a kid’s show going out before it even
gets dark, is that its largely preoccupied with at least some of the same fears
that It itself is: in other words, the abduction and murder of children. And
while the dialogue may skate over the ramifications of that so quickly, we may
miss it if we blink too much, the actual implications are clear: these children
are indeed being taken away from their families. And (in yet another direct
link with the Stephen King novel), as is pointed out, this clown also feeds on
the abject fear of the distressed parents. This is pretty dark stuff for a kids
show, dark enough that it cannot (and perhaps should not) depict at all realistically:
mere hours after a child’s abduction from within school grounds, the school has
not - as you might have expected - been
placed into lockdown, but still has after school activities going on where the
missing child’s mates cheerfully answer interrogations from a visiting middle
aged stranger.
All of this – Bradley Walsh as the Pied Piper, the child abduction plot,
the breathlessly casual way that the previous headmaster has (presumably) been killed
off, takes secondary status to the arrival of Rani Chandra. Later on, when
Clyde introduces her to Mr Smith, he smiles ‘This is where it gets
interesting,’ and a similar line can be thrown at the show itself. Not because
the previous episodes have been lacking – indeed, many of them have been
glorious – and not because Maria or even Kelsey were flawed as characters – but
as soon as Rani arrives, there’s an almost audible click of everything falling
into place. The Scooby Gang is all here.
Which is to say, this is a very fine ensemble cast (and, not to belabor a
point, a prime example of how having three companions is not too much to
cope with for a sci-fi show that’s led by a woman and features Bradley Walsh.
Not that we’re attempting to draw any direct correlations here). Luke will
always suffer from having to carry double duty on plot exposition (as per
demands, he either knows absolutely nothing about fairly obvious stuff or
absolutely everything about alien stuff – and even that is surplus to requirements
if Mr Smith is powered up and ready). Clyde has a much easier time of it,
getting to be both hot-headedly heroic and smart-ass, while Elisabeth Sladen is
allowed to do new things with her character: for a woman who’s faced off Daleks
and the Loch Ness Monster (copyright, Toby Whithouse, 2006), it makes some sort
of sense that the one thing that would genuinely unsettle her would be rooted
in irrational childhood panic.
All of which leads us to the point that this review has been hurtling
toward for some time now, which is to pour fulsome praise on Aniji Mohindra. It’s
a very confident performance right off the bat. Things are slightly unsettled
in parts of episode 2, where Rani is both written and directed to be a little
more wide-eyed and frenetic than she will be elsewhere, in a fashion that owes something
to her predecessors, and makes one suspect that the episodes were filmed in
reverse order. Otherwise, right from her first meet cute with Clyde,
immediately making snarky comments, and her nonjudgmental observation that Luke
is a ‘bit weird’ (Luke’s clarification that he’s actually ‘different’, could
easily be read as code for viewers who are not neurotypical), all lead to the
sense that Rani has earned her place in the team even before the end of her
first scene. It’s almost laughable – it’s certainly impressive – how the show
makes little to no effort to disguise the fact that Rani is being posited as a
prototypical Sarah Jane – she even wants to be a journalist, for god’s sake. If
The Sarah Jane Adventures has a ‘classic team’ in the way that Doctor
Who has – the Doctor, Victoria and Jamie, for instance, or indeed, the Doctor
and Sarah herself – it’s with this episode that Team SJA is firmly put in
place.
Episode Two
Once they’ve escaped the cliffhanger of the previous episode, Sarah,
Luke and Clyde decamp to Bannerman Road, joined by Rani. There’s the briefest
of hesitation before the plot – and Sarah Jane herself – decide to invite Rani
onto the team properly, via a Russell T Davies-style ‘all of time and space’
speech (only Sarah calls it work experience). Luke has a momentary feeling of loss,
moping at Maria’s photo (which to be fair is more than many classic companions
in Doctor Who got). Sarah has already been asked if she’s always saving
the world, or is that just on Mondays (a cute meta reference to when this
episode was first aired), and it’s time for Rani to find out what saving the
world actually means. There’s mild flirtation energy from Clyde, which is
mostly unnoticed. When alien life forms need help, Sarah explains, they give it.
And if they’re looking for trouble, Clyde grins, they give them that, too.
Before long, Sarah’s put down the rules for being part of her team – ‘We
look after each other, we respect all life, no matter where it comes from,’
which seems like a pretty sound guide to life. Yes, her career is journalism,
but saving the world is ‘more of a hobby’. Rani is mostly impressed by the
talking computer in Sarah’s attic that can answer any question (which
depressingly reminds you how much this story predates your Alexa). Mr Smith is
rattled by Rani right away, dismissing most of the connections that she
immediately makes, so it’s good to see that Sarah backs her up right away.
There’s a quick cameo from Floella Benjamin back at the Pharos Institute
as Sarah collects this week’s macguffin, before Rani has a chance to earn her
place in the team. Not at the episode’s denouement, which we’ll come to in a
moment, but in a more subtle way: she gets to deliver the type of speech
usually reserved for Sarah Jane at the close of an episode. ‘It’s incredible,
isn’t it,’ she muses as her new mentor looks on. ‘The universe. I mean, it’s
scary .. but it’s amazing.’
We just have time for a reasonably obscure Doctor Who clown reference
(no, not that one) and Sarah explaining why clowns scare her more than any
number of aliens (which is both a somewhat difficult thing to make long-term
fans buy, and also something that writer Phil Ford manages to deliver). In one
last reference to It, there are plenty of red balloons that push against
the wind, which make the schoolkids fall into zombified silence (shades of Children
Of Earth there). The kids are pulled back to the villain’s lair, and Sarah
Jane struggles to battle her fear – ‘We’re only scared of what we don’t
understand,’ she claims, only to have OddBob snarl that he literally defies
understanding.
At the close of the episode, Luke is captured (it’s neatly astute that
it’s he that is the damsel in distress rather than the new girl), and Rani – continuing
to prove her Sarah Jane pedigree – deduces that Clyde’s rep as the joker in the
pack (along with his bad jokes) will dilute the bully with the painted face. Again,
it’s essentially the same ending as the Stephen King book (we even get a
version of the ‘deadlights’), coupled with the argument that a mother’s fear is
not a weakness, but rather a strength.
As happy endings go, it’s somewhat bleak (we’re told quite clearly that
hundreds of children over many years have been killed by the entity formed of
fear itself), but as a mission statement, you couldn’t hope for better: fear
does not have to overwhelm you, it’s OK to be scared, and even bad jokes can
save the day.
Oh, and the universe really is surprising.
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