B00DPX9ST8 EBOK (188 page)

Doctor Who
Series 3 takes place over a four-day period in June, and the “Vote Saxon” poster seems to indicate the national election that concludes in
The Sound of Drums
. However,
TW: Out of Time
ends on 24th December, 2007, and
Combat
seems to take place shortly thereafter. Moving
Captain Jack Harkness
and
End of Days
to June because of the poster would mean, then, that six months pass between
Torchwood
episodes eleven and twelve.

While this might sound plausible in theory, it is hard to watch
Torchwood
Series 1 and genuinely believe that such a six-month gap has taken place where none was apparently meant to exist. Not only does the general flow suggest that events in
Out of Time
were fairly recent (notably the rawness that Diane’s departure has inflicted on Owen - as Ianto’s “You’ve been off, haven’t you?” comment helps to indicate), the costuming indicates January. Jack wears his trenchcoat regardless of the weather, but Toshiko and Bilis have on winter clothes that no sane person would wear in June. Owen and Gwen are dressed a bit more casually, but their jackets are still out of place for daytime in summer.

The apparent symmetry of Rift travel also suggests a January dating. Jack and Tosh travel through the Rift and arrive in 1941 on 20th January, and as previous Rift travellers seemed to arrive on the same calendar day they left (
Out of Time
), a case can be made that the two of them similarly depart on 20th January, 2008.

Overall, it has become a convention of modern-day television that time within a series progresses in relation to the time of broadcast - even some non sci-fi shows (such as
Boston Legal
) adhere to this rule, and in the main
Torchwood
is no exception. Series 1 seems to open a couple of months after
Doomsday
, and episode eight (
TW: They Keep Killing Suzie
) occurs “three months” after the series opener
-
it’s actually been more like two months in the real world, but it’s in the ballpark. Viewers innately tend to follow this pattern, and among those who keep track of this sort of thing, a January dating (roughly concurrent with the broadcast of
Captain Jack Harkness
and
End of Days
) seems to cause far less confusion than June.

One possibility is that the “Vote Saxon” poster indicates the Saxon Party, as mentioned by Saxon himself in
The Sound of Drums.
Little is known (beyond a general sense of instability) about British politics between Harriet Jones’ downfall and Saxon becoming Prime Minister, and the poster could refer to a secondary election that takes place in January. Similarly, the
Daily Telegraph
headline in
Love & Monsters
that reads “Saxon Leads Polls with 64 percent” is just as likely to refer to the party as Saxon himself.

[
1174
] Dating
TW: End of Days
(
TW
1.13) - There is an obvious need to link this story to
Doctor Who
Series 3, as Jack here registers the TARDIS’ arrival and chases the Ship down at the start of
Utopia
. Related to the dating issues in
TW: Captain Jack Harkness
, it seems far simpler to presume that it’s February 2008 when the Doctor and Martha land to refuel in
Utopia
, even though this (plausibly) means they’ve arrived four months before their first meeting in
Smith and Jones
, and that Jack is gone from Cardiff for that duration of time. The Torchwood website supports this with a missing poster of Jack that’s dated to February 2008.

[
1175
] Dating
Utopia
(X3.11) - The precredit sequence of
Utopia
matches up with the end of
TW: End of Days
, and shows Jack reunited with the Doctor - explicitly for the first time since
The Parting of the Ways
.
End of Days
is set shortly after Christmas 2007, so the Doctor and Martha must land a few months in her past.

[
1176
] Dating
TW: Consequences
: “Kaleidoscope” (
TW
novel #15b) - The story occurs shortly after Jack goes missing from Torchwood in
Utopia
, and
TW: End of Days
is cited as being “recent”. It’s wrongly claimed that Gwen and Rhys are already married (p69).

[
1177
] Dating
The Condemned
(BF #105) - Menzies starts interrogating the Doctor at “1:05 am on 29th February, 2008”; the Doctor and Charley seem to arrive in Manchester a couple hours or so beforehand. The baddies here try to poison the Doctor with a bit of aspirin - something fandom has presumed as being the pill the third Doctor thinks will kill him in
The Mind of Evil
, but which goes unnamed on screen.

[
1178
] Dating
The Haunting of Thomas Brewster
(BF #107) - The year is given, and it matches the year of this audio’s release.

[
1179
] Dating “Warkeeper’s Crown” (
DWM
#378-380) - The Brigadier is in his seventies, which (probably) means this is the first decade of the twenty-first century.

[
1180
] Dating
The Eleventh Hour
(X5.1) - It’s “two years” before Amy finally starts travelling with the Doctor, which is firmly established as 2010. When the Atraxi scan Earth, they see the Vashta Nerada, Hath and Ood - three races that we’ve never seen attack Earth. The image of the Cybermen marching is from
Rise of the Cybermen
, so it technically happened on a parallel Earth, but it presumably stands in for similar events from
Army of Ghosts
/
Doomsday
.

[
1181
]
The Forgotten Army

[
1182
] “Seven months and eleven days” before
TW: Adrift
, which means that the Rift likely “abducts” Jonah in March. A continuity glitch exists in that Jack investigates the incident on the very day that Jonah is taken - even though he should be off world with the Doctor and Martha (per
Utopia
). It’s possible that Jack used his Vortex Manipulator to go back and look into Jonah’s disappearance after the fact.

[
1183
] Alan claims that Chrissie “took [their] home apart six months” before
SJA: Eye of the Gorgon
.

[
1184
]
TW: The Undertaker’s Gift

[
1185
] The actor who played Geoff Noble in
The Runaway Bride
, Howard Attfield, died in October 2007, during the filming of Series 4. We learn that Donna’s father had died when we see her again in
Partners in Crime
. The novel
Beautiful Chaos
cites the day of Geoff’s death as 15th May, 2008, but see the dating notes on that story for why this must be called into question.

[
1186
] Dating
Smith and Jones
(X3.1) - In
The Sound of Drums
, Martha says it’s “four days” since she met the Doctor. As that story takes place the day after a General Election, and elections are always held on a Thursday in the UK, it would mean that
The Sound of Drums
starts on a Friday and so
Smith and Jones
is set on a Monday.

Smith and Jones
is clearly set after the Battle of Canary Wharf (
Doomsday
), and Martha, as a medical student, has upcoming exams. In
The Shakespeare Code,
the Doctor boasts that Martha is going to love reading the last
Harry Potter
book - eagerly anticipated at time of broadcast, but released on 22nd July, 2007, the year before he met her. Perhaps she’s mentioned she’s not read it, but as
The Shakespeare Code
follows directly on from
Smith and Jones
, there are maybe two opportunities for this off-screen conversation to occur.

In
Utopia
, Martha says the Cardiff earthquake (
Boom Town
, set in 2006) was “a couple of years ago”. A small oddity is that the Doctor’s John Smith persona (in TV’s
Human Nature
) dreams that he’s from “2007”, not 2008.

[
1187
] Dating
Turn Left
(X4.11) - This is the alternate timeline version of
Smith and Jones
. It’s “six months” since the alternative
The Runaway Bride
- despite dialogue saying the Thames “remains closed”, it looks fine in the footage we’re shown. Funnily enough, as Sarah Jane goes to the moon in this version of events, the story title
Smith and Jones
is still apt.

[
1188
] Dating
The Lazarus Experiment
(X3.6) - The Doctor says that Martha has only been away “twelve hours”. This has to mean “twelve hours” after she left in the TARDIS with him at the end of
Smith and Jones
, not when they first met each other in the kidnapped hospital - otherwise, Martha and her family would be made to experience Leo’s party and events in
The Lazarus Experiment
on the same evening.

[
1189
] Dating
Made of Steel
(
Quick Reads
#2) - This is the first time Martha has returned to the Royal Hope Hospital. The events of
Smith and Jones
are “recent”, and her absence is a source of curiosity to Rachel rather than serious concern - however, it’s clearly after
The Lazarus Experiment
, which is Martha’s first return to her own time. Martha’s exams are “soon”.

[
1190
] Dating
The Family of Blood
(X3.9) - The year isn’t given, but Latimer’s extreme age and the fact the service is conducted by a woman indicates at least a near-present-day setting. It’s likely Martha’s “present day”.

[
1191
] Dating
Wishing Well
(NSA #19) - The year isn’t given, although it seems to be around Martha’s native time. A 1989 mountaineering accident occurred “nearly twenty years” ago (p53). The book saw release in December 2007.

[
1192
] Dating “Bus Stop!” (
DWM
#385) - The story was published in 2007, and might follow the “year ahead” rule pertaining to Series 3.

[
1193
] Dating “Death to the Doctor!” (
DWM
#390) - None of the villains are said to have time-travel capabilities. Given the flashback of the ninth Doctor and Rose at the Powell Estate - and the third Doctor’s defeat of the Mentor in the UNIT era - this presumably happens in accordance with the story’s publication in 2007, allowing for the “year ahead” paradigm of Series 3.

[
1194
] Dating
Blink
(X3.10) - A caption says it’s a year later in the broadcast version, but doesn’t appear in the DVDs (possibly the result of a last-minute change the DVD-authoring house didn’t know about). The earlier sequences were explicitly set in 2007.

[
1195
] At the end of
42.

[
1196
]
The Sound of Drums