B00DPX9ST8 EBOK (194 page)

Two bits of discontinuity exist in
The Time Capsule
: Luke says that he’s only lived “for a year”, when it’s only been a couple of months since
SJA: Invasion of the Bane
. Also, Rani wears some glasses that Sarah Jane says “made her look older than her 15 years” - which has to be taken as a mistake, as all the on-screen evidence indicates Rani didn’t meet Sarah Jane and company until she was 16. Clyde, at least, is correctly said to be 15.

[
1317
] Dating
TW: Long Time Dead
(
TW
novel #16) - The dating evidence is a bit contradictory. It’s said (p17) that the Department started combing through the ruins of the Hub “barely a month” after its destruction (in September 2009,
TW: Children of Earth
), and that it’s now “three weeks” into that undertaking - meaning it’s currently on or about early November 2009. The Department believes that Gwen is still pregnant, and Jack appears in the final act, presumably before his departure from Earth (in March 2010,
Children of Earth
again). However, it’s said that Suzie has been dead for “years”, and that it’s been “so many years ago” since she created a bank account in 2007. Most specific of all, Suzie looks at the date on a note saying when a toilet was last cleaned and concludes “She’d been dead for
three years
?” (p30), which should mean that it’s now 2010, not 2009. It’s something of a coin toss as to which evidence should take precedence, but the timeline of the Department salvaging the Hub seems a bit harder to set aside.

[
1318
] Dating
SJA: Secrets of the Stars
(
SJA
2.3) - The article reporting on the mass hypnosis event in
The Ealing Echo
at story’s end is a bit difficult to make out, but seems to be datelined “November 7”. Sarah and friends first go to see Trueman’s show on a “Friday night”, and the mass-hypnosis event occurs the next day. In 2009, 7th November was indeed a Saturday - unfortunately, the first paragraph of
The
Ealing Echo
story reads, “the world was coming to [unreadable word] yesterday”, suggesting that the world was spellbound on “Saturday, 6th November”, and that this is yet-another instance of the calendar in a
Doctor Who
-related TV story being off from that of the real world. It’s a puzzler as to how news services in this story are reporting on the “hypnosis” event when Trueman has seemingly usurped every TV broadcast.

[
1319
]
SJA: Secrets of the Stars.
The date that Luke and Sarah pick for his “birthday” would
seem
to be 7th November - the same as the dateline listed on the
The Ealing Echo
that appears in the same scene - although this isn’t expressly said, and so they might be having the discussion on 8th November or shortly thereafter. Either way, they must take this opportunity to advance his “age” - Luke is “14” before this, but is “15” in
SJA: The Gift
. This means, however, that Luke has spent about 15 months (the time since
SJA: Revenge of the Slitheen
) being “14”, and that Sarah somehow forgot to inch up his age (or throw him a birthday party, for that matter).

[
1320
] They first meet at least “a month” before
SJA: The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith
. While Sarah’s life is extremely busy in this period, dealing with one crisis or another, it is hardly beyond the realm of all possibility that she could meet a man while shopping in a shoe store.

[
1321
] Dating
SJA: The Mark of the Berserker
(
SJA
2.4) - Paul Langer refers to “those Dalek things”, so it’s set after
The Stolen Earth
/
Journey’s End
. Clyde’s mother specifies that the story opens on a “Friday night”. As
SJA: Secret of the Stars
and
SJA: Enemy of the Bane
seem to respectively take place the first and third weeks in November,
The Mark of the Berserker
by logical extension can only start on the Friday in-between the two, i.e. 13th November, and continue to the next day.

[
1322
] Dating
SJA: The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith
(
SJA
2.5) - The events of
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?
were “last year”. The action begins on an afternoon and continues to the next day, when Rani says, “Mum, it’s a Saturday”. Given the need to accommodate
SJA: The Mark of the Berserker
occupying the only weekend available between 7th and 21st November, and the next story occurring on 21st and 22nd November,
The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith
has to unfold the two days beforehand (see the dating notes on
SJA: Enemy of the Bane
).

[
1323
] Dating
SJA: Enemy of the Bane
(SJA 2.6) - Miss Wormwood writes the date “20-11-200[?] ” on the cheque that she gives to Gita Chandra, with the last digit being a squiggle, probably either an “8” or a “9”. Either way, the third digit is a zero (so it’s before 2010), and the date of 20th November is very legible.

The story opens with Rani’s mum Gita working late on Saturday night to accommodate Mrs Wormwood’s order; the action continues the next morning when Rani and Haresh realise that Gita has gone missing (because Wormwood abducts her to get Sarah’s attention). In 2009, 20th November was actually a Friday, not a Saturday, although it’s plausible to think that Wormwood wrote the cheque the day beforehand as preparation for her scheme. That said, with the previous Series 2 stories occupying the other weekends in November, the cheque can only have direct relevance if
SJA: The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith
and
Enemy of the Bane
occur in rapid succession over a three-day period. Such a scenario is more believable than it might seem - as Sarah is only summoned to look into Gita’s disappearance the morning after it happens, her group at least has the comfort of dinner and a night’s sleep after
The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith
before dealing with this newest dilemma. In the course of her adventuring, Sarah has surely had to cope with a lot worse.

[
1324
]
SJA: Enemy of the Bane
, and suggested by mention of “homeworld security” (
The Sontaran Stratagem
).

[
1325
] Dating
SJA: From Raxacoricofallapatorius With Love
(2009
Comic Relief
special) - This five-minute special aired between Series 2 and 3, and fits comfortably there. K9 briefly appears, presumably leaving his duties around the black hole for a few minutes. The very last image is of K9 wearing the
Comic Relief
red nose, but this isn’t any more of a continuity violation than William Hartnell wishing everyone a merry Christmas at the end of
The Daleks’ Masterplan
episode seven - an episode that virtually everyone regards as canon.

[
1326
] Dating
The Sarah Jane Adventures
Series 3 (
SJA: Prisoner of the Judoon
, 3.1;
SJA: The Mad Woman in the Attic
, 3.2;
SJA: Monster Hunt
, webcomic #1;
SJA: The White Wolf
, audiobook #5;
SJA: The Shadow People
, audiobook #6;
SJA: The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith
, 3.3) - The transition of
The Sarah Jane Adventures
from being a show set one year ahead of broadcast (per all
Doctor Who
-related television after
Aliens of London
) and set at time of broadcast (starting with
Planet of the Dead
) means that
Sarah Jane
Series 2, 3 and 4 are condensed into about fifteen months of time. Series 2 (still a year ahead of broadcast) seems to begin in late August 2009 and to end on or around 20th November, 2009. By Series 4, the series has resumed a time-of-broadcast approach, opening in September 2010 and ending relatively close to 23rd November, 2010. (See the individual story entries for how those dates were derived.)

Series 3, then, fills the gap between the two. Where Sarah and Luke are concerned, their encounter with the tenth Doctor in
SJA: The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith
occurs prior to their final meet-up with him in
The End of Time
(TV) - the result being that Series 3 has to be broken in half, the first three stories occurring in 2009 and the rest occurring in 2010. It’s tempting to gain some flexibility on this by thinking that the dying tenth Doctor could have slipped through time a bit and met Sarah and Luke at virtually any point - as he does when he meets Captain Jack in the space bar - but Luke’s phone conversation with Clyde (“That was the maddest Christmas ever!”, followed by a reference that almost certainly denotes the whole world turning into the Master) suggests that
The End of Time
(TV) has very recently happened.

Everyone is wearing clothing that’s more or less commensurate with colder weather.

[
1327
] Sarah is already aware of the Judoon, although we’ve never seen her meet them before now. The embargo on the Judoon visiting Earth isn’t mentioned when they appear in the fifth Doctor sequence in “The Forgotten”. It’s said to be a Sunday, which could (in accordance with when Series 2 concludes) mean that it’s now 29th November, or early December (the 6th, for instance).

[
1328
]
SJA: The Vault of Secrets

[
1329
] Dating
SJA: The Mad Woman in the Attic
(
SJA
3.2) - Sam was born in 1994 and is now “15”. It’s specified as being a Saturday. Presuming the comment about Maria aiding “the government” can be taken at face value, it’s not entirely clear if this means the US or the UK government.

[
1330
] Dating
SJA: Monster Hunt
(
SJA
webcomic #1) - The webcomic was released in 2009, and involves Sarah Jane, Luke, Clyde and Rani (so it’s after
SJA: The Day of the Clown
). K9’s appearance in the final panel suggests that it’s after
SJA: The Mad Woman in the Attic
, although one does have to wonder why he isn’t seen helping against the Krulius.

[
1331
] Dating
SJA: The White Wolf
and
SJA: The Shadow People
(
SJA
audiobooks #5-6) - The audios were released together on 8th October, 2009, prior to the debut of
The Sarah Jane Adventures
Series 3. In
The White Wolf
, Sarah makes mention of encountering the Judoon (
Prisoner of the Judoon
), and Luke has memories of the “past few years”, even though it’s only been about sixteen months since
Invasion of the Bane
. It’s “close” to exam time, suggesting that it’s a bit later in the school year. With that in mind, these two stories have, a little arbitrarily, been placed after
SJA: The Mad Woman in the Attic
. Eddison Clough claims that “nearly forty years” of his life are missing - it’s actually been thirty-two (1972-2004), which again proves that characters in the
Doctor Who
universe do round their sums, and not every statement can be taken literally.

In
The Shadow People
, Sarah specifies that it’s a Saturday. Given that
SJA: The Mad Woman in the Attic
also occurs on a Saturday, that two weeks and five days elapse during
SJA: The Wedding of Sarah Jane
, and that Sarah’s wedding doesn’t seem to occur in tandem with Christmas or Boxing Day, the most likely scenario is that
The Shadow People
occurs on 5th December (the only Saturday remaining following
SJA: Enemy of the Bane
). However, it could also be case that these audiobook stories happen within the two-and-a-half-week period that elapses during
The Wedding of Sarah Jane
.