B00DPX9ST8 EBOK (195 page)

Events from
SJS: Ghost Town
are mentioned in
The Shadow People
, providing a bit of cross-pollination between the Big Finish and BBC
Sarah Jane
audio series.

[
1332
] Dating
SJA: The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith
(
SJA
3.3) - Rani says, in response to Sarah making up a flimsy story and sneaking off (to meet Peter), “It’s the fifth time she’s done this in a month.” This has commonly been interpreted to mean that nothing strange has happened to Sarah and her friends in the last month - but it doesn’t, it merely denotes the frequency with which Sarah has offered a lame excuse and dashed off somewhere on her own, so all sorts of adventures could easily have occurred in the interim. Events in this story play out over two weeks and five days, with the wedding itself falling on a Saturday. No matter how one orders
SJA: The Mad Woman in the Attic
,
SJA: The White Wolf
and
SJA: The Shadow People
, at least two Saturdays have passed since
SJA: Enemy of the Bane
, so it’s definitely December. As previously mentioned, for Sarah and Luke, this story has to end before
The End of Time
(TV). The Doctor’s outfit suggests that for him, these events happen between
Planet of the Dead
and
The Waters of Mars
.

[
1333
] Dating
The Slitheen Excursion
(NSA #32) - No year is given - but again, for the Doctor, this story is set between
Planet of the Dead
and
The Waters of Mars
.

[
1334
] Dating “The Big, Blue Box” (IDW
Doctor Who Annual 2010
) - The story seems to have a contemporary setting.

[
1335
] Dating “Old Friend” (IDW
Doctor Who Annual 2010
) - Barnaby lives at a “twenty-first century rest home”, and there’s nothing to suggest it’s not a contemporary setting. The story continues in “Final Sacrifice”.

[
1336
] Dating
Blue Forgotten Planet
(BF #126) - The few sane people on Earth - the ones who take a Viyran vaccine that counteracts the madness afflicting humanity - can’t remember the year, and the dating clues are very piecemeal.

It’s said that two billion have perished owing to the madness - presuming that this is true, the story cannot take place before mankind’s numbers are that high. Additionally, a crater is attributed to an oil refinery exploding, narrowing the possibilities to mankind’s oil-producing period. Lastly, the Viyrans, as time travellers, cannot be blind as to mankind’s eventual expansion beyond Earth - so the fact that they believe they can wipe out virus No. 9007/41 (which exists in every human) by treating the people on Earth alone suggests that mankind’s space age hasn’t happened yet. Related to this, it’s implied that Charley’s travelling with a past version of the Doctor has destabilised history, so the entire derailment of mankind’s future - colony planets, Earth Empire, everything - may have actually occurred before the Doctor steps in and fixes things.

Taking all of that into account, the best placement for
Blue Forgotten Planet
is, funnily enough, the modern day. The story saw release in September 2009 - not only does that work as well as anything, it actually avoids any conflict with the new-series adventures happening in the same window. The only real alternative is 1930 - the year that the Doctor and Mila were travelling to, but it seems that the TARDIS missed that mark. Anyway, the survivors all talk like modern-day individuals, not people from the 30s.

It’s commonly accepted that Mila, not Charley, dies at the end of this story; the final scene between “Charley” and the Doctor is reasonably ambiguous on this point, although the story‘s epilogue seems to suggest that the genuine article has survived. The fact that Big Finish has considered doing Charley solo adventures might also suggest that the real Charley lived.

[
1337
] Dating
Hornets’ Nest
(BBC fourth Doctor audios;
The Stuff of Nightmares
, #1.1;
The Dead Shoes
, #1.2;
The Circus of Doom
, #1.3;
A Sting in the Tale
, #1.4;
Hive of Horror
, #1.5) - The story was released in 2009, and there’s nothing to suggest it doesn’t have a contemporary setting. It’s “the twenty-first century” and the existence of aliens is common knowledge. Mike says in the opening narration of
Hornets’ Nest: The Stuff of Nightmares
that it’s “the day after the winter solstice - the twenty-second of December”. The Doctor relates his story the next day. It is “quite some time” since Mike’s UNIT days, which were in “the seventies”;
Hornets’ Nest: Hive of Horror
says that Mike’s tenure with UNIT was “three decades” and “thirty years” ago. It’s “seventy years” since Mrs Wibbsey’s time according to
Hornets’ Nest: The Dead Shoes
(so, circa 2002).

In the Doctor’s personal timeline, his “recent exploits” include “giant rats, killer robots, skulls from the dawn of time” (i.e., the end of Season 14 and
Image of the Fendahl
). In
Hive of Horror
, he recalls events from
The Invisible Enemy
. With no mention of Leela or Romana, the
Hornet’s Nest
series may take place for the Doctor between
The Invasion of Time
and
The Ribos Operation
.

[
1338
]
Hornets’ Nest: The Dead Shoes

[
1339
]
Hornets’ Nest: The Circus of Doom

[
1340
]
Hornets’ Nest: A Sting in the Tale

[
1341
] Dating
Hornets’ Nest: Hive of Horror
(BBC fourth Doctor audio #1.5) - The story follows directly on from
Hornets’ Nest: A Sting in the Tale
. It’s Christmas Eve when the fourth Doctor, Mike and Mrs Wibbsey defeat the Hornets, and they have Christmas dinner on Christmas Day.
The End of Time
(TV) implies that at some point later that day, Mrs Wibbsey and Mike Yates would have transformed into copies of the Master.

[
1342
]
Demon Quest: The Relics of Time

[
1343
] Dating
The End of Time
(X4.17-4.18) - No year is given, but it’s after
Planet of the Dead
. The story begins on Christmas Eve, and unfolds over the next two days. In
SJA: Death of the Doctor
, set in 2010, Sarah acknowledges seeing the tenth Doctor as part of his “goodwill tour”. The same story establishes that the dying Doctor visited every one of his former companions, not just those of his tenth incarnation.

[
1344
]
The End of Time
(TV). As humanity - including some billions with no Wi-Fi - spends an entire day as the Master, it seems very unlikely that many people would swallow this story.

[
1345
]
Hornets’ Nest: Hive of Horror

[
1346
] Events in 2010 include the last half of
The Sarah Jane Adventures
Series 3; the present day sequences of
Doctor Who
Series 5 and
The Sarah Jane Adventures
Series 4.

[
1347
] As revealled in
Demon Quest: Sepulchre
. This happens “earlier in the year”, i.e. 2010.

[
1348
] The year prior to
TW: Miracle Day
.

[
1349
] “Hotel Historia”

[
1350
]
Mad Dogs and Englishmen

[
1351
] “Decades” before the first portion of
Singularity
.

[
1352
] In Amy’s time, and “by 2010” according to
The Coming of the Terraphiles.

[
1353
] An alternative timeline seen in
So Vile a Sin
.

[
1354
] Dating
Shadow of the Past
(BF CC #4.9) - The story’s framing sequence is probably concurrent with the audio’s release in April 2010. Liz says that it’s been “nearly twice” as long since the Mim incident (in the UNIT era) as the young troopers slain during the event (who were “barely out of school”) were alive.

[
1355
] Dating
Cuddlesome
(BF promo #7,
DWM
#393) - It’s been three years since the main part of the story. Angela says that her ex-partner and his fiancé have a wedding planned “for June”.

[
1356
] Dating
The Macros
(BF LS #1.8) - The Doctor gives the year as 2010, and twice generalises that it’s “over sixty years” since 1943. The TARDIS has been refitted with a Zero Room (also seen in
Renaissance of the Daleks
and
Patient Zero
), following its destruction in
Castrovalva
.

[
1357
] Dating
Memory Lane
(BF #88) - No specific year is given, but most signs indicate that Kim and Tom hail from near the present day. Kim is familiar with iPods; Tom is acquainted with both
Space Lego
(1978-2001) and
Star Wars Lego
(first introduced in 1999) and the Doctor explicitly names their ion jet rocket as the product of the twenty-first century. It’s further said that the rockets come into being “thirty-five years” after the Earth-recreation of Tom’s childhood on Lucentra, and although this stems from a composite of Tom’s memories and isn’t very reliable, it does tie in with the date for
The Seeds of Death
in this chronology.

Kim expects Tom to recognise the names of female astronauts Eileen Collins (who flew in 1995 and 1997, and commanded missions in 1999 and 2005) and Pamela Anne Melroy (who piloted space shuttle missions in 2000 and 2002, and was selected to command one in June 2006).

[
1358
] Dating
Situation Vacant
(BF BBC7 #4.2) - The story seems to be contemporary, and was released in July 2010. The Monk’s involvement is revealled in
The Resurrection of Mars
.

[
1359
]
The Resurrection of Mars
, as partially revealled in
The Book of Kells
.

[
1360
] Dating
Apollo 23
(NSA #37) - It’s twice said (pgs. 30, 147) that it’s “thirty years” after
Apollo 22
launched in June 1980, which would roughly coincide with the novel’s publication in April 2010. The time of year is more indeterminate, although mention that it’s a “cold, grey day” in Texas (p7) tends to imply that it’s not summer. Either way, the story cannot fit into the one-day gap between
The Eleventh Hour
and
The Big Bang
, as it takes the Doctor and company a full day (pgs. 147, 160) to prep
Apollo 23
for launch, and another two days (p147) to reach Base Delta. The Doctor says that it’s “a few hundred years” (p55) before a penal colony is built on the moon (
Frontier in Space
) and that T-Mat won’t be established there (p87) “for a while yet” (
The Seeds of Death
). M3 Variant fuel was developed for the Mars Probe missions (
The Ambassadors of Death
). Mention of “Keller impulses” doubtless refers to
The Mind of Evil
.