The Sarah Jane Adventures/Headscratchers

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • In "Enemy Of The Bane part 1", The Brigadier tells Sarah Jane she will get in trouble if she's found inside the Black Archive. So why doesn't the Brigadier go in to look for the scroll (or whatever it was) since he says he is less likely that he will end up in trouble?
    • Because he's not allowed to take it either and he's an old man who hasn't kept in shape as well as Sarah Jane, so would have a harder time running away.
  • Another question about "Enemy of the Bane." Why did they bother stealing the scroll from UNIT in the first place? By stealing the scroll, Sarah Jane only gave Wormwood the chance to steal it from her. Wouldn't it have been safer if they'd left the scroll in UNIT's care? True, the Bane had a spy in UNIT but Sarah Jane had no way of knowing that.
    • Because these days she doesn't trust UNIT as far as she can throw them.
  • Where did she get the Sonic Lipstick?
  • Why do all the aliens speak English when the TARDIS isn't in the vicinity?
    • Well, a lot of them are aliens who are or were pretending to be human, so it would make sense that they would speak the language.
    • Does the TARDIS actually need to be in the area? When the Doctor lost the TARDIS in The Satan Pit, everything stayed translated.
    • The Bane had image translators, so they might have language translators. It would be kind of hard to take over the earth if no one can understand you.
    • Sarah Jane's residual Arton Energy creates a telepathic translation that originated from the TARDIS. It will last for a very long time and only stops if The Doctor is incapacitated. Just my guess.
  • Where exactly was Sara Jane during the whole 456 thing? The Doctor is understandable, he's off world enough, but you'd think she'd get involved with something that affects every child on the planet.
    • She was probably actively involved, or pre-occupied with a larger threat.
      • If she was involved, then they couldn't have shown it; SJA is a bit young for Torchwood, and Torchwood is a bit too dark to be on SJA.
  • What does Sarah Jane do for money? She has a nice house, a car, and a son to take care of. Her "freelance journalist" job is purely a sham; she's never seen writing a story and it's mostly used as a cover for her investigations. She's not affiliated with any organization like UNIT anymore, how does she pay the bills?
    • Presumably The Doctor takes steps to ensure the comfort of his former Companions, like he did with Donna.
    • Just because she isn't affiliated doesn't mean she's guaranteed to not get a check in the mail every so often for all the alien-fighting she does. Especially from Torchwood now that Jack Harkness is in charge there.
    • Maybe she uses Mr. Smith to steal from banks digitally?
    • This question is answered, albeit briefly, in "The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith" - she owes her independent wealth to her Aunt Lavina's will.
    • It's not frequent, but it's certainly not an outright sham. She's seen working on stories infrequently. I think it was in Revenge of the Slitheen where the power going out made her lose her work.
    • OK, my mistake then, but that brings up a second question: What does she write about? She tries to keep her alien adventures under wraps, and she doesn't seem to have the time to research other story ideas.
    • Maybe the writers have been on here because this is specifically addressed in the latest series, with Sarah Jane getting annoyed that the kids don't seem to realise she really is a journalist, and a very successful one: "what do you think pays for all of this?"
  • Why does Sarah (and later Jo Grant) keep mentioning Metebelis 3 as a place the Doctor is likely to be? It's inhabited by a race of body snatching spiders, and the last time he was there, he died!
    • From what I've seen of the UNIT years, Metebelis 3 seems to have been a bit of a Running Gag back then. They mention it quite a few times.
  • What possible use would Luke have for a car in Oxford? Everywhere he needs to be can be reached on foot or by bicycle. Quite apart from the question of where, in a city very much not designed with cars in mind, he'd keep the thing.
    • Well, Luke and Sarah Jane are incredibly close, maybe he just wanted to have a car handy in case he got homesick and wanted to come home for a weekend or so? (And in case Sarah Jane called and asked for help with one alien thing or another.)
    • Additionally, for a teenager, your first car is sort of a symbol of independence. Giving Luke her car is Sarah Jane's way of showing Luke that she's okay with him growing up and leaving.
  • And, for that matter, he wouldn't be old enough to drive anyway; you have to be 18 to take a driving test in the UK
    • Um, no. You have to be 17.
  • Why on Raxacoricofallapatorius DO THE SLYTHEEN KEEP COMING TO EARTH?!?!? Do they not keep track of the body count?
    • The Slitheen are too proud for that. They really want revenge on those who kill their family members, which never ends well for them.
  • What was with the line in Death of the Doctor that Ian and Barbara haven't aged since traveling with the Doctor.
    • It only said "rumored" to have never aged.
    • Apparently, that was pulled from The Face of the Enemy, an Expanded Universe novel from 2003, although I agree that it's going to make it very hard for Ian to show up in any 50th anniversary special, and Barbara...well...we all knew she wasn't showing up... No, a better question would be why Ben and Polly are running an orphanage, why Ace is running a charity, or why UNIT has left the Brigadier in Peru for three fracking years. The whole ending seemed rather ludicrous, save for the bit about Harry (though with Tegan's love of speaking it's not hard to see her becoming an activist.
      • It might not be Ace, it could be Dodo. They ARE both called Dorothy, after all...
      • Look at the acronym made by A Charitable Earth. (The novelisation confirms that Ace runs ACE - along with Mel.)
    • It's quite likely that "running an orphanage" or "raising money for charity" are no more accurate descriptions of what the others are doing than "freelance journalism" is of SJA.
      • As stated further up, she IS seen doing journalism and story writing from time to time. Just because she uses it as a cover for fighting aliens doesn't mean she doesn't work at all.
        • The point is: Sarah is a lot more than just a journalist. By the same token, Dorothy's "charity work" may be only a small part of what she really does.
    • Some of it is also a deliberate attempt to avert The Character Died with Him - much as the Series Finale is as well.
  • So, in The Lost Boy, how did Sarah Jane forget that her alien scanner registered Luke as a few hours old after she and Maria rescued him? Sure it wouldn't hold up in court or anything, but she seems convinced that Luke is actually that couple's son.
    • Pure WMG, but here goes:
      • She did simply forget, I've seen very calm, rational people (as much or more so than Sarah Jane) go completely hysterical where their children were involved.
      • The Bane had to get a human "template" from somewhere. There's the Fridge Horror possibility that Luke is based off the Bane's first victim (similar to a Flesh avatar,) and that the original "Luke" has disappeared. Maybe she really did think that he was that couple's son (or a very close second.)
      • I would assume that the "template" would be to the thousands of humans that went through the Bubble Shock scanner. He was created to be a perfect being.
    • A cut scene had Sarah Jane mention this to Mr. Smith, who replied that the scanner registered Luke's time from his point of activation.
  • Is it standard procedure for UNIT to send armed grunts in armored vehicles to deliver a Death Notification? Seems like overkill.
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