50 Years Ago Today, Sarah Jane Smith ChangedDoctor WhoForever

Fifty days ago , Doctor Who ’s 11th time of year began with “ The Time Warrior ” and convey with it a notable ocean of change . It notice the debut of the show ’s iconic “ diamond ” logo , which has now seen a return for the modern era withNcuti Gatwa ’s Doctor . It added an immediately iconic creature to the show ’s monster canonin the Sontarans . But its most durable donation , and its greatest , will forever beSarah Jane Smith .

From the mo we meet Sarah Jane in the first episode of “ The Time Warrior , ” she ’s contend for a place in a world that does n’t want her around . Using her skills as an investigative reporter — and her aunt ’s credential and identity — she slink into a unavowed lockdown of scientists by UNIT , look into a spate of disappearance . She immediately finds herself in the Doctor ’s domain — and more than a match to his dismissive attitude , much to his own joy , first when he immediately clocks her artifice , and then when he demands she make the amass man their chocolate .

There ’s a trap you’re able to fall in evangelizing Sarah Jane that she is thefirst “ feminist ” companion , and that the cleaning lady that came before her were just there to shrill at goliath and be preserve by the boy . But before this , the Doctor ’s female allies — teachers , scientists , adventurer , and geniuses among them — were fiber that encompass a form and nuance unlike many other sci - fi stories of their time , even if the series did shin to effectively utilize that variety . It also finger reductive of Sarah Jane herself , in a means , that she was defined by being “ not like those other girls . ” What made Sarah Jane find so unlike to the woman that had make out before her was that she just simply did n’t care what anyone thought of her , and above all was let to by her stories : she was a adult female on a mission , upshot be damned . If there was a story to be found , Sarah Jane Smith was going to find it .

Image: BBC

“ The Time Warrior ” as a whole gives us a brilliant encapsulation of Elisabeth Sladen ’s grasp with the role , one we would see produce and flesh out over the next three years of adventures . She catch to be cutthroat and independent , thrown out of time as she find out herself stowed away in the TARDIS as the Doctor hunts down the cause of the missing scientists . She catch to be funny , and wizard , navigating being push up into the Middle Ages — using her muliebrity to get to stead she “ should n’t ” belong , and using that against her foes to aid save the mean solar day . She does indeed get to be a impregnable feminist , with her first nefarious transparency being characters like medieval despot Irongron and Commander Linx and his battle - obsessive machismo , and proves herself completely unwilling to crumple to their attack to look down on her . Sarah Jane still does a mickle of the typical things a familiar does — get trance and require help — but she ’s just as often allowed to help herself and work thing out on her own damage , and she ’s allowed to be flawed along the means .

The Sarah Jane we meet in “ The Time Warrior ” immediately has that spark , not just from Sladen ’s magnetic performance — it is almost unacceptable to imagine she was not the first choice for the role , but a replacement for actress April Walker after Jon Pertwee bristled at not being confab with her casting — but because she feel like , for the first time , Doctor Who has capsule a decennium ’s Charles Frederick Worth of lessons about its companion and distilled them into a exclusive character . It ’s less that Sarah Jane Smith is Doctor Who ’s first feminist fellow traveler , it ’s that she ’s the first that just feels like a substantial , complete woman , undefined by a unique trait or by her affiliation with the Doctor .

It ’s no wonder then that Sarah Jane and Sladen were constantly Doctor Who ’s spot of call when it came to imagining spinoffs from the show without the Time Lord in the spotlight . In the ‘ LXXX of course , we have the failed attempt of K-9 and Company , but at last those plan would be realized more fully after Sarah Jane had been reforge in the crucible of Doctor Who ’s advanced revival in 2006 . “ School Reunion ” firmly reflects on contrast Sarah Jane with the form of companions her bequest in the classic geological era went on to enliven by having her brush up against , and then bind , with Rose Tyler , but it also remind us that , as much as she missed them in all their year aside , Sarah Jane never demand the Doctor to strike — and in her own fashion , then got to show that to a new genesis of small fry inThe Sarah Jane Adventures . It would ’ve been easy to cast her in a quasi - Doctor - ish role in the child ’s spinoff — that to be her truest self Sarah Jane just became an iteration of the Doctor , the sage former guardian to adventurous companion of her own — but even decades after the fact SJA constantly reminded us of the subtlety and mankind Sladen brought to the lineament , and allowed her the rare chance to search the life leave unseen onscreen after all these geezerhood later .

Screenshot: BBC

Screenshot: BBC

What cruel fate it is that Sladen leave us with so many of those adventures still go out untold . Herdeath in 2011broke the heart of horde of Doctor Who lover across generations , thanks to her return and renaissance in the modern epoch with The Sarah Jane Adventures . But it also intelligibly broke Doctor Who ’s heart , too . For years after the series was unwilling to accept a opening that Sarah Jane was not part of its world any longer . We could n’t see her , but she ’s Sarah Jane Smith , god dammit — she was still out there , still find the stories she craved , still being this singular , wonderful mortal . She simply had to be . It took until 2020 for Doctor Who tocanonize Sladen ’s passingalongside Sarah Jane ’s , in the short story “ Farewell Sarah Jane , ” but it took until just afew week agofor the show itself to grasp it in just a individual , grievous line between Ncuti Gatwa ’s fifteenth Doctor , and his precursor in David Tennant ’s traumatized , weary 14th in the 60th day of remembrance particular “ The Giggle ” : “ Sarah Jane has gone , can you conceive that for a 2nd ? ”

Even in acknowledging it , it ’s like Doctor Who still ca n’t conceive it . Fifty old age on from her debut , looking back it ’s clear to see why the show would want to envisage that fantasy of a Sarah Jane Smith perpetually — to undo harsh reality and simply keep the memory of this complex , loving , adventurous , fierce heroine go and going unseen . But few thing palpate more fitting a tribute to Sarah Jane ’s legacy to countenance her go , and see her intake in the future , and the legions of familiar and ally that came after . She made her mark , and we just have to keep administer with it , consequences be damned . How very Sarah Jane , indeed .

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Screenshot: BBC