The Day of the Clown (TV story)

Synopsis
The new girl on Bannerman Road, Rani Chandra, is being haunted by a sinister clown -- does it have anything to do with the local children that have gone missing? When Clyde's friend Dave disappears, the trail leads them to a strange circus museum- and the legend of the Pied Piper.

Part 1
A new family is moving into number 36 Bannerman Road, the house formerly occupied by Alan and Maria Jackson. Luke Smith still misses Maria, even though she's keeping in touch by e-mail. His mum Sarah Jane sympathises, and reminds him that Maria will visit England before too long; she'll be at her mother's wedding. But, as Luke notes, it's not the same.

There's a new girl at Park Vale School, the boys' comprehensive: clever and inquisitive Rani, who wants to be a journalist. Clyde is smitten--even forgetting his odd sightings of clowns, always just out of the corner of his eye--until he notices that there's also a new head at the school: humourless Mr Chandra, who is determined to improve the students' scores and put an end to the recent rash of child disappearances... and who is not impressed with Clyde, the class clown. Clyde doesn't make it to lunch before receiving a summons to the new head's office.

While he is waiting by Mr Chandra's office, Clyde has another clown sighting. He tries to laugh it off, but he is shaken when his friend Dave ducks into a small art closet for supplies... and doesn't come out. Moreover, the art closet is empty; Dave has vanished into thin air.

Sarah Jane brings the new family some tea and biscuits as a welcoming gesture. Only Gita Chandra is there--her husband and daughter are at school, she explains--so the two women share tea, and Gita describes her family. She is thrilled to learn that Sarah Jane is an investigative journalist, as her daughter Rani wants to become one herself.

Clyde and Luke are walking home from school when Clyde sees another clown. Though Luke doesn't see anything, the boys give chase; they encounter only Rani, who has also been seeing clowns. Rani is quick to wonder if there is an extraordinary or supernatural explanation behind the disappearances, and the three teens are deep in discussion when they reach Bannerman Road... and discover that Rani's dad is Mr Chandra. He is not pleased to see his daughter walking home with Clyde, whom he has pegged as a troublemaker, though he is delighted that she has also made friends with Luke, one of Park Vale's most gifted students.

Luke goes to help Rani unpack. In Rani's room, the two continue their discussion of the missing children. The mention of clowns jogs Rani's memory: suddenly, she remembers taking a ticket to see a circus museum from a man outside the Tube. Rani quickly decides to investigate, and Luke feels he has no choice but to follow.

Clyde and Sarah Jane have independently discovered the same thing: all the missing children had received tickets to the same circus museum, and only children with tickets were seeing the clowns. They elect to visit the clown museum as well.

Spellman's Magical Museum of the Circus is run by strange Elijah Spellman, who shows them around and leads them to a room filled with clown mannequins. Clyde spots a picture on the wall: an old watercolour painting of a man wearing red, blue, and yellow--just like the mysterious ghost clowns he'd been seeing. Sarah Jane explains that the figure depicted is the Pied Piper, a legendary figure out of European folklore who was purported to steal children.

Elijah Spellman agrees: he reveals that he is the Pied Piper and the mysterious clown, and he has come for more children. Nor will he tolerate discovery--with a word, he vanishes, and the clown mannequins come to life and threaten Sarah Jane and Clyde.

They run to the entrance, where they meet Luke and Rani, and discover that--while Sarah Jane's sonic lipstick is effective against the clown mannequins--the Pied Piper has trapped them in the building...

Part 2
to be added

Cast

 * Sarah Jane Smith - Elisabeth Sladen
 * Luke Smith - Tommy Knight
 * Clyde Langer - Daniel Anthony
 * Rani Chandra - Anjli Mohindra
 * Gita Chandra - Mina Anwar
 * Haresh Chandra - Ace Bhatti
 * The Pied Piper / Elijah Spellman / Odd Bob the Clown - Bradley Walsh
 * Dave Finn - Jem Brownlee
 * Tony Warner - Aaron Shosanya
 * Mr Cunningham - Huw Higginson
 * Steve Wallace - Elijah Baker
 * Professor Rivers - Floella Benjamin
 * Young Sarah Jane - Jessica Mogridge
 * Maria Jackson (voice) - Yasmin Paige
 * Clowns - Alan Ruscoe & Sean Palmer

Production crew
to be added

Foods and Beverages

 * Sarah Jane Smith and Gita Chandra share tea and biscuits.

Story notes

 * Luke claims that they have saved the world 12 times.
 * One of the Clowns shown on Sarah Jane Lap top is of Clara the Clown a Clown that appeared in The Celestial Toymaker.

Ratings
to be added

Myths
to be added

Filming Locations
to be added

Discontinuity, Plot Holes, Errors

 * What happened to the rest of the meteor that the clown came in? Can that still be used to attack people's fears?
 * What happened to the kids the Pied Piper took from history? They faded away some time ago, vanishing from existance just like anything else that stayed in the dimension too long.

Continuity

 * Mr Chandra refers to Greg Blakeman, the previous head teacher--who was killed by the Slitheen (SJA: Revenge of the Slitheen)--but claims that Blakeman "mysteriously vanished."
 * Sarah Jane, who finds clowns creepy, tangles with sinister clowns in this story. Fellow companion Ace was also frightened of clowns, but conquered her fears when she encountered sinister clowns at the Psychic Circus on Segonax. (DW: The Greatest Show in the Galaxy)
 * Menacing clowns have also appeared in DW: The Celestial Toymaker and The Deadly Assassin. There were also clowns among the Night Travellers in TW: From Out of the Rain.
 * The Nestene Consciousness also uses animated mannequins as attack drones. (DW: Terror of the Autons, Rose)
 * On the noticeboard on the classroom there is a paper with the name Rhys Williams written on it. Probably coincidence as there cannot really be anything to link a 30 something logistics manager from Cardiff to a school in West London.
 * While Sarah Jane is flicking through different pictures of clowns, one of Clara from DW: The Celestial Toymaker is briefly visible.

DVD and Other releases
to be added