Death of the Doctor (TV story)

Death of the Doctor was the third serial of series 4 of The Sarah Jane Adventures. It was written by Russell T. Davies and directed by Ashley Way. It featured guest appearances by Katy Manning as Jo Jones and Matt Smith as the Eleventh Doctor, as part of a second crossover episode with Doctor Who.

It contained the only televised meeting between classic-era companions Sarah Jane and Jo Grant, and the first televised appearance of Jo since The Green Death in 1973.

Behind the scenes, it was the only time that Russell T Davies wrote for the Eleventh Doctor for television, having completely turned over his production responsibilities to the programme the instant that David Tennant's side of the regeneration sequence was completed in The End of Time.

Synopsis
When the Doctor is declared dead, old companions Sarah Jane Smith and Jo Grant meet for the first time and join forces to discover the truth. As an interstellar conspiracy gathers around UNIT HQ, Clyde finds he holds the fate of the Time Lord in his hand – quite literally!

Part 1
Sarah and the gang are talking to Luke on a webcam when UNIT arrive on Bannerman Road outside her house. She is told by Colonel Tia Karim that her friend, the Doctor, is dead, but doesn't believe it. Colonel Karim tells the gang that alien undertakers, the Shansheeth, are organising the funeral. This makes Sarah more suspicious, so much so that she dares to ask who would believe something like that. Mr Smith tells her the Shansheeth are called the galactic undertakers. That night, Sarah tells Luke the news and that she thinks the Doctor is still alive. Luke thinks the idea is crazy. The next day Sarah goes to the funeral, accompanied by Rani and Clyde. Just as he is getting into the private car, Clyde receives what seems to be a static electric shock to his hand. The gang go to Mount Snowden, home to the UNIT base which will host the Doctor's funeral.

At Snowden, the gang bump into the Groske, a blue, tame version of the Graske. One of the Groske follows them and tells Clyde he "smells like time." Clyde looks at his hand, where he sees artron energy. The gang are taken to the parlour where a gathering of remembrance is taking place. Sarah asks to see the body, but Karim refuses, and Sarah is suspicious until told that he was hurt. She sits down with Rani and Clyde, confessing that she thinks the Doctor regenerated, and she doesn't even know what face he could be wearing. The Shansheeth play music on a harp to help the mourners remember the Doctor, but their thoughts of him are interrupted by the entry of Jo Jones (née Grant), who has dropped the flowers she brought. Jo chatters while she and her grandson Santiago pick up the flowers. When they recognise each other, Jo sits next to Sarah. Santiago sits behind Rani and Clyde. Sarah and Jo talk and make friends, as do Santiago, Clyde, and Rani.

After the remembrance, the gang is in a bedroom where Jo agrees with Sarah's belief that the Doctor is still alive. As Clyde, Rani, and Santiago leave the room, they again meet the Groske who told Clyde that he "smells like time". Clyde gives chase, but the Groske jumps into a ventilation shaft.

Meanwhile, Azure of the Claw Shansheeth is "filleting the Cradle" - using the harp from the remembrance to view the memories of the Doctor that were collected at the gathering. The Shansheeth wearing red and yellow agree Sarah and Jo have the strongest memories. They play more music through the vents, putting Sarah and Jo into a trance. Clyde, Rani, and Santiago follow the Groske into the vent, where they lose him, but overhear the Shansheeth discussing their plot to use a memory weave to steal Jo and Sarah's memories — which will kill them. The artron energy on Clyde's hand returns with a bright, blue light, alerting the Shansheeth to their presence. The youngsters shuffle their way backwards out of the vent. Sarah and Jo hear the clatter, which breaks their trance. They run into the corridors and bump into the others. Clyde tells Sarah and Jo that this is a trap and they are the prize.

Clyde freezes and starts talking in a different voice, a voice that knows Clyde, Rani, Jo, and Sarah. Clyde regains control of his voice and realises he has someone else's hand. Clyde disappears and the Doctor takes his place.

Rani, not recognising the Doctor, asks who he is before demanding to know what has happened to Clyde. The Doctor explains that he used Clyde's residual artron energy to switch places with him, which is trouble for Clyde, who is now in a red, wasteland-like planet full of debris. Although she had mentioned that she expected it, Sarah marvels that the Doctor has "done it again" (regenerated) — though, as before, he smiles and says, "Hello, Sarah Jane." Having never seen this current incarnation either, Rani and especially Jo are bewildered — Jo asks, "What Doctor? The Doctor? My Doctor?" until Sarah asks Jo if she knew the Doctor could change his face. She does but is shocked that the Doctor is much younger than the other Doctors she has met and has a baby's face compared to theirs. The Doctor responds to Jo, "Oy, imagine it from my point of view! Last time I saw you, Jo Grant, you were what, 21, 22? It's like someone baked you." Hearing this, any doubt that Jo has that it is indeed the Doctor vanishes.

At this point, the Shansheeth arrive, and the Doctor strides forward to meet them, irritably saying, "I've been looking for you. Have you been telling people I'm dead?" They tell the gang the death certificate had been sent out early. Azure of the Claw Shansheeth says this can be rectified. He shoots the Doctor with an energy beam, saying, "Rest in peace!".

Part 2
Caught in the energy beam, the Doctor disappears and Clyde reappears. He and Clyde keep swapping places. The energy beam disengaged, the Doctor, Jo, Sarah, Rani, and Santiago run from the Shansheeth and find safety behind a locked door. The Doctor takes Jo and Sarah by the hand. All three swap places with Clyde on the alien planet. As the Doctor works on the machine he used to swap places, they talk. The Doctor says he looked in on Jo and all his old companions before he last regenerated. He tells Jo that her forthcoming thirteenth grandchild will be dyslexic, but a great swimmer. With the help of Sarah's sonic lipstick and some natural tea carried by Jo, the Doctor adjusts the machine so they can travel to Earth without sending Clyde to the planet.

Clyde and Rani talk with Santiago. He hasn't spoken to his parents in six months. Meanwhile, Colonel Karim is working with the Shansheeth. They are plotting to use Jo and Sarah's memories of the TARDIS to create a new TARDIS key, so the Shansheeth can stop death across the universe by interfering with the timelines.

Rani, Santiago, and Clyde are rescued by a Groske and taken through the ventilation shafts. They come to a hiding place, but Karim discovers them. She locks them in and turns on the heat, making the place so hot the children may boil. The Doctor, Jo, and Sarah come to the rescue, but the two companions are kidnapped and strapped into the memory weave. Their minds are scanned and they begin remembering the TARDIS. These memories begin to generate a new TARDIS key as the Shansheeth and Colonel Karim make their intentions clear.

The Doctor, Rani, Clyde, Santiago, and the Groske come to the door of the room where Sarah and Jo are strapped into the memory weave. It is locked. The Doctor tells them to remember all of their adventures with him, in as much detail as possible. Sarah and Jo both remember past encounters with the Doctor and all the creatures and enemies they met. Clyde and Rani tell Sarah to remember their experiences fighting aliens as well. Santiago tells Jo to remember all the places she's visited. Jo remembers all the countries she has been to as Sarah remembers her battles with aliens.

The Shansheeth begin panicking as the memory weave reaches critical. The Doctor tells Sarah and Jo that it's his funeral and they realise there is an empty, lead-lined coffin waiting next to them to be used. Karim tries to get in the coffin with them, but they keep her out as the memory weave explodes, frying the Shansheeth to "fried chicken", killing Karim, and blasting the doors off. The Doctor and Sarah's companions enter the room and open the coffin, to find Sarah and Jo hugging each other out of fear. They notice the Doctor and everyone else looking down at them and laugh happily that they survived.

The Doctor takes them in the TARDIS and materialises in Sarah's attic. Mr Smith detects the time fluctuations of the incoming TARDIS and activates to state that it has landed. Clyde and Rani exit the TARDIS and Clyde is stunned to find they're back at Bannerman Road. Rani complains to Mr Smith that the Shansheeth were evil but Mr Smith tells her that they actually encountered a rogue group and the Wide Wing of the High Shansheeth Nest have sent their apologies. Santiago is shocked that they have a sentient computer, which trumps anything he's seen. In the TARDIS, Sarah and Jo examine the new interior. Jo feels the TARDIS is the same no matter how it looks. Jo says she could stay and travel with the Doctor forever, but notes he could get in trouble with the Time Lords. Sarah and the Doctor remain quiet, but the Doctor tells her that it's about time he got going. Sarah and Jo tell the Doctor that if he ever did die, they believe they'd feel something. The Doctor agrees and whispers that the entire universe might shiver if he died. He then shouts to make his old friends jump and they exit the TARDIS. They all watch as it dematerialises.

Jo and Santiago leave for Norway and the trio are left behind. Sarah says that she googled TARDIS and learned of others whom she believes to have been companions of the Doctor. She tells them of Tegan, fighting for aboriginal rights in Australia; Ian and Barbara Chesterton, Cambridge professors who are rumoured not to have aged since the 1960s; Harry Sullivan, her old friend from UNIT, who worked on finding remedies for diseases; Ben and Polly, running an orphanage; and a Dorothy-something who has raised millions of pounds (money) through her company "A Charitable Earth".

As they watch Jo and Santiago leave, Sarah says, "With friends like us, he's not really going to die, is he?"

Cast

 * Sarah Jane Smith - Elisabeth Sladen
 * The Doctor - Matt Smith
 * Clyde Langer - Daniel Anthony
 * Rani Chandra - Anjli Mohindra
 * Mr Smith - Alexander Armstrong
 * Jo Jones - Katy Manning
 * Santiago - Finn Jones
 * Tia Karim - Laila Rouass
 * Haresh Chandra - Ace Bhatti
 * Shansheeth - Paul Kasey, Ruari Mears, Ben Ashley
 * Voice of Shansheeth Blue - David Bradley
 * Additional Shansheeth Voices - Jon Glover
 * Groske - Jimmy Vee (body), Philip Hurd-Wood (voice)
 * Luke Smith - Tommy Knight

Individuals

 * Santiago mentions his father and mother.
 * Robert Mugabe is a politician from Earth.
 * Haresh mentions Rani's grandfather.
 * Jo Grant's thirteenth grandchild will be dyslexic but a great swimmer.
 * Sanjay is a friend of Luke's.
 * Clifford Jones is at Ascension Islands.

Culture

 * Karim refers to Clyde, Rani and Santiago as "three ASBO kids".
 * Karim refers to the kids as the Brady Bunch.

Planets

 * Jo mentions Metebelis III.
 * A honeymoon planet is a planet on a honeymoon.

Organisations

 * The Gay Dads Organisation is an organisation for gay dads.
 * The 15th Funeral Fleet is the fleet of the Claw Shansheeth.
 * The Wide Wing of the High Shansheeth Nest apologises for the behaviour of Azure, Aureolin and Amaranth of the Claw.

Locations

 * Santiago visited Mount Everest, the Andes and Santiago.
 * The Nambikwara are a tribe from the Mato Grosso.
 * Jo sailed down the Yangtze river in a tea chest; she also flew kites on Kilimanjaro.
 * UNIT Base 5 is located at Mount Snowdon.
 * Jo and Santiago took a hovercraft as transport to Norway.

Objects

 * X-15 is a rocket in possession of UNIT.
 * The Shansheeth use an Epitaph stone.

Races and species

 * Karim mentions that the Groske are just like the Graske, but blue and tame.
 * Sarah Jane and Jo mention Drashigs, Axons, Ogrons, Daleks, Cybermen, Zygons, and Aggedor and Azal.
 * The Claw Shansheeth lie that the Doctor died saving children from the Scarlet Monstrosity.
 * While trapped with the Groske, Rani and Santiago, Clyde mentions the Judoon.
 * Jo met the Aborigines.
 * Jo has seen many whales during her journeys.

Story notes

 * A trailer was broadcast featuring the Eleventh Doctor.
 * Russell T Davies thought about using Death of the Doctor as the name for The End of Time Part 2. (REF: The Writer's Tale - The Final Chapter)
 * This episode marks the last on-screen adventure that Sarah Jane has with the Doctor.
 * This story features the last appearance of the Eleventh Doctor's original tweed coat.
 * This is one of the first times since the revival of Doctor Who that the issue of how many regenerations has been mentioned, with the number given as 507. This is in contrast to the fact that it has previously been mentioned as being only twelve, giving each Time Lord a total of thirteen lives. Russell T Davies, who wrote this episode, stated in an interview, "They only said 13 once or twice." It's worth noting that, within the context of the episode, the Doctor is simply teasing Clyde. In a serious context, he really is limited to twelve regenerations, which he confirms in The Time of the Doctor.
 * The death of Tia Karim marks one of the few times in the young viewer-friendly Sarah Jane Adventures that a human adversary has been killed through the direct actions of the heroes. In contrast, in Secrets of the Stars, it is left ambiguous as to whether Martin Trueman is killed or not.
 * This story contains the most extensive updates of past companions since The Five Doctors.
 * Liz Shaw is stranded on a UNIT Moonbase and cannot get back until Sunday. The fact she's alive and well contradicts the events of the novel Eternity Weeps, set in the early 2000s, in which she died, though in that novel she was also working on the Moon for UNIT. The reference means all three of the Third Doctor's female companions are recognised in this story.
 * The Brigadier is stranded in Peru, on an ongoing mission. He is also said to be in South America in The Poison Sky and The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith.
 * Jo has seven children and twelve grandchildren, with a thirteenth on the way. The Doctor says that the thirteenth will be dyslexic, but a great swimmer.
 * As far as she is aware, Jo hasn't seen the Doctor since the events of The Green Death, though she did try to call him through UNIT but was told he had left, though TV: Planet of the Spiders has Jo corresponding with the Doctor and UNIT via mail, however.
 * Tegan Jovanka is fighting for Aboriginal rights. This reference indicates that Tegan is still alive in 2010, despite having a life-threatening health condition in 2006, as shown in AUDIO: The Gathering.
 * Ben Jackson and Polly Wright are running an orphanage in India.
 * Harry Sullivan is said to have worked with vaccines and saved thousands of lives. He is referred to in the past tense by Sarah. Harry was previously implied to be dead in the novelisation of The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith. The actor who played Harry, Ian Marter, died in 1986.
 * Ian and Barbara Chesterton are professors at Cambridge and, according to rumours, haven't aged since the 1960s, suggesting something they encountered in their travels with the Doctor caused them to stop ageing. The reference is the first on-screen confirmation that the two married at some point after the events of TV: The Chase; the wedding was later depicted in the comic story Hunters of the Burning Stone. Other stories showed the rumour about their age to be false, such as HOMEVID: Ian Chesterton: An Introduction, AUDIO: The Five Companions and AUDIO: Sphere of Influence.
 * A companion called Dorothy is said to have raised billions of pounds through her charity "A Charitable Earth." As the charity spells out the words "ACE," this is likely the Seventh Doctor's companion Ace. Different media have offered differing futures for Ace, so this does not necessarily contradict any particular one. In DWMSE 32, Davies indicates that, had the series continued, he intended to reintroduce Ace in a future storyline.

Ratings

 * Part 1 — 0.92 Million
 * Part 2 — 0.96 Million

Filming locations

 * Clinton Road
 * Millennium Stadium
 * Upper Boat Studios

Production errors
to be added

Continuity

 * Clyde is still fascinated with UNIT. (TV: The Last Sontaran)
 * Sarah Jane refers to when she last saw the Doctor and correctly assumes that he regenerated shortly afterwards. (TV: The End of Time)
 * Sarah Jane notes that she arrived at UNIT (TV: The Time Warrior) soon after Jo had left. (TV: The Green Death)
 * Sarah Jane tells Jo that it has "been about four years" since she first met the Doctor again. (TV: School Reunion)
 * Jo and Sarah Jane recall their separate visits to Peladon with the Third Doctor. (TV: The Curse of Peladon, The Monster of Peladon)
 * Clyde still has some residue Artron energy inside him from when he slammed into the Doctor's TARDIS. (TV: The Wedding of Sarah Jane Smith)
 * Jo mentions visiting Karfel. (TV: Timelash)
 * Jo is aware that the Doctor can "change his face" because she met the First and Second Doctors. (TV: The Three Doctors) She also witnessed the Third Doctor regenerate into his fourth incarnation prematurely before a Nurazh reverted him back to his third body during the regeneration. (PROSE: The Touch of the Nurazh) Likewise, Rani is also aware of the Doctor's ability to regenerate, having been shown footage of his third and ninth incarnations by Mr Smith. (WC: Alien File: The Doctor)
 * Jo mentions the Doctor's promise to visit her. (TV: The Green Death)
 * The Doctor says he looked back on every companion, prior to his last regeneration, not only those of his tenth incarnation. (TV: The End of Time)
 * The Doctor tells Sarah Jane and Jo, "Ventilation shaft, that takes me back, or forwards." Sarah Jane once got stuck crawling through a duct. (TV: The Ark in Space) The Fourth Doctor also used ventilation shafts shortly before Sarah Jane and he parted ways, (TV: The Hand of Fear) and Jo previously used ventilation shafts to escape as well. (TV: Planet of the Daleks)
 * After Rani reminds Sarah Jane of their previous encounter with the Mona Lisa, (TV: Mona Lisa's Revenge) the Doctor asks an unanswered question of what incident they were referring to. He had his own dealings with the Mona Lisa, which did not involve Sarah Jane. (TV: City of Death)

DVD releases

 * This story was included in the Complete 4th Series DVD release (Region 2 release: 31st October 2011).
 * It was also released in the Complete Collection Series 1-5 box set release (Region 2 release: 6th February 2012).


 * Death of the Doctor was included as a special feature on the special edition DVD of The Green Death.

Blu-ray releases

 * Death of the Doctor was included as a special feature in Doctor Who: The Collection - Season 10, released in the UK on 8th July 2018, and released in the US (as Jon Pertwee - Complete Season Four) on 15th October, 2019.