Monday, October 13, 2008

Bradley & Trueman

Although the episode has already aired on the digital CBBC channel, tonight sees the premiere of "The Day of the Clown - Part One" on UK terrestrial television. It airs on BBC One at 4:35pm, with the second installment following straight after on the CBBC channel, at around 5:15pm. It features the introduction of new girl Rani Chandra (played by Anjli Mohindra) and also sees Bradley Walsh (he of game show and Coronation Street fame) playing a sinister clown. Get him, huh?

Here's what a number of readers had to say after seeing the opening "...Clown" episode last Monday - but BE WARNED! There's ever-so-slight SPOILERS afoot!

Anonymous: "The Day of The clown part one is quite a different yet excellent story. It shows the arrival of RANI CHANDRA and her mum and dad (which turns out to be the head of PARK VALE HIGH)!!! The parents combined are excellent; also Rani does make an excellent new arrival to the trio. I like the whole clown aspect and the museum climax to the 1st part - as Bradley walsh turns out to have 4 or 3 forgot pesonalities!! Can't wait for part 2"

Who Cares: "Wow is Rani too curious for her own good or what? I'm looking forward to next week when she's stops asking questions we already know the anwser to. Also it looks like Clyde was right back in the Lost Boy a couple more months and Luke might just pass for cool. If he keeps up reading those kinds of "encyclopedia". It's a good thing the writers aren't neglecting the fact that he's getting more and more accustomed to the world."

Nabu San: "Oh my lawdys, Day of the Clown was effing BRILLIANT! We're finally back to the classic SJA we know and love! Yaay for Rani! Think she's officially replaced Luke as my favourite character on the show. :D"

Last week's BBC One effort - part two of "The Last Sontaran" - managed 0.6 million, down 100,000 viewers on the week before; but don't forget that a chunk of the audience had seen the advance preview on CBBC, which may account for the dip.

Looking ahead, the BBC Press Office have issued synopsis for both parts of the next adventure, "Secret of the Stars":

Part One: Astrologer Martin Trueman causes a stir with his uncanny insights and predictions. While Sarah Jane doesn't believe in astrology, she does believe that all is not as it seems with Trueman. Around her, people are falling under Trueman's sinister spell and even Mr Smith doesn't understand what's going on.

Part Two: As Trueman begins to take over the world's population through their star signs, Clyde takes a big gamble to help Sarah Jane, Luke and Rani into the astrologer's inner circle. But when Sarah Jane's plan to defeat Trueman fails, who will be Earth's last hope to overcome the Ancient Lights?

Martin Trueman is played by long standing children's television fave, Russ Abbot.

The story debuts - part one at least - next Monday on the CBBC channel.

But forget about that for now; enjoy tonight's show, in all its creepy glory! Don't forget to leave your thoughts and opinions on tonight's episodes; because we'll post the very best here next week. Oh, we're so kind to ya all!

The Sarah Jane Adventures, airing on BBC One, Mondays at 4:35pm.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well the day of the clown part 2 certainly does do a great job of coming across.Rani finally gets the truth and it seems she is to be a regulaur now and is very excited to learn sarah jane's secret promising to only keep it between herself, luke, clyde and sarah jane ofcourse! Mr smith seems a little rude to Rani but i think he'll learn to accept her. Sarah jane has flashbacks of her childhood clown fear but overcomes them in a bid to save lucke from Spellmans evil plot. Very good acting skills from all of the cast a very enjoyable episode.The only critism i would give is that the House of Mirrors scene were sarah jane is trapped in a "mirror horror" is not very good effectswise but other then that a Powerful enjoyable 9/10 episode! KEEP GOING SJA your doing good and The sarah jane adventures is gripping me onto its hook until Doctor whos christmas special.ALMOST FORGOT A LITTLE SPOILER MABYE: the meteior peice that sarah jane got from PHAROS INSTITUTE MAY be useful in THE TEMPETATION OF SARAH JANE SMITH: i THINK its a back in time machine! look out for it!!!!!

Anonymous said...

Hmm some very strong points and some weaker ones. The ending being one of the weaker points. The principal idea was good but the execution was very lacklustre. They had something plausible and added something fantastic (note the sarcasm) for no good reason also shouldn't Rani save the day? Don't know what they were thinking on that one.

On to the good points. The scene about the reasoning behind Sarah's fear of clowns was extremely well done. It not only established why she was scared of them (which is a good thing because if we didn't believe she was terrified of them the whole episode would have fallen apart) but also sets things up for "the temptation" and above all it was just a really great scene between Luke and Sarah Jane containing character development for both characters.

I know mentioned this last week but Luke is really developing nicely. He's using his interpersonal relationship skills just fine in that scene. Only can't the kid get a break once in a while. The whole Luke getting taken from Sarah Jane deal is starting to get old really fast.

On a side-note these two episodes are the first time I've actually been annoyed by Clyde or like Finney said "You're problem is you don't know when to lay off." Well apparently whoever wrote this (Phil Ford) didn't know either. It kinda pays off at the end but it was still too much of the good thing... This time around.