17th January, 2013

The Sarah Jane Adventures Series 4, episode 3 "The Vault of Secrets" Part 1

     The episode begins with a teenage girl entering an abandoned asylum. I immediately think "a-ha! This girl's replacing Luke!" but events soon lay that theory to rest. The girl seems to be on a mission, and her demeanor makes me think that I was mistaken about her age. She encounters a trio of android "men in black" that makes me think of Autons. The girl is shown to be under the control of one of the Veil, disproving just about everything I was thinking about this girl.
     I love that in the following scene in Sarah Jane's attic, we see a brief glimpse of a pyramid shaped structure on Mars. I think we all know what that is! I wonder if NASA is getting frustrated with their efforts to send robots to Mars since Sarah Jane has apparently foiled previous attempts to explore the surface. Also, we see how they'll include Luke in these episodes while he's away at college. They did the same thing with Maria, before relegating her to the occasional mention. Luke's too important for them to forget about him in the same way, surely?
     LINDA flashbacks, anyone? While I'm glad they're acknowledging Rani's parents having knowledge of the existence of aliens, surely pretty much everyone in the DW universe should know about them by now? You know, 26 planets in the sky, Daleks subjugating humanity just to name one example? Anyway, the group comes across as a bunch of crackpots. I'm relieved that at least one of the group is later shown to have a bit more depth than that. I won't mention the name of the group, as I think that joke falls flat, clearly aimed at the sense of humor of a typical 8 year old. While I know that is the show's intended demographic, it usually doesn't stoop to that level of patronizing.
     The androids are later explained to, indeed, be the "men in black" from alien conspiracy lore. I like this wrinkle, although I can't help to be a little bit disappointed that they're not Autons. I guess we've already filled our quota of original Doctor Who references for this episode. Also, the speaking android is reminding me of Agent Smith from the Matrix. Well, if this were him, and if Clyde got his wish to see Will Smith, with Sarah Jane and Mr. Smith, we'd just have too many Smiths in the episode, wouldn't we?
     So the character Ocean encountered the androids in '72 and has the other disc? This matches the last date of a men in black sighting, so did they become inactive after this encounter? I'm glad she's not just another UFO whack-o. Minty and Ocean actually are a little more interesting than they originally seemed at the meeting. They seem to be living together, so they are probably a couple, although this is never specified in the dialogue. I'm actually starting to like them.
     We end the episode with Androvax in Clyde's body, both discs having been obtained, and the men in black threatening to incinerate everybody. I'm confident the regulars will be safe, but what about Ocean and Minty? Don't kill them when they just became interesting!