The Time Capsule

"This is no ordinary diamond."

Writer: Peter Anghelides 

Format: Audio

Released: August 2008

Series: SJA Audio 03

Featuring: Sarah Jane, Luke, Clyde, Rani

Synopsis

It seems like a regular, routine weekday: Sarah Jane is doing a supermarket ship (and trying not to embarrass Clyde, who is doing his work experience in Betterworth's) while Luke is at the Natural History Museum, helping to catalogue items and set up displays.

But their ordinary day is about to turn extraordinary, as forces from an alien world start to affect Earth and all hell breaks loose. With an icy void opening beneath the chiller cabinet, museum exhibits coming alive and terrifying monsters appearing, Sarah Jane, Luke, Clyde and Rani are soon left fighting for their lives.

Verdict

The Time Capsule was a good little audio for The Sarah Jane Adventures! I liked how this story was firmly a part of the second series of the show's television chronology and I was delighted once again to hear Elisabeth Sladen in the narrator role. She really was terrific and just epitomises this series so having her tell another adventure was a delight. I liked the realism of Luke and Clyde being on work experience and just a nice way to incorporate real world stuff. It also served as a good reminder of just how young Luke and Clyde are as personally it seems an absolute age since I did work experience at an office for a car company. Clyde's work experience took him to Betterworth's supermarket which seemed to suit him well and it was fun for him to not be expecting Sarah Jane to show up doing her shopping. Things escalated quickly when Mr Ploughman got more involved and with him not being seen for around a fortnight for Luke to do his shopping, an alien was at work as we were first introduced to the Persopolisian. The concept of it using anything around it to become a monster seemed to work well on paper, but in action it was a little hooky as we had a creature formed out of food and cereal boxes! If it's even possible, it seemed like we had a Sarah Jane Adventures imitation of the Kandy Man! It was quite the image though. I liked how Luke's work experience was taking place at the Natural History Museum and with him being involved in cataloguing, that sounded ideal. That would be something I would love as well. It was clear that these events were somewhere early in Series 2 of the show as Sarah Jane referred to Gita as her new neighbour and it was fun to have her mentioned and still not getting that Sarah Jane's full name was not Sarah. That gag will never got old. I thought Janksia as the main Persopolisian was decent and the way that Luke was drawn to the black diamond was very uncharacteristic. Sarah Jane knew from the phone call that something was up if he resorted to theft, but he just locked himself in the cleaning cupboard which was quite funny. The component dating back to 1066 and when Haley's Comet passed by was pretty good and I liked the scale of the diamond. The Perspolisian turning into a car monster was another interesting use of its ability, but I couldn't shake off the image of Transformers in my head. Things definitely picked up as we reached the conclusion and the action that came from Luke and Clyde being drawn in from the mysterious Mr Ploughman who acted as host for the Perspolisian was very good. It wasn't always obvious that Sladen was the sole actor performing which is testament to her qualities. I thought Janksia falling victim to a garbage compactor could have been slightly more elegant and I admired that Clyde tried to save, but it just felt a little quick and emphatic without being worthy of a surprise. Still, it was a more than enjoyable listen! Overall, a strong little audio.

Rating: 7/10