Sarah Jane Adventures -  Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?
Written by Gareth Roberts
Directed by Graeme Harper

The series' twin axes have always been the strange and alien and the domestic and for the first time, those come together completely here. Opening with a genuinely funny sequence at a local skate park, the story builds on this moment of normality, of domesticity and twists it into something unique and in many ways exponentially more effective than either of its two sister shows.

The surprising lack of screen time for Maria in Warriors of Kudlak is more than made up for her as Yasmin Paige remains front and centre for almost the entire story. As she struggles to understand how the world around her has changed, there are some surprisingly subtle character beats that reveal not only a ruthlessness that very few Whoverse characters are allowed to display but also the sort of intelligence and perception that marks her out as a genuinely interesting, intelligent main character. There's one scene in particular where she's butting heads with Jane Asher as Andrea Yates and not only holding her own but winning that's amazing to watch. Paige is a genuinely talented actress and is finally given the chance to shine here. The end result is fantastic and shows Paige up as one of the best things about this series. Whilst Tommy Knight and Daniel Anthony get very little to do here (Apart from a beautifully timed Clyde double take in the final few minutes), their absence is more than made up for by a guest star and a surprising member of the regular cast stepping up to the plate. Jane Asher is superb as Andrea Yates, cheerful, brassy and just a little desperate from the get go. Even before you find out why Andrea is there, there's a sense that she's dancing a little too fast, smiling a little too widely that makes for some really nicely handled, and very unsettling moments. Her final scene, whilst unsurprising, is also genuinely affecting and she stands out as one of the best guest stars not only on this show, but in the Whoverse as a whole.

However, full honours have to go to Joseph Millson as Maria's dad, Alan. He's been an amiable if slightly dim presence throughout the series but here, Alan does a lot of the dramatic heavy lifting and crucially, moves forward. 'New Who' has been regularly and justifiably criticised for being a show where apocalyptic world events pass unnoticed and everything remains exactly as it was before. This story, for the first time, changes that and it'll be fascinating to see how the relationship between the characters, and the change in Alan's world view, affects it. Plus, top marks must go to all involved for the best skateboard action sequence in years.

This is the darkest, most ambitious and most effective Sarah Jane story to date and it's interesting to note that it takes a standard Torchwood trope (Impact of alien technology on normal life) and does it orders of magnitude better than that series has managed to date. Intelligent, complex and potentially game-changing, this isn't just one of the best Sarah Jane stories to date, it's one of the best New Who stories to date.