From Raxacoricofallapatorius with Love (TV story)
From Raxacoricofallapatorius With Love was a special episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures broadcast on 13 March 2009 as part of the 2009 Comic Relief appeal.
The title of the episode does not appear on screen. Pre-broadcast publicity attributed the title Funny for Money (also the slogan of Comic Relief) to the special, but co-writer Clayton Hickman revealed the episode's true title in a post to the Doctor Who Forum a few days after the broadcast.
Synopsis
While she is performing maintenance on Mr Smith, a surprising guest visits Sarah Jane.
Plot
Sarah Jane, Luke, Rani and Clyde are running a routine check on Mr Smith, concluding with manual calibration of the energy reversal beam. Before they get the chance to finish, the entire attic starts shaking and Mr Smith warns them of an unknown force locking in on their location. Just as suddenly as it began, the shaking stops and a small man in a bowler hat teleports into the room.
The man greets them and tells them he is Ambassador Rahnius, sent by the Galactic Alliance to thank them for protecting Earth. With a click of his fingers, he bestows upon them a gift: a set of sparkly red deeley boppers each. Confused, Luke asks what they are. Rahnius explains that cultural differences make humans very difficult to buy for. Rahnius makes himself comfortable by hanging his hat on the back of the door and taking a seat. Whilst telling a story he breaks wind noisily. This raises Sarah Jane's suspicions as they have encountered an alien race with "gas problems" before: the Slitheen family.
Suddenly, K9 teleports into the attic and identifies Rahnius as a Slitheen. His cover blown, Rahnius activates a device on his ring that attaches a clamp to K9, deactivating him. He unzips his forehead and peels off his skin to reveal his true form, then activates another device that roots Sarah Jane, Luke, Rani and Clyde to the floor through their "Deadly Deeley Boppers".
His enemies immobilised, Rahnius reveals he plans to steal K9. With his extensive knowledge of the past and the future, no bank in space will be safe from them - they'll crunch the credit of the cosmos. With Rahnius distracted by K9, Luke reminds Sarah Jane of the energy reversal beam, but Sarah Jane reminds Luke it is still un-calibrated and none of them can reach the switch. Clyde tells them to leave it to him as he grabs Rahnius' hat off the door.
Sarah Jane gets Rahnius' attention, telling him she still has her sonic lipstick. She signals Clyde, who throws the hat. It hits the calibration switch. Mr Smith channels the energy reversal beam through the sonic lipstick. Rahnius is now stuck to the floor and everyone else can move again. Sarah Jane tells Mr Smith to send Rahnius back where he came from, along with K9's clamp.
Sarah Jane exclaims that it was the most bizarre five minutes of her life. K9, a red nose adorning his face, agrees.
Cast
- Sarah Jane Smith - Elisabeth Sladen
- Luke Smith - Tommy Knight
- Clyde Langer - Daniel Anthony
- Rani Chandra - Anjli Mohindra
- Voice of Mr Smith - Alexander Armstrong
- Voice of K9 - John Leeson
- Ambassador Rahnius- Ronnie Corbett
- Slitheen - Jimmy Vee
- Voice of Slitheen - Ronnie Corbett
Crew
to be added
References
- Rahnius claims to have been on the 211th hole when he was summoned for the mission by the Galactic Alliance.
- Brucifax
- Tarbulon
- Galactic Canteen
- Raxacoricofallapatorius
- Galactic Law
- The Slitheen's long-established gas-emission problem while wearing skin suits provides the bulk of the episode's humour.
Story notes
- This episode marks the first time one of the Doctor Who spinoffs has been featured in a mini-episode and is the first "mainstream Whoniverse" Comic Relief mini-episode (the previous production, The Curse of Fatal Death, was a spoof and not considered part of mainstream continuity).
- Running at just over 5 minutes, it was the shortest mini-episode produced as of its broadcast and the shortest episode to date ever produced for the Doctor Who television franchise. It was later beaten by the three-minute Doctor Who mini-episode Tonight's the Night, though the later production is not considered canonical, whereas the SJA mini-episode is. In December 2009 a made-for-Internet short story WC: A Ghost Story for Christmas, running 3.5 minutes, took the record of shortest legitimate Who-franchise story ever filmed. However, From Raxacoricofallapatorius With Love can correctly be called the shortest canonical Who-franchise story ever broadcast on television, if the specials DW: Space and Time are considered to be one story, as they are separately shorter than From Raxacoricofallapatorius With Love.
- The title of the mini-episode does not actually appear on screen, making this only the third Doctor Who franchise episode in history to not display a story title (following the Doctor Who TV movie and the 2005 Doctor Who Children in Need Special mini-episode).
- The title is a play on From Russia with Love, the title of a James Bond novel and movie.
- This was K9's only appearance in a Series 2-era production, as he does not appear in any of the regular season episodes.
Ratings
- 8.3 million viewers according to unofficial over-night ratings.
Myths
- The fansite sarahjane.tv claimed before transmission that this episode would feature an attack from an alien species called the Rednosicles. This was proved false, as the episode features an attack by Slitheen.
- Many fans speculated that this production would feature the Graske. This proved incorrect, although Jimmy Vee, the actor who previously played the Graske, appears as a Slitheen.
Filming locations
Continuity
- Presuming Ambassador Rahnius was a real person, this is the first time in the series that a Raxacoricofallapatorian is seen wearing the skin suit of a non-human.
- There are a handful of references to The Two Ronnies - a long-running TV series that Ronnie Corbett co-hosted - including Rahnius saying that his nickname, "Rani", and Rani herself makes them "The Two Ranis", that whilst he was in the Galactic Canteen there were fork 'andles and when Rahnius is finally teleported away, Sarah Jane says "And it's good night from him," which was Ronnie Barker's catchphrase. Equally, Corbett's monologue, a running feature in The Two Ronnies, is referenced through the speech pattern and mannerisms of Rahnius when he is sitting, much as he did in the aforementioned show.
- "Two Ranis" can also be a reference to The Rani, showing that the fact she shares her name with Rani Chandra is not significant because there are a lot of Ranis. One of the murder victims in Torchwood premiere "Everything Changes" was a Rani Gosch.
- With the exception of K9, for no apparent (in-universe) reason donning a Comic Relief red nose, there is nothing in this mini-episode to suggest it cannot occur in mainstream continuity, unlike the franchise's previous Comic Relief production, The Curse of Fatal Death, which was a spoof.
Timeline
- The presence of Rani places From Raxacoricofallapatorius With Love as occurring at some point after SJA: The Day of the Clown.
Home video releases
- The mini-episode is included in the Series 2 DVD box set as a "bonus footage prize" for correctly answering five consecutive questions in a quiz. Along with the rest of Series 2, this was the first time the mini-episode was officially made available to North American viewers, as the Comic Relief special was never broadcast outside the UK.
External links
Footnotes
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