The Sarah Jane Adventures - a Doctor Who spin-off featuring Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith

The first episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures was broadcast on New Year's Day 2007 at 4.50pm on BBC1. This spin-off show from Doctor Who features the return of Sarah Jane Smith, famously played by the much-loved actress Elisabeth Sladen. Lis returned to the world of Who in the new Second Series episode entitled School Reunion. Due to the popularity of Sarah Jane and the fan's love of the character, a new series aimed at younger viewers was soon commissioned by the BBC.

The initial broadcast of The Sarah Jane Adventures saw the title character doing battle with the Bane, who were using fizzy pop to take over the world. Lis saved the day with the help of some local children plus her old faithful friend K9. 2.92 million viewers saw the show making one of the most popular children's programmes of the year.

Sarah Jane Smith, a journalist, first appeared in The Third Doctor story The Time Warrior alongside Jon Pertwee. Other notable actors in this story included Jeremy Bulloch (aka Boba Fett from the Star Wars films) and June Brown, better known as EastEnders' Dot Cotton. In this story, Sarah Jane was impersonating her Aunt, the virologist Lavinia Smith, in order to gain access to the research centre where top scientists were being held in protective custody by UNIT who were investigating several mysterious disappearances. These led Sarah Jane to meet The Doctor who then took her on many further adventures.

Lis' last appearance in the show was in the classic story The Hand Of Fear where she starred with The Fourth Doctor, played by Tom Baker. The Fourth Doctor was summoned back to Gallifrey by his fellow Timelords, but due to law of his race, no humans could accompany him back to his home planet. Sarah Jane was left in what The Doctor thought was Hillview Road, South Croydon, but in fact it was Aberdeen.

On 28th December 1981, K9 & Company, a special one-off show featuring Sarah Jane Smith was shown on BBC1. The story, entitled A Girl's Best Friend, was seen by 8.4 million people but, to the disappointment of many Doctor Who fans, no series followed.

In School Reunion, Sarah Jane met the Tenth Doctor as played by David Tennant. She was pleasantly surprised to see her time travel companion once more, but she was equally annoyed with The Doctor for leaving her and not returning. During the story, Sarah Jane was investigating strange goings on at a local school. With the help of the Doctor, Rose Tyler and, of course K9, the World was saved once more in the ongoing battle to save the Earth.

The first series of Thee Sarah Jane Adventures was broadcast on BBC1 and the CBBC Channel from 24th September 2007. This popular 10 part series - 5 stories of 25 minutes in length - featured Sarah Jane battling various enemies including the Slitheen, who were first seen in the First Series of the revamped Doctor Who. Sarah Jane was assisted by her newly-adopted 'son' Luke, their neighbour Maria and her friend Clyde. Towards the end of the series, Maria's Dad also joined in the action to save the world.

The second series of The Sarah Jane Adventures was announced earlier in 2008. Before the second 12 part series began to air on 29th September, Lis returned to her famed role in the final two episodes of new Who Series Four. In this final story, Sarah Jane Smith helped The Doctor and several previous companions fight the dastardly Daleks and their evil creator Davros. This story was particularly shocking for Sarah Jane as she was present at the creation of the evil race in the classic story Genesis Of The Daleks.

In Series Two of The Sarah Jane Adventures, Maria, one her the title characters gang of teenage assistants, will be leaving. This popular character will be replaced by another young woman called Rani. Despite much fan speculation, this new SJA character is not The Doctor's famed foe The Rani.

Other announcements for this new SJA series include the return of Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, who has seen been promoted to a Sir. This character is played by Nicholas Courtney, a star of the show who I was lucky enough to meet in 2008 at Norwich's Television & Movie Store.

Red Nose Day 09 saw Elisabeth Sladen and the gang joined by former Two Ronnies favourite Ronnie Corbett in a special edition of the show. The short sketch was seen by over 8 million viewers when broadcast on 13th March 2009. The special was introduced by The Tenth Doctor himself, David Tennant, who was one of the bi-annual fundraiser's main hosts.

A few days before Karen Gillan was announced as The Eleventh Doctor's assistant for Series Five of the revamped, another exciting announcement was also made. In late May 2009 we were told that David Tennant would be making one of his final appearances as The Tenth Doctor Who in Series Three of The Sarah Jane Adventures. It was widely reported that The Tenth Doctor would be appearing in 2 episodes of this popular show, which reunites David Tennant once more with Elisabeth Sladen. The pair, of course, were last seen together in the classic Series Two episode School Reunion.

In April 2006, I was lucky enough to meet Elisabeth Sladen at an event celebrating the DVD release of The Genesis Of The Daleks at the Puppet Theatre in Norwich. Please Click Here for more information on this very enjoyable day.

Elisabeth Sladen also appears in some of my favourite Doctor Who stories - Click Here for more information.

In April 2008, Sarah Jane Smith was voted as The Doctor's favourite assistant by the readers of SFX Magazine. In the same poll, Sophie Aldred's character of Ace was featured in Fourth place.

To celebrate Sarah Jane Smith's many adventures with Doctor Who, I have created a Gallery showing the character and Elisabeth Sladen through the years. Please Click Here to see my Gallery.