B00DPX9ST8 EBOK (190 page)

Ianto’s statements establish that
In the Shadows
happens on a Friday; Mariwyn establishes that “Shrouded” occurs two days before a “Wednesday”, but the story then continues an unspecified number of days later.

[
1214
] Dating
TW: Adam
(
TW
2.5) - Torchwood believes that Adam has been working alongside them for “three years”, and his doctored personnel file says he was recruited on “07/05/05”.

[
1215
] Dating
TW:
“Rift War” (
TWM
#4-13) - Owen hasn’t yet kicked the bucket, but “three weeks straight” have passed since Torchwood had any engagement with the Sanctified.

[
1216
] Dating
TW: The Twilight Streets
(
TW
novel #6) - Once again, placement is determined because Rhys knows about Torchwood but Owen still isn’t dead yet. Moreover, it’s “twenty-two months, eight days and about nine hours” (p76) since Jack last met Margaret Slitheen’s secretary Idris Hopper - an encounter that happened “a month” (p81) after
Boom Town
, in October 2006. So, it’s now August 2008. The year is loosely confirmed in that it’s “nearly one hundred thirty years” after Queen Victoria established Torchwood (p103).

[
1217
] Dating
TW: Reset
and
TW: Dead Man Walking
(
TW
2.6-2.7) - A glitch exists in that Owen says that one of Copley’s victims, Meredith Roberts, is 45, but both the man’s driver’s license and Tosh’s computer search says he was born “11-01-1962”. It’s impossible to think that this story occurs prior to 11th January, and yet that would only amount to it being 2007.

[
1218
] Dating
TW: A Day in the Death
(
TW
2.8) - Three days have passed since the previous episode.

[
1219
] “Two years” before
TW: The Men Who Sold the World
.

[
1220
] Dating
SJA: Invasion of the Bane
(
SJA
1.1) - It’s at least “eighteen months” since
School Reunion
, as that’s how long Sarah has had her new K9. Maria’s dad says that she’s going to “start school next week”, presumably in September (as with the 2010 school year starting on 6th September in
SJA: The Nightmare Man
). Maria’s clock says “11 1”, but she starts a new school “next week” and it’s light at 6 pm, so we can only assume it’s showing the wrong date, possibly because it was unplugged during the move.

A small oddity is that Sarah says in
SJA: Sky
that Luke was “born” as a 13 year old, yet he’s “14” just a week afterwards in
SJA: Revenge of the Slitheen
. It’s possible, however, that she initially designated him as 13, then shortly thereafter decided he was “14” (and had Mr Smith alter Luke’s documents accordingly) to accommodate his entering school at a slightly higher level.

[
1221
]
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?

[
1222
] Dating “A Perfect World” (BF #113b) - The year is specified, and coincides with the story’s release in October 2008.

[
1223
] Dating
SJA: Revenge of the Slitheen
(
SJA
1.2) - The Slitheen refer to the events of
Smith and Jones
. It’s the start of a school year, so the story begins on a Monday and continues onto Tuesday.

[
1224
]
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?

[
1225
] Dating
SJA: Eye of the Gorgon
(
SJA
1.3) - No specific dates are given. In
The Mind Robber
, the Doctor was convinced that Medusa could not exist. Sarah also presents herself as “Victoria Beckham” in
SJA: The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith
.

[
1226
] Sarah tells the Trickster, in
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?
, “Never mind the Bane, what about the Slitheen? And the Gorgons? And the Patriarchs of the Tin Vagabond? I stopped them all from taking over the Earth.” There’s some leeway as to when she fought the Patriarchs, and it’s not even clear as to whether she did so with the teenagers or on her own, but it seems reasonable to presume that she’s naming her recent adversaries in order. The Doctor referred to the Church of the Tin Vagabond as worshippers of the Beast in
The Satan Pit
. Sarah seems to have made a return to fighting satanists, as she did in
K9 and Company: A Girl’s Best Friend
and also the
K9 Annual
.

[
1227
]
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?
. If this means that the Trickster somehow averted the Gorgon from coming to Earth in the first place (which isn’t said), then the “Andrea Yates” timeline must be devoid of the Medusa mythos.

[
1228
] Dating
SJA: Warriors of Kudlak
(
SJA
1.4) - It’s a Tuesday, but children aren’t at school, so it may be half term. No human astronaut has set foot on Mars by this time, which directly contradicts
The Ambassadors of Death
and
The Dying Days
.

[
1229
]
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?

[
1230
] Dating
TW: Something Borrowed
(
TW
2.9) - The story opens on a Friday night at Gwen’s bachelorette party, and the wedding occurs the next day. Given everyone’s dress and the ease with which they can go outdoors, it’s a warm month.

[
1231
] Dating
TW: SkyPoint
(
TW
novel #8) - Gwen and Rhys have been married “a little over two weeks now” (p1, p13), and have just returned from their honeymoon of “ten days in Cuba” (p1). More time than that seems to pass between
TW: Something Borrowed
and
TW: From Out of the Rain
, so
SkyPoint
appears to fall between the two. The month is September (p85).

[
1232
] Dating
TW: From Out of the Rain
(
TW
2.10) - Enough time has passed since
TW: Something Borrowed
that Gwen has gone on her honeymoon and returned. Everyone is now wearing jackets, suggesting that it’s a bit later in the year.

[
1233
] Dating “Hotel Historia” (
DWM
#394) - The month and year are given.

[
1234
] “The Crimson Hand”

[
1235
] Dating
Brave New Town
(BF BBC7 #2.3) - The exact date is given.

[
1236
] Dating
TW: Adrift
(
TW
2.11) - Further establishing that it’s 2008, Rift-abductee Jonah Bevan was born 15th February, 1993, and is now 15. Also, a flier says that the first meeting of Searchlight - a missing persons support group - is slated for Monday the 27th; in 2008, such a day only occurred in October. The story’s epilogue takes place one week later, presumably in early November. Entertainingly, a handwritten note says that another abductee, Bahri Agon, was born on the fictional date of “30/2/83”.

[
1237
] Dating
TW: Pack Animals
(
TW
novel #7) - The back cover mentions “Halloween is a day of fun and frights”, and yet the action occurs on a “freezing Saturday... in November” (p57) that falls after a bit of Halloween festivities (p51). In 2008, the day after Halloween was a Saturday, so the story presumably takes place on 1st November. Regrettably, the book is at odds with the continuity of Series 2 - Owen is already dead (p75, so it’s after
TW: A Day in the Death
), and Gwen and Rhys are still making preparations for their wedding (so it’s before
TW: Something Borrowed
), but a placement anywhere in November (hard to avoid, as the month is expressly stated) would have
Pack Animals
occurring after or roughly concurrent with
TW: Adrift
, which manifestly occurs after Gwen and Rhys’ nuptials. To judge from the prologue, Gareth murders his first victim on the Saturday before Halloween.

[
1238
] Dating
TW:
“Jetsam” (
TWM
#3) - The comic saw release between
TW: Adrift
and
TW: Fragments
. It’s specified as being “a wet Tuesday morning”.

[
1239
] “The other week” according to
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane Smith?
Sarah and Captain Jack use the warp star against the Daleks in
Journey’s End
, and it’s presumably still aboard the Crucible when it’s destroyed.

[
1240
] Dating
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?
(
SJA
1.5) - Andrea says she has been dead “forty years” and she’s the same age as Sarah Jane, who was born in 1951. It’s later established that Andrea died in 1964, so it was actually forty-four years earlier. It’s still 2008, as Clyde says in
SJA: The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith
, set in 2009, that they first fought the Trickster “last year”. The Trickster makes his move on the Doctor in
Turn Left
.

[
1241
] Dating
SJA: The Glittering Storm
and
SJA: The Thirteenth Stone
(
SJA
audiobooks #1-2) - The stories take place during
The Sarah Jane Adventures
Series 1, and saw release simultaneous to
Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?
episode two.

[
1242
] Dating
SJA: The Lost Boy (SJA
1.6) - It’s straight after
SJA: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?
. The news report about “Ashley Stafford” (i.e. Luke) says that his family hasn’t seen him in “five months”, which is presumably how long has passed since
SJA: Invasion of the Bane
. If that were literally true, however,
The Lost Boy
would have to take place at the absolute end of 2008, or possibly even in the early part of 2009 (not impossible, but the seasonal weather seems all wrong for that). One possibility is that Sarah and her friends, upon hearing the report, presume that “Ashley” was taken by the Bane and experimented upon for some weeks prior to Luke’s “activation” in
Invasion of the Bane
. Supporting this idea, everything that’s happened to Sarah and her friends since is said to have happened in the “past few months”. Maria, who was 13 in
Invasion of the Bane
, is now 14. A guard says that it’s a Saturday.

[
1243
] The month and year are specified. Barbra’s arrival is seen in
Iris: Iris and the Celestial Omnibus
: “The Deadly Flap”. Barbra relates her arrival in the twenty-first century in
Iris: Enter Wildthyme
.

[
1244
] Dating
The Raincloud Man
(BF #116) - Charley says that
The Condemned
took place “earlier in the year”.
The Raincloud Man
saw release in January 2009, but Menzies specifies that “it’s Christmas” - presumably denoting the season rather than the actual day, as an awful lot of people are out doing Christmas shopping - which suggests a dating of December 2008.