From: jblum@hamlet.umd.edu (Hi ho -- Kermit the Frog here...)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.drwho
Subject: Re: I just have a question
Date: 18 Nov 92 23:09:45 GMT
Organization: University of Maryland, College Park

In article <1992Nov18.052319.14686@galileo.cc.rochester.edu> as010b@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (andrew david simchik) writes:
>....but if you have the audacity, poor judge of character (if you can't
>understand Sarah Jane, best leave Falstaff alone), and sheer lack of
>observation to call Sarah Jane Smith a "nil brain", YOU HAVE A FIGHT ON YOUR
>HANDS.

Oooh.  I'm sorry, I tried, but I can't pass this one up.

Also from Andrew David "Drewcifer" Simchik, a few days ago:

>Just because you like someone or something that I don't doesn't make your
>opinion any more valid than my own.  If I dislike Ace, that's an opinion
>based on perception.  If you like her, don't presume that you have any more
>of a factual basis than I do...opinion is opinion and I can't believe that
>you cannot comprehend this!

Hmm, Drew?  So, are you now saying that some opinions come from a "sheer
lack of observation" and are therefore invalid?

Well, considering that in the recent Ace bash-fest, some of us cited
plenty of details you'd missed or ignored, but you insisted that you
still had the God-given right to keep shouting your opinion in our faces
at every opportunity no matter what the facts of the stories were...

>And if you thought the Ace thing was bad, just you wait and see how this
>debate flames!

...then this ought to be fun.

>****************************************************************************
>*  Andrew David Simchik *  DISCLAIMER: I said it... 			   *
                                           ...and said it...
                                           ...and said it...
                                           ...and said it...
>*  a.k.a. Drewcifer     *  			No one else would!	   *							   *
                                                Or felt the need to.
>****************************************************************************

But seriously, folks, now that I've gotten that out of my system...

Was Sarah Jane a no-brainer?

I think not.  True, she did fall very much into the traditional "Doctor,
what's happening?" role, playing as a foil to the Doctor, but she also
did quite a few intelligent things.  Look at "Invasion of the Dinosaurs",
where she goes off and investigates on her own for a large chunk of the
story, or "Terror Of The Zygons", where she figures out a lot of what
is going on before the Doctor does.

She even had the sense, in "The Masque of Mandragora", to ask the obvious
question that no one (except the viewers) ever thought of before.  How
come everyone in outer space or ancient history speaks English?  :-)

On the other hand, she did break down completely in "Ark In Space", and
she played the typical Hammer Horror maiden-in-distress in "Brain Of
Morbius".  Sarah's problem wasn't so much one of being a bad character --
she was just an inconsistently written one.  Would the dead-on shot with
the rifle in "Pyramids of Mars" come from the same person who is too
terrified of a clanking robot to move in "Robot"?

I'd definitely blame the writers of some stories before I'd blame Lis
Sladen for Sarah Jane's shortcomings.  Bonnie "Eeek!" Langford, on the
other hand, deserves full blame for Mel.  But that's another thread
entirely.

Comments, anyone?