October 10-11 2021 marks the original broadcast of The Curse of Clyde Langer, the middle story of the fifth and final season of The Sarah Jane Adventures.
Written by Phil Ford.
Due to the death of Lis Sladen, The Curse of Clyde Langer unintentionally became the swansong for Ace Bhatti as Rani’s father Haresh and Jocelyn Jee Esien as Clyde’s mother Carla.
Haresh later attended Sarah Jane’s funeral as recounted by Gita in Farewell, Sarah Jane.
At the beginning of The Curse of Clyde Langer, Clyde showed Rani at school, The Silver Bullet, a superhero comic strip which he created.
Later on it is revealed in Farewell, Sarah Jane, Clyde made commercial success out of The Silver Bullet as a comic book series and was involved in adapting it as a movie.
Just as Clyde was showing Rani, The Silver Bullet, came fish that literally fell out of the sky.
Clyde makes a pun out of this saying it is fishy!
Mr Smith detects possible link with the falling fish to a new exhibit at a museum, that of a totem pole,
Clyde gets the said curse due to him being bitten by the said totem pole which results in everyone (except Sky probably because she is an alien, I had surmised at the time) turning against him when they say, hear or read his name.
With the exception of Sky, as everyone who has said, heard or read his name had turned against him Clyde eventually accepts help from a girl called Ellie.
This marked the cliffhanger to Part 1.
For Part 2 I noted that it had more been about Clyde’s isolation than with the menace that is the totem pole.
Due to the curse that has been placed on his name, Clyde came up with a fake name Enrico Box, an inspiration taken from a discarded pizza box, to introduce himself to Ellie.
Sky, having not been affected by the curse, is the one who came up with the solution to free Clyde from the curse.
I noted at the time that just as the totem pole caused Clyde’s isolation it is also what caused him to lose Ellie as he had no time to let her know where he was going when his friends came for him.
Also Ellie seems to be lost forever because like Clyde’s use of a fake name, Ellie is not her real name as it was one that she read off a poster and therefore cannot be traced.
At the time I surmised that while the loss of Ellie was tragic it probably wasn’t in the production team’s mind to have another new regular character so soon after introducing Sky.
The Curse of Clyde Langer featured the homeless and Clyde unfortunately becoming one due to the curse and this presents a harrowing presentation of that very topic.
Matthew See
Spocksoc Vice President
Spocksoc News Page 