Coming off of this season felt felt weird compared to the last few, and especially when compared to the exit seasons of the previous three Doctors. In some ways it felt disjointed and mixed in the way that season 15 did, but otherwise i found six of the seven stories at least serviceable, and many of them felt radically different from each other which made them especially hard to compare for a ranking, or to even examine this season as one cohesive thing. A big reason for this can probably be attributed to major cast overhauls through the seasons, as well as the introduction of two overarching story arcs that essentially divided the season into three, fairly distinct parts that don't really resemble each other at all. It's to the point where I went ahead and watched the "Behind the Sofa" segments from the season bluray before writing this review just so I had a fresher idea in my head of what each story was like.

A lot of this can be attributed to the fact that John Nathan-Turner took over from Graham Williams as producer and immediately pushed for a number of stylistic changes, some good and some bad, so coming off the previous season it immediately felt jarring. It also involves a lot of plot and character setup for the next season and the new era of the show, while not seeming to pay much attention to the era that's ending. One of the strengths of the Third Doctor's exit was how many elements from his tenure ultimately came into play with his ultimate end, but that was very much not the case here, which was disappointing. I suspect my feelings on this season in the future will ultimately be influenced by what I think of the Fifth Doctor's era. Right now I'm just thinking about how far this all feels from the Fourth Doctor's debut.

Like the previous seventeen seasons, the serials are available to watch via streaming on Britbox. This season had seven stories, and as stated above is easily the hardest and perhaps most involved ranking I've ever had to do for this show.

( They say the atmosphere there was so full of goodness that evil just shriveled up and died. Maybe that's why I never went there. )

Originally I was going to tack this onto my review of season 18, much like how the pilot itself is included as a bonus on the season 18 Blu-ray box set, but I ended up having so many thoughts and feelings about it I thought it would be better to give it it's own separate, mini-review. After an era-ending season I had mixed feelings about, it was nice to sit down and watch this short, 50 minute pilot for a TV show that never went to series that featured two of the best elements of the Fourth Doctor era - Sarah Jane Smith and K9. It was one of the things I was most excited to get to when I began Classic Who, as it established so much of how those two characters would subsequently be portrayed in spinoff media as well as New Who and The Sarah Jane Adventures. In a sense, this is the Classic series equivalent of The Sarah Jane Adventures, and having seen the full run of that series it's especially fascinating to look back on this.

It's honestly a shame this never went to series. I just keep imagining if it had gone for a season or two and then culminated in Sarah Jane's appearance in The Five Doctors (which I have yet to see and am very much looking forward to). The set design in this was so well crafted and cozy, which only helped when this eventually became a stealth Christmas Special before Doctor Who had Christmas Specials. With the advent of Big Finish, I'm actually very surprised there was never an audio continuation of this later on, even though they apparently alluded to it in material featuring Sarah Jane, and I'm also surprised there was no real effort to bring back any of these characters in a small way in The Sarah Jane Adventures. Speculating on what could have been is an exercise in futility though, since what we did get is still pretty great.

Like most of Classic Who, this special is available to watch via streaming on Britbox. Because it's only one episode, there's no ranking, but I'm going to format this entry the same as the others anyway.

( She's like a butterfly, never in one place long enough to lick a stamp. )