Story 189 # "Partners In Crime"

Season

4

Writer

Russell T. Davies

Book/CD

Episodes

1

Director

James Strong

Vid

Story code

Producer

Phil Colinson

DVD

X

Episode Details

Episode

DR MM:SS

TX dd/mm/yy

RPT TX dd/mm/yy

In BBC Archive

1

48:34

05/04/2008

Y

Cast Details

Regular Cast
David Tennant (The Doctor), Catherine Tate (Donna)

Synopsis

Donna Noble, the eponymous Runaway Bride who helped the Doctor defeat the Empress of Racnoss, has realised she made the wrong decision when she turned down the chance to travel in the Tardis. She's determined to track the Time Lord down and tell him she's changed her mind. Meanwhile, the Doctor is investigating the strange goings-on linked to a new diet pill that claims to promote dramatic weight loss..

1. Donna first met the Doctor in The Runaway Bride. Several elements of that story are referred to in this episode, including Donna’s ill-fated fiancé Lance, the Doctor’s suit and the spider creatures, the Rachnoss.
2. The Doctor is alone at the start of the story, having been left by Martha and Jack in Last of the Time Lords and then having lost Astrid in Voyage of the Damned.
3. Donna refers to the Titanic flying over Buckingham Palace on Christmas Day, an event that occurred in Voyage of the Damned. Bernard Cribbins, who plays Donna’s grandfather Wilf, also featured in that story as a newspaper vendor, and it is quite likely the character is the same.
4. The episode is dedicated to the memory of Howard Attfield, who played Donna’s father in The Runaway Bride and who was scheduled to appear in this series, but sadly died shortly after filming began.
5. The Doctor talks of not being much of a cat person, a sentiment echoed in Fear Her, presumably inspired by his trip to New Earth.
6. Rose was last seen in Doomsday, having been apparently trapped in a parallel world with her mother Jackie and boyfriend Mickey.
7. After Stacey Campbell dies, Donna gets into the cab Stacey had ordered. The cab has an ATMOS sticker in the lower right front corner of the windshield (see The Sontaran Stratagem / The Poison Sky).