Returning Ex-Regulars Week!

By coincidence, both new episodes this week, which happen to be airing back to back on the Sci Fi Channel this Friday, feature the return of popular ex-regulars in long-bruited guest starring roles. (Check out the newly expanded listings for more info.)

On Doctor Who, Billie Piper returns after several episodes of foreshadowing: she appeared as a (oddly blasé) illusion in the season premiere, "Partners in Crime," and as an image on a screen in "The Poison Sky" and "Midnight." Not only do we get Billie's Rose Tyler back from the alternate universe where she's been trapped, but there are hints of how other stories we've seen this season have played out where she's been. Rose and Donna (Catherine Tate) join UNIT in trying to undo a timeline that resulted in the Doctor's unnatural death. Those engaged in the sport of following repeat small-part players in Who will notice Chipo Chung, who plays the fortune teller who sets things in motion here and was Yana's assistant Chantho in "Utopia" (3x11).

This is the second round of returning-companion alliances this year after the adventures with Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman) earlier in the season – the third if you count "future companion" River Song (Alex Kingston) from "Silence in the Library"/"Forest of the Dead" – and it won't be the last. For the two-part finale "The Stolen Earth"/"Journey's End" we get the kitchen sink: Rose, Martha, Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen), Mickey Smith (Noel Clarke), Jackie Tyler (Camille Coduri), Harriet Jones (!) (Penelope Wilton), and the (surviving) cast of Torchwood: Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman, who also counts as an ex-companion), Ianto Jones (Gareth David-Lloyd), and Gwen Cooper (Eve Myles, who also played a different role on Who in "The Unquiet Dead" (1x03).) Not to mention, of course, the Doctor's greatest and most compelling enemy from the classic series.

Then on Stargate Atlantis, one of those pesky alien organisms incapacitates Dr. Keller (Jewel Staite); needing a doctor to figure things out, and David Tennant not being handy, newly arrived expedition commander Richard Woolsey (Robert Picardo) hauls Carson Beckett (Paul McGillion) out of the freezer to get the problem sorted. Beckett was put in stasis because his clone body suffers from a degenerative cellular condition; his illness will add some tension to the crisis threatening Keller and the rest of the base. Apparently freezer burn has affected his hair -- not sure why that happened.

This episode also introduced Woolsey properly to Atlantis – in "Search and Rescue" we only saw him in the SGC, breaking the bad news to Col. Carter (Amanda Tapping), which means we see his uninspiring speech and other bits of newbie-Woolsey comedy.

Oh, and isn't it interesting to see what they came up with for the 8 o'clock slot -- Joan of Arcadia! So far I'm enjoying getting reacquainted with yet another prematurely canceled supernatural series, especially as I love seeing Erik Palladino in just about anything.