PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Twilight Zone S2D5

The fifth and final disc in the Season 2 DVD set has 5 episodes and some extras. Rod Serling is the creator and host. He writes a good number of the episodes. I sometimes find his stories a bit heavy handed but I'm not the one that needs to be learning that lesson.

The Silence  April 28 1961

Written by Rod and directed by Boris Sagal. Franchot Tone is a member of a business men's club. Johnathan Harris is his lawyer. Franchot arranges a wager with a loud talking guy who is always trying to borrow money and never shuts up. If he can keep quiet for a year Franchot will give him half a million dollars. The loud guy takes the bet and gets stuck in a glass cage for a year. When he wins Franchot tells him he has no money. The loud guy cheated too, he cut his own vocal cords so he can't talk. What a bunch of jerks. The lawyer is the best guy there. That's the Twilight Zone for ya. I don't seem to remember this one but it wasn't too bad.

Shadow Play  May 5 1961

Written by Charles Beaumont and directed by John Brahm. Dennis Weaver has the same dream each night. He's on trial, gets convicted, sentenced to death and tossed on the electric chair all in one snooze. He's really tired of the dream but he's stuck in the TZ. Sucks to be that guy. More interesting than a lot of the season's entries. Dennis Weaver is pretty darn good. Nicely directed too. I didn't remember this one but I did like it. There's a ok commentary by Dennis Weaver on the dvd as well as an isolated score.

The Mind And The Matter  May 12 1961

Written by Rod and directed by Buzz Kulik. Shelley Berman is a tired business man who hasn't much love for humanity. He gets a book on mind over matter and makes everyone disappear. For some reason he is lonely and he gets them all back. That's just crazy. It was so quiet there, the subway was so empty, what's not to like. I enjoyed it but I'm a Berman fan from my youth. Shelley does a nice commentary about his time on the show and his career in tv and doing his stand up act. I used to play a couple of his comedy albums frequently when I was in my teens. I just didn't have that many comedy albums then so they got played often. There's an isolated score on this one.  

Will The Real Martian Please Stand Up?  May 26 1961

Written by Rod and directed by Montgomery Pittman. Some highway patrol men see something fall out of the sky. They think it's a meteor and it fell in the lake. Until they see the tracks in the snow. They follow them to a diner where a bus waits outside. The bus driver says he has 6 passengers but there are 7 people there. Oh, oh. John Hoyt, Jean Willis and Jack Elam play some of the passengers and Barney Phillips plays the counter guy in the diner. The paranoia ramps up as they try to figure out why there are 7 instead of 6. The bus leaves, with 7 passengers aboard, only to crash in a river. Everyone is killed but the alien. He makes it back to the diner and gets a big surprize. I did remember this story. I'll always remember that third eye. It's not the best makeup but it was effective at the time. There's a TZ radio drama and an isolated score.

The Obsolete Man  June 2 1961

Written by Rod and directed by Elliot Silverstein. Burgess Meredith is a librarian who's been rendered obsolete as the totalitarian state has eliminated books. Made them a crime in fact, just having a Bible will get you the death penalty. The Chancellor is his judge and after the guilty verdict he gives Burgess the option to choose his execution. They're quite a bunch of dicks, that state, I sure wouldn't like them much. Burgess invites the Chancellor, played by Dennis Weaver, to his apartment a hour before the execution. Burgess has chosen a bomb as the way to go and he wants it televised. Burgess locks Fritz in with him. Fritz holds out until the very last moment, when he breaks down, begging God for mercy. Burgess lets him out. Boom. Burgess gone. The next day as Fritz comes to work he finds he's been made obsolete. Ha ha. Not a bad one, a little heavy handed. I love the court room set. I remember this one too. There's a TZ radio drama and an isolated score.

  

There are a few Extras on the disc that aren't tied to a specific episode. Rod often appeared on talk shows and occasionally on other comedy shows. Here are there of his tv appearances. The Mike Wallis Interview September 1959, Tell It To Groucho, The Jack Benny Show. In the latter Rod takes Jack Benny into the Twilight Zone. There are some Season 2 Billboards, which are the short sponsor announcements as the show goes to commercial. There's a Twilight Zone comic book in PDF format. Here are a few of my favorite pictures from the DVD.

   

 

Science Fiction Sunday 300

  

Time Flight is the 123 serial and it's the last story of the 19th season. It first aired March 22 to 30 1982 and 10 million people watched the first episode. The 2nd had 8.5, the 3rd 8.9 and the last 8.1 million. Peter Davison is the 5th Doctor and Janet Fielding is Teagan and Sarah Sutton is Nyssa. Peter Grimwade wrote the screenplay and Ron Jones is the director.

Everyone is hanging out in the Tardis feeling sad because Adric is gone. Not me. To cheer them up the Doctor plans to take them back in time to The Great Exhibition in 1851 London. This is when the Crystal Palace was first built. They don't actually get there, winding up in Heathrow Airport in the modern day. The Tardis settles in the airport lounge and the authorities come looking to see what's up. The Doc is arrested and taken to the management. He asks them to call UNIT which leads to the Doctor helping them with their problem.

A Concorde went missing on it's incoming landing. It was taken back in time 140 million years by an alien guy. He uses the passengers to build stuff for him. The Doctor loads his Tardis on another Concorde and they follow the time contour back in time. They find out the alien is really The Master and they have to fight him. He nearly gets the upper hand but fails pretty much as you'd expect. The story was ok for the most part. Nothing much special and I think I'm growing tired of The Master.

The sets were fair to poor and the in studio green screen effects were lamer than normal. Davison comments in the commentary that he wasn't happy with the serial. He likes the story but feels it wasn't told as well as it could have been. They had run out of cash and he thinks the sets and props are worse than their usual quality and I'd agree. The forced prespective of the outdoor shots in the past sure don't look real. Especially when you are seeing it on a DVD. The old level of quality on the TV sets of the day it first aired masked a lot of the budget issues. In another part of the commentary Eric Seward, the script editor, talks about the cliff hangers that appear on the episodes. He's not much of a fan of them and neither am I. They're kind of pointless and the repeated footage at the beginning of the 2-4 episodes just cuts down the amount of time for story. I guess it saves money on the production costs and there's little to do about it now, huh.

The commentary with Peter Davison, Janet Fielding, Sarah Sutton and script editor Eric Saward is ok. There's a Janet Fielding interview about her time on the show, some deleted scenes, some raw footage, some outtakes, a short interview with Peter Grimwade, info text, photo gallery, 1983 Doctor Who Annual. the Radio Times listing and a trailer for an upcoming dvd.

Friday Night Movies 491

A pal of Mike's gave $100 to the film makers behind The Late Night Double Feature and they passed along a copy of the DVD. The double feature is made up of 2 short films that total 85 minutes. X, The Fiend From Beyond Space is about a spaceship that picks up an alien. He's a mean one and he nearly kills the whole crew. The Wall People is about a guy who's kid is abducted by an alien. He tries to save his kid. The movie is the work of Minnesota film maker Christopher R Mihm and that's nothing for the state to be proud of. He makes parodies of black and white 1950's science fictions films with the intention of making them bad so people will laugh. I think he does a crappy job of recreating the 50's type of film. His basic plots are pretty good story ideas and they would be the kind of thing you might actually see in a 1950's sf film but the execution is mind bogglingly awful. The acting is nearly non existant, we've got mediocre actors trying to act bad, and we suffer. We were a sad lot after we sat through the whole film. We watched his 2013 film The Giant Spider and didn't care for that either. You're better off watching those real 1950's films.  

Votes	Percentage	Rating
8	42.1%	10
1	5.3%	9
3	15.8%	8
1	5.3%	7
3	15.8%	6
0		5
0		4
0		3
1	5.3%	2
2	10.5%	1

Arithmetic mean = 7.5.  Median = 8

Don't let the 7.5 on the IMDb fool you, someone is screwing with the scores. As you can see 8 people gave the movie a 10 and that out of 19 votes. Almost all the scores are above a 6 and that's just crazy stupid. IMDb members, go fix that, I already did my part, I gave the thing a 3 and that was being generous. When I saw The Giant Spider last year it scored an 8.5 but now it scores a 6.6 which is still too high.

Our second feature, The Battle Of Pussy Willow Creek, scores a 5.8 on the IMDb and that's a little more reasonable. The 2010 movie is written and directed by Wendy Jo Cohen even though the film says it's credited to Grace A Burns in the opening titles. Wendy Jo has several tv documentary producing credits listed on her IMDb page so it makes sense she might create this parody civil war documentary. The story is about the lives of 4 people who were responsible for the northern victory at the little known battle of Pussy Willow Creek. There's an opium-addicted gay Colonel, an aging Chinese launderer, a nerdy escaped slave, and a one-armed teenage prostitute. They all work together to defeat the secret division of British troops. The style is influenced by Ken Burns with lots of sound effects, voice overs, interviews and picture scanning. There are plenty of graphics, old pictures, drawings and live footage of the areas the battles were fought. It's got a fanciful story with some silly material and a good number of clever jokes. It's a 95 minute movie that mostly kept my interest but it slows down about the hour mark. I did laughed several times out loud. I'd recommend to those that like a bit of a laugh. It certainly stands head and shoulders above our first film.

Babylon 5 - S1D3

Babylon 5 is described in the opening credits as the "last best hope for peace".  There were 4 previous stations, the first three were destroyed by terrorists and the 4th disappeared. There are a quarter of a million humans and aliens on the station. The EarthForce personnel number about 2000. Here's Commander Sinclair's narration for the 1st season's titles.

It was the dawn of the third age of mankind – ten years after the Earth-Minbari War. The Babylon Project was a dream given form. Its goal: to prevent another war by creating a place where humans and aliens could work out their differences peacefully. It's a port of call – home away from home – for diplomats, hustlers, entrepreneurs, and wanderers. Humans and aliens wrapped in two million five hundred thousand tons of spinning metal… all alone in the night. It can be a dangerous place, but it's our last best hope for peace. This is the story of the last of the Babylon stations. The year is 2258. The name of the place is Babylon 5.

Deathwalker  April 20 1994

Written by Lawrence G Ditillio and directed by Bruce Seth Green

Na'Toth attacks a Dilgar woman who's just arriving on the station. She claims the now unconscious Dilgar is Deathwalker, the notorious Dilgar Warmaster and mass murder named Jha'dur. She is supposed to be dead. She'd been hiding amongst the Windswords and she'd developed weapons for the Minbari during the Minbari-Earth War. Delenn tells Sinclair that the Minbari government never knew until Jha'dur turned up at the station. All the races have their secrets in secrets and they hardly ever turn out well for anyone. Turns out Deathwalker has a universal anti-agathic drug that cures disease and retards the aging process in all humanoid life forms. That would be popular, huh.

Sinclair is told by Senator Hidoshi that he has to get Deathwalker to Earth right away. The League of Non-Aligned Worlds put a stop to that, they want to try Jha'dur for her war crimes. She killed whole populations during the war that happened 30 years ago. It was the first space war the Earth entered, helping the League against the Dilgar invasion. The Humans hadn't meet the Minbari yet. The League sends warships to B5 and it gets a bit hairy until Sinclair gets them to hold off. They can have her once she helps the Earth develop the drug. Turns out that drug requires one person or alien to die to keep another going. Ha, ha. Like that would stop people from using that. There'd be a rash of new crimes that would require the death penalty. It's doesn't matter much, the Vorlons blow up Deathwalker's ship as she gets to the jump gate. Kosh tells everyone they aren't ready for immortality. You can't really argue with that. Most humans and aliens don't seem ready for lunch.

The other story line in the episode concerns our mysterious Vorlon. He hires the stations telepath Talia Winters for some business. They meet with a guy named Abbut. That's him in the black hat and purple stripped coat. I've always liked the variety of costumes on Babylon 5 and that includes the colors. Visually, I find the show a treat. Kosh and Abbut exchange odd words and Talia stands there. She has some weird visions and it disturbs her. Nothing is ever explained. Just more Vorlon stuff. They are the most sercet of races. At least for now. It's an episode I liked quite a bit. It doesn't move the arc along much but it gives you some backstory and a bit of look at the Vorlons.

Believers  April 27 1994

Written by David Gerrold and Richard Compton

I've always had a hard time watching this one. Dr Franklin has a little boy in his care. He wants to operate but the parents religion does not allow that. He goes ahead and operates and the parents have to kill their son because he's now being controlled by demons. Once the skin is broken the soul is destroyed and demons take over. It's a tough story and a good one. I just feel so sad for the family, either way, their kid is dead. I don't feel much sympathy for Dr Franklin, he did what he did for a good reason, but it was the wrong thing to do.

The drama is cut with some space action. Ivanova takes out a gang of Star Furys to help a stranded ship. There are a good number of raiders in the spaceways. Babylon 5 tries to keep them cleared out of their area. It's another episode that doesn't move the arc forward and like all the rest of the episodes on this disc it isn't written by JMS. Science Fiction readers might recognize David Gerrold's name from the novels and stories he wrote over the years. I read his 1972 short story collection With My Finger In My I when it came out. I also read the novel he wrote with Larry Niven, The Flying Sorcerers, but I don't remember reading anything else on his book list on the Wikipedia.  He also wrote a good bit of TV including Star Trek's The Trouble With Tribbles. A much lighter toned story to be sure.  

Survivors  May 4 1994

Written by Marc Scott Zicree and directed by Jim Johnston

President Santiago is coming to the station and someone wants to kill him. That same group frames Mr Garibabldi and he has to go on the run from his own men. We learn that Mr G has had a checkered path and problems with alcohol. He falls off the wagon while he's on the run and gets caught. He manages to pull his feet out of the fire and figure out who is behind the frame. Garibaldi is one of my favorite characters in the series. He's got his issues but he's always ready to help a pal when they need a hand. He's a good man to have at your back. It's another one that I like a lot, even though it's a well used plot device. The characters are what make the series so wonderful and the actors do a great job bringing them to life. Lucky for them they have such good scripts.

By Any Means Necessary  May 11 1994

Written by Kathryn M Drennan and Jim Johnston

The stations dock workers are overworked, they work too many shifts, people are getting hurt. The station says they have no more budget and they can't do anything. The workers start an illegal strike which puts Sinclair on the spot. Earth sends a strike breaker named Orin Zento but before he gets everyone arrested Sinclair saves the day. I think the story line makes the station more real. JMS has said he wanted it to be a lived in universe. It sure is. I like it.

In the other story thread a special plant G'Kar needs for a religious ceremony gets destroyed. It's a rare thing, if he ordered a new one, it wouldn't arrive before the ceremony's deadline passes. It turns out that Mollari has one of the plants, he was going to get high with it, but he won't give or sell it to G'Kar. Sinclair gets in there and gets the plant. The deadline has just past and Londo is happy. The ceremony has to be held when the light from Narn's sun falls on a certain spot on Narn. Sinclair reminds G'Kar that the light from the Narn sun would be getting to the station later in the day. G'Kar can hold the ceremony. Sinclair does a lot of good on the station and he'll have a big impact on the Minbari in the future.

Another good batch of stories and even though JMS didn't write them he does have a chance to rewrite and add stuff. He keeps the characters on track and adds a lot of interesting dialog and story idea. We don;t get as much advancement on the story arc in this batch of shows but that wheel turns soon enough.

A Touch Of Frost Series 6 & 7

The 6th series of A Touch Of Frost consisted of four 100 minute episodes that first aired in March 1999. The 7th series was a 2 part story that aired on Christmas Day 1999 and New Years Day 2000. David Jason is Detective Frost in the fictional town of Denton. He's usually got a new partner each episode. 

Appendix Man

Caroline Harker returns as DS Hazel Wallace and she's helping Frost with the mess left whil;e he was on leave. There's a guy hanging in his house and there are fingerprints in the room from a guy who drowned a year before. I'd say the dead will rise but Frost wouldn't have anything to do with that. It's nice to see Hazel again.

One Man's Meat

A homeless teen is found drowned in the river. Frost is taking care of a police dog while it's handler is laid up with a bunged up leg. A meat inspector is missing and the meat packers are up to something. It's a nice mix of grim murder and dog jokes.

Private Lives

A woman is hit by a car and it might not be an accident. There's also a robbery at a brewery. Philip Jackson returns as DS Billy "Razor" Sharpe. He's an interesting character of the old school type.

Keys To The Car

Frost gets yelled at for his questioning techniques, he is a bit over the top, and there's a guy who's stealing a string of cars as he drives across country. They find a dead drug dealer in the boot on one of the cars. DS Bill Dorridge is working with Frost this week, and he's played by Paul Jesson.

Line of Fire 1 & 2

The regional crime squad police detective Tim Fox has been found dead. Frost wonders if it was the car thieves he was investigating what done him in. A power station was burgled and Frost and Dorridge are on that case too.

The quality of the productin, writing and acting hasn't changed, it's still good in every way. I have the next batch of dvds coming from the library. I'll stick them in between the next dvd of Babylon 5.

Sansho The Bailiff 1954

I got the Criterion edition of Sansho The Bailiff from NetFlix and watched it over the weekend. It's a 1954 Japanese film written by Fuji Yahiro and Yoshikata Yoda from a story by Mori Ōgai. It was directed by Kenji Mizoguchi who had directed Ugetsu and the 1941 version of The 47 Ronin. He directed a lot of other films in his career. It started in 1923 and ended in 1956 with a total of 98 credits as listed on the IMDb. Sansho The Bailiff is set in the Heian period of feudal Japan. It's a crappy time, there's plenty of war and the poor are pretty much stuck in poverty while the handful of rich guys screw everyone they can. The Governor of a province has overstepped his boundries. He's sent into banishment and his wife and children are sent to her brothers. 

Later the wife, kids and a nanny travel to see the father. On the way they're kidnapped, the kids are sold to Sansho the Bailiff, the mother into prostitution on the island of Sado. The nanny is falls out of the boat and no one bothers with her, she's not even worth getting wet for. Sansho is a real terror, he keeps his slaves in line with torture and murder. Trying to escape will get you branded, getting too old, weak or sick gets you left in the woods to die. They won't even bury you; the birds will take care of your corpse. The kids grow up in Sansho's compound and the boy Zushiô becomes hardened to the life. The girl Anju retains her heart. Their father was a just man who believed that without mercy, man is not a human being. Not many in the land felt that way, especially those that were at the top of the pile.

The kids plan their escape but another slave puts a kink in it. She's sick, medicine costs money, so she's to be left in the woods to die. Zushiô is assigned to carry her there and the sister is sent along to help. Anju decides to stay behind and distract the guard watching them so her brother can escape with the other slave. He takes her to a Buddhist temple where she gets some medicine. Back at the compound Anju drowns herself so she won't have to tell where her brother went. Zushiô makes his way to Kyoto to see the Chief Advisor. He proves who he is and the CA makes him Governor of Tango which is where Sansho lives. He also tells him that his father had died the year before. Zushiô frees the slaves of Tango and exiles Sansho. He finds out his sister is dead. The slaves party so hard they burn Sansho's house down. Zushiô resigns his post, knowing that he's overstepped his bounds, and travels to find his mother. He finds her and they have a sad reunion.

I tell you, it's one sad thing after another. It's a really well made film and people who see it rave over it big time. It's just not something I might want to watch that often. It's a great looking film and worth seeing for that. You can see it on YouTube and I've stuck a link in the title above. I'd recommend it, especially for those that like a bleak drama.

Twilight Zone S2D4

I got to another disc of The Twilight Zone, it's the fourth of the second season and it's got 6 episodes.

Mr Dingle The Strong  March 3 1961

Written by Rod Serling and directed by John Brahm. Burgess Meredith gets super strength due to the meddling of a two headed Martian. Don Rickles plays an annoying bar patron. The Martians remove Mr Dingles strength when he gets on tv. Luckily for Mr Dingle some Venutians show up and make him super smart. Rod closes the show hinting that there are more aliens out there and Mr D is in for some more visits. It's a goofy one, I liked it, and I remember it from the olden days. There's a 3 minute commentary by Don Rickles and an isolated score.

Static  March 10 1961

Written by Rod and directed by Buzz Kulik. A sentimental and sad story about an older man, Dean Jagger, who lives in a rooming house with a woman who he nearly married 20 years ago. An old radio gives him a second chance in the TZ. In order to save money the show was recorded on videotape and transferred to film. Not one I remember but it sure is a Rod type show. There's a 13 minute interview with Buzz Kulik where Buzz talks about shooting the show on tape. There's an isolated score and a clip of the production slate.

The Prime Mover  March 24 1961

Written by Charles Beaumont and directed by Richard L Bare. Buddy Ebsen is a cook in a diner that has telekinetic powers. Dane Clark takes him to Las Vegas to win a lot of money from the casinos. Buddy controls the games that Dane bets on. Buddy gets tired because Dane pushes too hard. Dane's girl leaves him and Buddy looses his powers at a critical point in a big crap shoot with some gangsters. Things get back to normal for Buddy and Dane. Just the ilolated score as an extra.

Long Distance Call  March 31 1961

Written by Charles Beaumont and William Idelson and directed by James Sheldon. Billy Mumy plays a little kid who loves his grandma. She gives him a toy telephone so she can talk to him any time he wants to. After she dies he still talks to her. This causes problems when Billy wants to join her. Philip Abbott plays the dad. I sort of remember this one but hadn't remembered that Billy Mumy was in it. I'm currently watching him, credited as Bill Mumy, in Babylon 5. There's an audio commentary with William Idelson and Bill Mumy and the production slate.

A Hundred Yards Over The Rim  April 7 1961

Written by Rod and directed by Buzz Kulik. Cliff Robertson is leading a small wagon train to California. His kid is sick, they are about out of everything, including their lives. He takes a trip over the rim and winds up in the future. He gets some penicillin  and goes back to his own time. His son will be saved. John Astin plays one of the men in the wagon train. I remembered this one but not that Cliff and John were in it. There's a commentary with Cliff Robertson, an interview ith Buzz Kulik, an isolated score by Frew Steiner and a TZ radio drama.

The Rip Van Winkle Caper  April 21 1961

Written by Rod and directed by Jus Addiss. Some criminals rob gold bullion from a train and hide in a cave where they plan to escape the law by using suspended animation chambers. They wake up 100 years in the future with one of the chambers broken. Simon Oakland plays the jerkiest of the crooks, he kills one of the survivors right away and then wrecks the truck. Oscar Beregi Jr plays the brains behind the outfit. It winds up with the two of them out in the desert carrying the heavy gold. Oscar loses his canteen and has to pay Simon a bar of gold for a drink. That greed doesn't go so well for either of them. The car that Robbie The Robot drove in Forbidden Planet makes an appearance at the end of the episode. I guess it's what the people 100 years from 1961 are driving. I sort of remember this one too. It's kind of a typical Rod story. Still entertaining. There's an isolated score.

All in all a good batch of shows. There's one more disc to watch in this season and I'll try for that next week.

Science Fiction Sunday 299

 

It's a double shot of the Doctor today and first up is the 121st serial Black Orchid. It's a two part story that aired March 1 and 2 1982. The 5th Doctor is played by Peter Davison and his three Tardis pals are Matthew Waterhouse as Adric, Sarah Sutton as Nyssa and Janet Fielding as Tegan. It's written by Terence Dudley and directed by Ron Jones.

The Doctor winds up in 1920's England when the Tardis comes to a rest on the platform of a railway station. The Doctor is mistaken for an other man and taken to a fancy manor house. He plays cricket and does rather well. In the house a mysterious man, we only see him from the chest down, kills a man. At the fancy dress ball the Doctor's costume is taken while he's in a fancy hidden suite of apartments behind a series of secret doors and passages.

The butler is killed by the mysterious man under the Doctor's fancy dress costume. The Lord of the manor sends for the police and has the Doctor arrested. He proves he's not from around here by showing them the inside of the Tardis. It's kind of a slight story, very much like an English cosy mystery. The real murderer is revealed so the Doctor doesn't have to go stuck in pokey for the rest of his life. That could be a long time. I enjoyed it well enough.

Besides the commentary with Peter Davison, Mathew Waterhouse, Janet Fielding and Sarah Sutton, there's a now and then feature, some deleted scenes, a bit on the episodes film restoration, a bit of a Blue Peter episode where they go to a famous costume shop, a look at the comic book appearances of he 5th Doctor, an info text, a few complaints by the British public about the moving of the series from Saturday afternoon to Monday and Tuesday evenings, a photo gallery, a coming soon ad, and the usual Radio Times listing. The Easter Egg is some bits of BBC promos with a mention of subtitles on CEEFAX. Not sure what that is but there you go.

 

The next serial in line is Earthshock. I wound up buying the DVD from Amazon UK because neither the library nor NetFlix had the US dvd. It's the 122nd serial and it first aired March 8 to 16 1982. It's the 5th serial of the 19th season. The Tardis crew is the same as the last serial. The story is written by Eric Saward and the director is Peter Grimwade.

They've come to a stop in a mine on Earth in the 26th century. Some scientists have been attacked and the military is investigating. There are two black suited people walking about in the mine too. Adric is homesick and he wants to go back to his planet in E-Space. The Doctor thinks it's too dangerous and doesn't want to make the journey.

The Doctor, Nyssa and Teagan leave the ship and go check out the mine. Adric remains in the Tardis to sulk calculate the trip to E-Space. The military runs into some problems and the Doc and his gang look at a dinosaur skeleton. The military finds one of their group that's been melted just before they encounter the black suited figures. The Doc's group meets up with the military who think that the Doctor has something to do with the killings. He just can't keep out of trouble, that Doctor.

The black figures attack and the Doctor figures out they are androids. He's right but what he doesn't know is that the androids are under the control of the Cybermen. The androids are defeated and the Doctor finds a bomb set to blow everything up. The Doc loads everyone into the Tardis and there's a countdown to boom. The Cybermen want to blow up the whole planet so you know that the Doctor is in the right place at the right time.

The story moves into space where we meet some human spacemen. The Doctor and Adric get arrested when they are found near a body. The Cybermen continue to monitor the Doctor and his Tardis from their hideout in the hold. Other weird things happen on the ship and the Cybermen continue their plan to blow up the Earth. They are truely dedicated douchebags. The Cybermen attack and the ship security men fight back.

Teagan and the military leave the Tardis and find the aftermath of the Cyberman attack. Nyssa and the surviving scientist are still on the Tardis so there's hope. The Cybermen try breaking through to the bridge where the Doc and Adric are holed up with the Captain. They get through and everyone is captive. Oh, oh. They'll get out of that after the usual running about, getting caught and escaping.

It was an ok serial, it just seemed drag after the two parter. It's the last serial for Mathew Waterhouse. His character is the first of the companions to die on the job. I liked this bit from the Wikipedia:

SFX named Adric's death the twenty-ninth best "tearjerker" in science fiction and fantasy, calling it a "tragedy" that managed to make the audience care about him. The magazine also listed the scene as the third best companion departure, calling it "a beautifully constructed death scene" despite the fact that the character was "loathed by fandom".

I won't miss Adric, I'm like the fans mentioned above, I didn't care much for him. I wouldn't go so far as to say loathed. That would require me to care more.

The extras include the usual commentary, this one with Peter Davison, Janet Fielding, Sarah Sutton and Mathew Waterhouse. There's a featurette on the serial that was pretty entertainment. There's 3 minutes of clips from the whole series that celebrates the Doctor's 40th Anniversary. It's kind of so-so. There's nearly 9 minutes of the film shot. Not sure why it's there. A section of the British tv show Did You See..? that chats about Doctor Who and many of it's aliens. There's an option that can add new CGI effects to the serial and that pesky old info track that I don't care much for. There's a photo gallery and a clay animated 5th episode to the serial. Adric lives, lands on Earth but is eaten by a dinosaur. There's an Easter Egg that plays a comedy bit from JBC with Jamaican jokes.

Babylon 5 - S1D2

 

That's the main characters on the series. Commander Sinclair in the front with Michael Garibaldi and Susan Ivanova to the left of him. Talia Winters and Stephen Franklin are the other two Humans in the picture. The three aliens across the back are Londo Mollari, Delenn and G'kar. Most of them are key players in the up coming conflict and they shape worlds and lives. I fear the body count must be rather high for the run of the series. Billions and billions. On with the fun.

The Parliament of Dreams  February 23 1994

Written by J. Michael Straczynski and directed by Jim Johnston

Sinclair's old girlfriend Catherine Sakai come to the station on business. They get involved again. She's a planetary surveyer and she's got a nice little spaceship to get about in. Na'Toth is G'Kar's new diplomatic attache and she's played by Caitlin Brown. The previous aid was written out of the series by an unfortunate air lock accident.

There's a festival to introduce people to the religions of the other races. The Centauri host a party filled with music and dance and copious drinking. Passing out is considered a good thing. I hope no one draws a dick on Londo's huge forehead. Lennier arrives to be Ambassador Delenn's aid. Billy Mummy does a great job capturing the awed Lennier. I like the character but he will have a lot of growing up to do and he won't always make good choices. That's a lot about what the whole series is about. Your mind, clouded by something, takes you down a path you shouldn't be on.

An old enemy of G'Kar's send an assassin to torture and kill him. G'Kar gets a body guard but the big guy is killed right away. The Minbari hold a much more serious ceremony. G'Kar gets kidnapped by the assassin but is rescued. He still gets kicked around a good bit. It's a violent universe. huh. It's an entertaining episode, there's a nice balance of humor and serious. I did like Sinclair's religious presentation. It's not a scene you'd normally see. The show always did a good job at surprising me with something, a scene, a line, a character's actions.

Mind War  March 2 1994

Written by JMS and directed by Bruce Seth Green

Jason Ironheart is a telepath with the Psi-Corps. He comes to Babylon 5 and he's on the run. He's followed by Psi-cop Alfred Bester and his partner. They aren't very welcomed but they have power to pretty much do what they want. Bester contacts the station's resident telepath Talia Winters because of her past relationship with Ironheart. She hadn't seen him, not yet. Later when she talks to Ironheart she finds out he's been experimented on by the Psi-Corps to make him a stronger telepath.

It worked really well, he became really powerful and the Psi-Corps are kind of afraid of him. Ironheart doesn't think this kind of power belongs at the Psi-Corps and he's sure right. They will prove to be huge dicks in the B5 universe. Ironheart escapes and winds up on Babylon 5. His powers are becoming too much for him to control and he literally becomes a superior being. At least he's all glowy, that's got to mean something.

The episode starts the long and dangerous battle between Bester and Garabaldi. It won't go well for Mr G at first but he comes through it all pretty well. Bester's life story is chronicled in a trilogy of novels that start in his youth and tell of his rise in the Psi-Corps. He falls pretty hard and winds up drugged in prison until he dies. He's a horrible misguided man and Walter Koenig plays him most wonderfully.

There's a second story track that features Sinclair's gal pal Catherine Sakai. She's got a request to survey a planet named Sigma 957. She gets a warning from G'kar, he tells her it's a dangerous place to be. She goes anyway and he sure was right. She encounters an unknown ship that drains the almost all the power from her ship. She's skimming the planet's atmosphere when some friendly Narn's pluck her red hot ship from that ol' brink o' doom. When she meets up with G'Kar on the station they have a bit of a conversation. One I really like a lot.

Catherine Sakai: Ambassador! While I was out there, I saw something. What was it?

G'Kar: [points to a flower with a bug crawling on it] What is this?

Catherine Sakai: An ant.

G'Kar: Ant.

Catherine Sakai: So much gets shipped up from Earth on commercial transports it's hard to keep them out.

G'Kar: Yeah, I have just picked it up on the tip of my glove. If I put it down again, and it asks another ant, "what was that?",  [laughs]  how would it explain? There are things in the universe billions of years older than either of our races. They're vast, timeless, and if they're aware of us at all, it is as little more than ants, and we have as much chance of communicating with them as an ant has with us. We know, we've tried, and we've learned that we can either stay out from underfoot or be stepped on.

Catherine Sakai: That's it? That's all you know?

G'Kar: Yes, they are a mystery. And I am both terrified and reassured to know that there are still wonders in the universe, that we have not yet explained everything. Whatever they are, Miss Sakai, they walk near Sigma 957, and they must walk there alone.

The War Prayer  March 9 1994

Written by D. C. Fontana and directed by Richard Compton

An old friend of Delenn's comes to the station. She is a poet and person of peace. She's attacked by some hooded humans. They have been attacking the other races and Mr Garibaldi's team has been having a hard time catching them. An old flame of Inanova's comes to the station and he leads them to the Home Guard, an anti alien group, operating on the station. There are more attacks before the men are caught. It's a tough story but there's a bit of balance in the second plot line.

Vir's cousin and his girlfriend steal some credit cards and buy passage to Babylon 5. They think Vir, who's told them he's the ambassador in letters, could help them get married. They both have been betrothed to other people in arranged marriages. It's something that Centauri families do. Londo wants to send them home to their fates but Vir talks him into coming up with a better solution. There's a bit of a romantic in Londo. Sadly, he lives in a society that values that little. The cousin is a victim of the Home Guard but he survives with help from Dr Franklin.

And the Sky Full of Stars  March 16 1994

Written by JMS and directed by Janet Greek

Two men kidnap Commander Sinclair and drug him up. They have a machine that will let the one man go into Sincliar's mind. They want to find out why Sinclair was missing for 24 hours at the battle of the line. He doesn't know but the mental probing loosens up some memories of the time. He had been taken aboard a Minbari battle cruiser and brought before the Grey Council.

He eventually escapes but still drugged he sees attackers on all sides. After brief fire fight with the security team Delenn talks him out. Later in Medlab Sinclair tells Delenn that he doesn't remember anything. Still later Sinclair tells Garibaldi about the new memories he's got. Garibaldi vows to help him in any way he can to find out what happened.

I enjoyed this disc a lot. The plot thickens and gets more complex. There are plenty of danger out there in the universe and a lot of it comes visiting to Babylon 5. We've got many new clues about the story and where it's going. I couldn't second guess where the story would go and there were always nice surprises. Even on rewatching it's still so good that I have nearly the same joy.

Friday Night Movies 490

 

Our pal Ryan sent along a copy of The Golden Bat. It's a 1966 Japanese film called 黄金 バットor Ōgon Bat. The Wikipedia says: it's a seminal Japanese superhero. The character was created by writer Ichiro Suzuki and illustrator Takeo Nagamatsu in 1930. Ōgon Bat is considered to be the first Japanese superhero. Originally debuting in kamishibai (paper theater), Ogon Bat is considered a precursor to later superhero characters such as the Japanese Kamishibai character Prince of Gamma (debuted early 1930's) and the American comic book characters Superman (debuted 1938) and Batman (debuted 1939).

The paper theater goes back to the 12th century with monks using it to teach morals to children with stories. The story teller would tell the story and change the pictures in the little wooden stage accordingly. Kind of like a picture book for children. In Japan there was a revival of the art that started after WWI and lasted until tv became popular in the early 1950s.

There's not so much seminal about the 1966 Toei film but it is a fun bit of noisey action and alien battling. It's directed by Hajime Sato from a script by Susumu Takaku. Sonny Chiba stars as the head of an organization that investigates an island that has risen out of the sea. That's Sonny up there with the beard. The older man is the group's head scientist. The young man is a newly recruited member and the woman is one of the group. The island turns out to be a part of Atlantis. They find a sarcophagus with the Golden Bat inside. The air revives GB and he's a hoot. The Golden Bat laughs uproariously and he's great at fighting and flying. His costume reminds me of Mexican wrestlers and the action in this film is often as poorly executed as those Mexican movies.

   

Out in space an alien called Space Killer Nazō is heading to the Earth. He has a big metal claw for a hand and big ears. That's him up on the left, on the right are his underlings Jackal, Piranha and Keroido. Nazō's ship is a giant screw that digs through Earth's crust as easy as it flies through space. He wants to destroy the humans and their planet. He's sent a small planet to the Earth and it will crash into it in 10 days. the old scientist and Sonny have invented a death ray but they need the rarest mineral in the universe to make a lens. Sonny and his crew have a hard time with the alien invaders who have superior technology. Lucky for him the Golden Bat is totally capable of kicking Nazō's ass. There's plenty of running about and some fighting. Most of the fighting isn't very good but it made us laugh. The underlings are a fun lot too, especially Keroido, who's particularly maniacal. He's worth the price of admission easily.

When it was all done we were still laughing. I'd recommend it but sadly the movie isn't readily available. We saw a fan subtitle bootleg that might have come from a source like this. I wouldn't think it's worth 20 bucks, it's cheaper to Bit Torrent it, apparently there are copies out there.

 

There was a 1967 Japanese cartoon based on the character. There's an episode on YouTube. I like the bike riding toy.

St Trinian's 2: The Legend Of Fritton's Gold is the 2009 sequel to the highly popular and successful 2007 St Trinian's film which was a reboot of the popular 1950's series. I really liked the first film and finally the second popped up on NetFlix. The directors of the previous film, Oliver Parker and Barnaby Thompson, are back. The script is by Jamie Minoprio with additional material by Jonathan M Stren.

Rupert Everett is Miss Camilla Fritton, the head of St Trinian's Girls School. As the film opens we see the girls returning to the school for the new year in their own styles. The local police are scared of the girls and with good reason. There's not much higher learning going on, most of the lessons are rather better for a life of crime or stint with MI6. Talulah Riley plays Camilla's niece Annabelle Lealla Fritton and she's the new Head Girl at St Trinian's. The girls learn of a special ring that an ancestor of Miss Fritton left behind. It points to a secret treasure worth millions of pounds. The movie is a race against a villainous David Tennent. He's head of a bunch of twats secret club that doesn't like women. He wants the treasure and he has a grudge against the Frittons. An ancestor of theirs had robbed David's ancestor's ship 420 years ago.

The girls band together to fight David's invading henchmen but he gets the ring they have. There's a second ring and you need both to find the location of the treasure. The girls have some clues and the hunt is on. There's plenty of gags and physical humor. The girls are great and there's a nice variety of types, emos, chavs, posh toddies, goths, nerd and plenty more. Colin Firth, an ex of Miss Frittons joins the team. He steals the ring David has and the girls score the second ring. The action moves to London where the girls have a flash mob dance to cover Anabell, and some of the other girls, slipping away to the Globe Theater. It's where the treasure is. David's right on their heels and briefly he has the upper hand but pirate girls always win over little weasels. Especially in the movies. I laughed a lot but I'm totally in love with the girls of St Trinian's and their defense of Anarchy. It's a nice bit of silliness and girl power that gave me a big smile. I'll certainly want to see it again.