Here's a great little shocking stuffer from that exciting series, SPACE: 1999. This is definitely my favorite episode, it's all about a discredited Eagle pilot, Tony Cellini, who has freaky recurring nightmares after he was the only survivor of a disastrous space mission. Now, the Moon is approaching the same area in space that Cellini encountered.
The series starred Martin (THE BEING) Landau, Barbara (MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE) Bain and Barry (ASYLUM) Morse and was produced by the amazing team of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson!!
The episode starts with Dr. Russell explaining the story behind what happened to Eagle pilot Cellini to Commander Koenig, and, a flashback of his recollections ensues...
Cellini and a small crew are on a mission to an alien planet. They encounter stranded spaceships and hook up to one of them... Beautiful miniature work there!
Cellini is in the cockpit, the other crew members open the door to the stranded ship, and...
A freaking thing from Hell manifests itself!.. Now what?!!
Well, it pulls you in, then, spits you out! And, you don't look that great when it spits you out!! Anyway, each crew member is killed the same way with Cellini trapped in the cockpit, he breaks out just in time to see the massacre.
He detaches the ship from the rocket and drifts through space until he's eventually rescued. Back on Earth (before the Earth/Moon disaster), Dr. Russell was his physician.
Flashback over, Koenig and his pals go to see Commissioner Dixon for permission to go to the approaching planet and check out Cellini's story, because, if true, it could be a disaster for humans...
Permission is granted and an Eagle finds the ship. Love this shot, dog pile on the monkey!!
There are MOBY DICK overtones as Cellini sneaks out to deal with the monster, because, he thinks he knows how to kill the goddamn thing from Hell... Before he's dragged in, he tells Koenig to attack the glowing eye.
Koenig somehow manages to use an ax to disable the eye, finally killing the monster.
The thing is a mass of melting gristle and tentacles, bringing the story to an end. We're back on Wednesday for more early presents, til then, Scary Xmas Ever'bloody!
Man, I don't remember many of the Space 1999 episodes but this one is burned into my brain.
ReplyDeleteMartin Landau was considered for the role of Spock on Star Trek, but, as we all know, the part went to Leonard Nimoy. Landau and Barbara Bain co-starred on Mission: Impossible for the rest of the 1960's.
ReplyDeleteThen, Landau and Bain left MI, and Landau's replacement was Nimoy. And Landau and Bain went on to star in Space: 1999.
So, Landau & Bain went from spy-fi to sci-fi, and Nimoy went the opposite route.
I could see the show being remade - "Space: 2099"
ReplyDeleteThere's a reasonably thriving lunar base (population about 20,000 - big enough for survivability/sustainability, and so that it's not possible to know everyone). Interplanetary travel is relatively safe, easy, and cheap (use the usual sci-fi handwaving technobabble to explain this).
A preliminary test of something that might lead to an actual faster-than-light warp drive goes haywire, and the Moon warps off to interstellar parts unknown!
Now the inhabitants are stuck trying to survive on limited resources while they figure out what happened, can it be reproduced, and can it be controlled - and also knowing that losing the Moon so suddenly really messed up the Earth (loss of tides and all that) and probably wiped out civilization.....
This is one of my few favorite episodes of S:99!
ReplyDeleteForty three years on,still an horrifying episode!!
ReplyDelete