Year: 1983

Categories
Blackadder Season 1

Born To Be King

Blackadder1486. The King is away on a Crusade, but will be home by St. Leonard’s Day, a time of great feasting. While Prince Harry is running the country in his father’s stead, Edmund is in charge of the sheep and getting the frolics together for the feast. When a visiting Scottish Lord calls Prince Harry’s parentage into question, a plan is hatched to remove Harry from the right of succession…

Order the DVDswritten by Richard Curtis and Rowan Atkinson
with additional dialogue by William Shakespeare
directed by Martin Shardlow
music by Howard Goodall

Guest Cast: Alex Norton (McAngus, Duke of Argyll), David Nunn (Messenger), Angus Deayton (Jumping Jew)

Notes: This episode is a re-writing of the original Black Adder pilot, which took place about a hundred years later in history. Born To Be King was originally transmitted out of order, switching places with The Queen Of Spain’s Beard; it was intended to be the second episode.

Alex Norton re-creates his portrayal of McAngus from the original Black Adder pilot. He is considerably more savage (and filthy) here.

David Nunn appeared in several episodes of The Black Adder as the somewhat dim messenger seen in this episode. He returned to Blackadder for a small appearance in Blackadder’s Christmas Carol.

LogBook entry by Philip R. Frey

Categories
Children's Records Star Wars

Rebel Mission To Ord Mantell

Star Wars: Rebel Mission To Ord MantellIn the wake of the Battle of Yavin, the Rebel Alliance abandons its base and sets up shop on the icy planet of Hoth. Luke and Han are assigned to take two X-Wing fighters to scout a jungle planet instead – to draw the Empire’s attention away from the new Hoth base. Once the Empire is diverted from Hoth, Luke and Han return to the ice planet, where Leia is already planning their next mission. Luke, Leia, Han, Chewie and the droids plan to pull off a heist of Imperial funds on the planet Ord Mantell, with the help of a Rebel informant who also happens to be an insectoid life form. Han is instantly suspicious, since Narithians are capable of instantaneous telepathic communication with their egg-mate siblings, but Leia assures him that this agent’s sibling is dead – the result of a brotherly rivalry turned deadly when one signed up with the Rebels and the other with the Empire. Even using the Millennium Falcon is a risk, since Han and his ship are wanted not only by Jabba the Hutt, but by the Empire as well. But once Leia and her team arrive on Ord Mantell, their carefully orchestrated plan quickly falls apart: Han’s slip of the tongue reveals Leia’s identity, and the insectoid informant turns out not to be a Rebel sympathizer, but a treacherous bounty hunter. Han, Leia, Artoo and Chewie are disarmed by the bounty hunter, leaving Luke and Threepio to carry off the caper by themselves on a cargo dock where weapons are forbidden. Fortunately for Luke, however, no one seems to remember what a lightstaber looks like…

written by Brian Daley
directed by Jymn Magon
music not credited
(combination of John Williams soundtrack cues and generic production library music?)

Cast: not credited; see notes below.

Notes: Mention an adventure at an offscreen location in the Star Wars universe, and sooner or later, somebody is going to chronicle it, somehow. This entire story springs from a throwaway line in The Empire Strikes Back about Han “running into some trouble with that bounty hunter on Ord Mantell.” Rebel Mission To Ord Mantell follows much the same format and length as an episode of National Public Radio’s Star Wars radio series, but there the similarity ends. (There is no indication that Ord Mantell was ever considered for broadcast, or that any Star Wars audio stories not adapting existing movies were ever in the works for radio.) It features none of the NPR series’ cast, not even Anthony Daniels; Brian Daley seems to be the only link between Ord Mantell and the NPR radio dramas (though this may be the same uncredited cast who appeared in a handful of Star Wars read-along storybooks released by the same label, some of whose stories were adapted from Marvel’s between-movie comics). Ord Mantell was actually produced after the first two radio series. Curiously, despite having access to Lucasfilm’s library of Star Wars sound effects (and a cover credit for Ben Burtt), several sound effects from the 1979 Disney movie The Black Hole can be heard, though this may be because Ord Mantell was released on LP in 1983 on Disney’s Buena Vista Records label. Perhaps not surprisingly, there are many conflicting accounts of Han’s trouble with that bounty hunter on Ord Mantell in prose fiction, comics, gaming media and probably even haiku form; this is the only version to be played out as a full-cast audio drama.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Blackadder Season 1

Witchsmeller Pursuivant

BlackadderAutumn, 1495. The Black Plague is ravaging the land. The King himself is ill, leaving Harry and Edmund to deal with the crisis. It is decided to call on the Witchsmeller Pursuivant to root out the evil. Edmund’s vocal opposition is rewarded by being pegged as a witch, himself. Prince Harry agrees to put Edmund on trial, but with the Witchsmeller out to get him, Edmund’s survival is anything but certain…

Order the DVDswritten by Richard Curtis and Rowan Atkinson
with additional dialogue by William Shakespeare
directed by Martin Shardlow
music by Howard Goodall

Guest Cast: Frank Finlay (The Witchsmeller Pursuivant), Richard Murdoch (Ross), Valentine Dyall (Angus), Peter Schofield (Fife), Stephen Frost (Soft), Mark Arden (Anon), Perry Benson (Daft Ned), Bert Parnaby (Dim Cain), Roy Evans (Dumb Abel), Forbes Collins (Dopey Jack), Patrick Duncan (Officer), Barbara Miller (Jane Kirkettle), Natasha King (Princess Leia), Howard Lew Lewis (Piers), Sarah Thomas (Mrs. Field), Louise Gold (Mrs. Tyler), Gareth Milne (Stuntman)

Notes: Frank Finlay is best known for his extensive theatrical career. He early work included multiple Shakespearean productions, including Othello (1965), Much Ado About Nothing (1967), Julius Caesar (1969) and The Merchant of Venice (1972). Genre work includes The Deadly Bees (1966), the role of van Helsing in Count Dracula (1977), The Magical Legend of the Leprechauns (1999) and Ghosthunter (2000).

Cain and Abel (Bert Parnaby and Roy Evans) are back (following their appearance in The Archbishop) and re-appear in the final episode, The Black Seal.

Following her appearance in The Queen Of Spain’s Beard, Natasha King makes another brief appearance as Edmund’s wife, Princess Leia.

Stephen Frost makes a return appearance in the Blackadder Goes Forth episode Corporal Punishment. He is probably best known to American audiences for his many appearances on the British improv show Whose Line Is It, Anyway?

LogBook entry by Philip R. Frey

Categories
Astronauts Season 2

Episode 8

AstronautsThe Orbital Workshop crew has been in space for months, and cabin fever has set in. Mattocks has gotten into the habit of having long, meaningful conversations with Bimbo the dog. Ackroyd talks to himself in the mirror. Foster talks to a tape recorder, and then plays back the tape and has conversations with herself. Even Beadle, frustrated because no one seems to listen to him either on the ground or in orbit, mumbles to himself in ground control. But what happens when the isolation even begins affecting Bimbo?

written by Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie
directed by Dick Clement

AstronautsCast: Christopher Godwin (Mattocks), Carmen Du Sautoy (Foster), Barrie Rutter (Ackroyd), Bruce Boa (Beadle), and Bimbo (himself)

Notes: The second season of Astronauts was produced by Central Independent Television (inheritor of ATV’s broadcast franchise and facilities after a sell-off of some parts of the company and the loss of ATV’s Astronautsbroadcast license). ATV signed off for the last time on January 1st, 1982. Whereas the first season had neither a theme tune nor incidental music within the episodes, there was now a “spacey” theme tune over the open and end credits. Other than that, one can be forgiven for thinking that no time had passed at all. The second season was produced in 1982, before the ATV-to-Central handover.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Blackadder Season 1

The Black Seal

Blackadder1498. Humiliations at court finally lead Edmund to attempt to overthrow the King. He dismisses Baldrick and Percy and sets out to form The Black Seal, a band consisting of the six most evil men in the land. With their help he hopes to gain the Crown. But Edmund’s new friends are not really the type you can trust in a pinch…

Order the DVDswritten by Richard Curtis and Rowan Atkinson
with additional dialogue by William Shakespeare
directed by Martin Shardlow
music by Howard Goodall

Guest Cast: John Carlisle (Murdered Lord), Bert Parnaby (Cain), Roy Evans (Abel), Forbes Collins (Trusting Father), Des Webb (Person of unrestricted growth), John Barrard (Retired Morris Dancer), Perry Bevon (Pigeon Vendor), John Hallam (Sir Wilfred Death), Roger Sloman (Three-Fingered Pete), Patrick Malahide (Guy de Glastonbury), Ron Cook (Sean, the Irish Bastard), Paul Brooke (Friar Bellows), Big Mick (Jack Large), Rik Mayall (Mad Gerald), Patrick Allen (Philip of Burgandy, The Hawk)

Notes: Edmund’s wife, Princess Leia, is notably not among those killed at the end of this episode. While Leia was likely around ten at the time of her marriage (1492), she would be about sixteen by the time of this episode, a more than reasonable child-bearing age for the day, thus assuring the Blackadder line to follow.

Cain and Abel (portrayed by Bert Parnaby and Roy Evans) have had a hard time. Three years earlier (in Witchsmeller Pursuivant) they were still healthy, if stupid. By 1498, they’re both blind.

Rik Mayall returned for appearances in Blackadder II (Bells), Blackadder Goes Forth (Private Plane), and Blackadder: Back & Forth. The role of Mad Gerald was credited in this episode to “himself.” Mayall is best known for his alternative comedy work in such TV series as The Young Ones, Bottom and The New Statesmen. (He also starred in Drop Dead Fred (1991), but let’s not hold that against him.)

LogBook entry by Philip R. Frey

Categories
Astronauts Season 2

Episode 9

AstronautsFoster and Ackroyd gradually become aware that Mattocks is keeping things from them, and so is Beadle. The two are exchanging scrambled, coded messages during the overnight hours. When answers are demanded of Mattocks, he tries to stall his crewmates with a cover story, before finally giving in and revealing that he is taking spy photos from orbit, monitoring both Soviet and American military movements. Worse yet, Mattocks’ dossier for “Project Sparrowhawk” includes contingencies for everything from an attack by enemy spacecraft to “survival priorities”, and Ackroyd threatens to scuttle the whole mission and reveal all to the world if the spy project isn’t shut down.

written by Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie
directed by Dick Clement

AstronautsCast: Christopher Godwin (Mattocks), Carmen Du Sautoy (Foster), Barrie Rutter (Ackroyd), Bruce Boa (Beadle), and Bimbo (himself)

Notes: Astronauts finally grudgingly steps into the modern space age when Ackroyd says that the food resembles “reject towels off the Space Shuttle” (which, by the show’s 1983 airdate, had already undertaken its first orbital test flights, whereas Skylab, the inspiration for the show’s fictional space station, had fallen out of orbit in 1979). This is an unusually topical episode, but it dealt Astronautswith a topic that had been a reality since the 1960s. Various actual Soyuz missions had been thinly disguised military spy missions from orbit, while the United States Air Force had planned (but ultimately cancelled) a manned military space station in the ’60s called Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL), and the U.S. Department of Defense had plans for entire Shuttle missions devoted to classified “national security” tasks (including spy satellite deployment).

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Astronauts Season 2

Episode 10

AstronautsOn the eve of his wedding anniversary, Mattocks becomes obsessed – thanks in no small part to his crewmates egging him on – with talking to his wife, which would end a months-long ban on the crew receiving news of their families and personal lives left behind on Earth. When Ackroyd receives word that his divorce has been finalized, Mattocks begins worrying about the state of his marriage since he’s been in orbit.

written by Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie
directed by Dick Clement

AstronautsCast: Christopher Godwin (Mattocks), Carmen Du Sautoy (Foster), Barrie Rutter (Ackroyd), Bruce Boa (Beadle), Mary Healey (Valerie), and Bimbo (himself)

Notes: This episode states that Mattocks and the others have been in space for four months.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Astronauts Season 2

Episode 11

AstronautsAs the crew deals with the latest equipment failure, an unfamiliar voice is heard over their air-to-ground radio link: a Soviet cosmonaut has piloted his Soyuz capsule within a mile of the space station, and is trying to contact them. To nearly everyone’s amazement, Foster knows enough Russian to respond and maintain a conversation (including a bit of long-distance chess). Paranoia begins to seize Mattocks and Ackroyd about their Russian-speaking crewmate, though the only thing more disturbing than a chatty cosmonaut sharing the sky at close range is when he falls silent.

written by Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie
directed by Dick Clement

AstronautsCast: Christopher Godwin (Mattocks), Carmen Du Sautoy (Foster), Barrie Rutter (Ackroyd), Bruce Boa (Beadle), Jeffrey Wickham (Rudy), and Bimbo (himself)

Notes: Suddenly, Astronauts has continuity – mention is made of “Project Sparrowhawk” from two episodes ago, and the fact that tensions are running high in the Cold War on Earth – and a bit of peaceful politics.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Astronauts Season 2

Episode 12

AstronautsWith just one week to go before the mission’s end, Mattocks is seized by a sudden profound belief in God, and even confesses that, during the initial launch to the space station, he has no idea how he saved himself and his crewmates from certain doom. He now attributes this – and just about everything else – to the Almighty. Ackroyd, in the meantime, is growing more and more depressed, not wanting to return to Earth at all. And this leaves Foster to worry that neither of her crewmates may be fit for the journey back to Earth at all.

written by Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie
directed by Dick Clement

AstronautsCast: Christopher Godwin (Mattocks), Carmen Du Sautoy (Foster), Barrie Rutter (Ackroyd), Bruce Boa (Beadle), and Bimbo (himself)

Notes: The crew has been in orbit for 5 months, 23 days at the beginning of this episode

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Astronauts Season 2

Episode 13

AstronautsOn the morning of the crew’s return to Earth, Mattocks receives a personal message from his wife Valerie. As Ackroyd and Foster continue to worry about whether or not their commander, still flush with newfound religious enthusiasm, is in any kind of mental state to fly them home, Mattocks proceeds to fall apart. The private message was an admission that Valerie has been less than faithful during Mattocks’ six month stay in space. Can Beadle convince the astronauts to return when all three of them are now convinced that they have nothing left on the ground with living for?

written by Graeme Garden and Bill Oddie
directed by Dick Clement

AstronautsCast: Christopher Godwin (Mattocks), Carmen Du Sautoy (Foster), Barrie Rutter (Ackroyd), Bruce Boa (Beadle), Mary Healey (Valerie), and Bimbo (himself)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Classic Season 20 Doctor Who

The Five Doctors

Doctor WhoThe Doctor, Tegan and Turlough find themselves in no immediate danger for once, until the Doctor suffers from repeated, severe pain, claiming that his past is being altered in a way that could endanger him in the present. Somewhere on Gallifrey, long-abandoned machinery from the earliest days of the Time Lords is reactivated and its powers are brought to bear on each of the Doctor’s first four incarnations, snatching each of them from their own timeline and depositing them in Gallifrey’s infamous Death Zone, where the tomb of Time Lord founding father Rassilon stands. The fourth Doctor is trapped in the time vortex and never makes it to Gallifrey. As the various personae of the Doctor join forces, along with many companions, they find themselves fighting a variety of old adversaries – and one new antagonist – for the future of Gallifrey itself.

Order the DVDwritten by Terrance Dicks
directed by Peter Moffatt
music by Peter Howell

Guest Cast: Richard Hurndall (The First Doctor), Patrick Troughton (The Second Doctor), Jon Pertwee (The Third Doctor), Janet Fielding (Tegan), Mark Strickson (Turlough), Nicholas Courtney (Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart), Elisabeth Sladen (Sarah Jane Smith), John Leeson (voice of K9), Carole Ann Ford (Susan), Richard Franklin (Mike Yates), Caroline John (Liz Shaw), Frazer Hines (Jamie), Wendy Padbury (Zoe), Anthony Ainley (The Master), Philip Latham (Lord President Borusa), Dinah Sheridan (Chancellor Flavia), Paul Jerricho (Castellan), Richard Mathews (Rassilon), David Savile (Colonel Crichton), Ray Float (Sergeant), Roy Skelton (Dalek voice), John Scott Martin (Dalek), Stephen Meredith (Technician), David Banks (CyberLeader), Mark Hardy (Cyber Lieutenant), William Kenton (Cyber Scout), Stuart Blake (Commander)

Appearing in footage from The Dalek Invasion Of Earth: William Hartnell (The First Doctor)

Appearing in footage from Shada: Tom Baker (The Fourth Doctor), Lalla Ward (Romana)

Broadcast November 23, 1983 (US) / November 25, 1983 (UK)

LogBook entry & review by Earl Green

Categories
Automan

Pilot

AutomanPolice officer Walter Nebicher is a danger to himself and others on the beat, so the chief of police puts him in the job best suited to him: running the department’s computers. Walter, still determined to fight crime in his own way, creates an artificial intelligence that manifests itself as a solid hologram – Automan, “the world’s first fully automatic man.” As long as he has sufficient power to draw upon, Automan can fight crime, starting with the mysterious disappearance of Lt. Jack Curtis, Walter’s friend and fellow officer who was following on a lead regarding shady activity at a private security company. Walter’s computer also points to the same company and its executives as a potential suspect, and he and Automan (and Automan’s tiny assistant Cursor, which can create vehicles for Automan on demand) set out to solve the mystery…but Automan must disappear to recharge when his power runs low, leaving Walter to improvised his way through tricky situations.

written by Glen A. Larson
directed by Lee H. Katzin
music by Stu Phillips / Automan Theme by Billy Hinsche and Stu Phillips

AutomanCast: Desi Arnaz Jr. (Walter Nebicher), Chuck Wagner (Automan), Heather McNair (Roxanne Caldwell), Gerald S. O’Loughlin (Capt. Boyd), Robert Lansing (Lt. Jack Curtis), Patrick Macnee (Lydell Hamilton), Steven Keats (Collins), Robert J. Hogan (Peterson), James Antonio Jr. (Cramer), Robert Dunlap (Chuck Wilson), Don Galloway (Martin Wills), Doug McClure (Det. Ted Smithers), Camilla Sparv (Tanya), Sid Haig (1st Gang Member), Mickey Jones (2nd Gang Member), Gloria LeRoy (Landlady), Herman Poppe (Swiss Guard), Carol Vogel (Joanne Wills), Dennis Fimple (The Taxi Driver), Kristina Hayden (Stewardess), Ed Hooks (Parking Attendant), Angela Lee (Wills Girl #1), Tricia Tomicic (Wills Girl #2)

AutomanNotes: Created by Glen A. Larson and obviously inspired by Disney’s heavily-promoted 1982 movie Tron, Automan takes the concept of a man from inside the computer world…and drops it into a buddy cop show. Without the budget for the manually-animated intricate body armor of Tron, Automan instead used a technique called front-axial projection, illuminating Chuck Wagner’s special reflective costume (and similarly reflective detailing tape on Automan’s various vehicles) with a powerful but narrowly focused light mounted to the camera itself. If Glen Larson had any visions of an Automan empire, they were quickly dashed – the show lasted less than one full season on ABC.

AutomanGuest star Patrick Macnee (1922-2015) was a frequent flier guest star on American TV, having established himself as the debonair star of the long-running, light-hearted British spy show The Avengers, which originally started out darker and featured Macnee’s character of Mr. Steed as its second banana. Sid Haig is also a mainstay of American genre TV, known best to science fiction fans as Dragos, self-styled Master of the Cosmos, the chief bad guy in the 1970s Filmation live-action series Jason Of Star Command. Automan mentions that Walter has programmed him to take sharp 90-degree turns – inspired by Tron‘s light cycles, but here chalked up to the 90-degree turns taken by video game characters such as Pac-Man and Donkey Kong.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Automan

Staying Alive While Running A High Flashdance Fever

AutomanWalter is riding along for a police operation targeting a powerful mob boss, but Captain Boyd leaves Walter at the side of the road (for his own safety) to continue the pursuit. Walter calls on Automan to help pursue the mob, but the trail leads somewhat paradoxically to the home of a powerful judge who has made a career out of putting the mob behind bars. Walter’s trail of evidence dead-ends because Automan naturally has to return to the digital world to recharge, leaving his human partner high and dry. New evidence arrives, leading Automan to Las Vegas…and possibly implicating the judge after all. Now Walter has to go to Vegas himself, and has to convince Lt. Curtis and Roxanne that he isn’t crazy for following this latest lead. And while he’s searching for clues among the Vegas nightlife, Automan takes on a smooth-dancing persona who proves popular with the ladies.

written by Glen A. Larson
directed by Winrich Kolbe
music by Stu Phillips / Automan Theme by Billy Hinsche and Stu Phillips

AutomanCast: Desi Arnaz Jr. (Walter Nebicher), Chuck Wagner (Automan), Heather McNair (Roxanne Caldwell), Gerald S. O’Loughlin (Capt. Boyd), Robert Lansing (Lt. Jack Curtis), Mary Crosby (Ellen Fowler), Don Gordon (Leonard Martin), Angela Aames (Bartender), Robert F. Lyons (Jason), William Windom (Judge Farnsworth), Jack Perkins (The Drunk), Jorge Cervera Jr. (Jackson), Jim Storm (The Driver), Bud Davis (Sieger), Gary Epper (Brandt)

AutomanNotes: Jack Sowards (1929-2007), co-writer of Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan and former writer for Bonanza and The Streets Of San Francisco, joins Automan as its executive story consultant, a function he also served on both of those shows as well as Falcon Crest. When Automan wants Walter to tell him what his astrological “sign” is, Walter replies “Tell them you’re an Apple II!” Songs heard in the background of the episode include Michael Sembello’s “Maniac”, Michael Jackson’s “Beat It”, and the Bee Gees’ “Stayin’ Alive”.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Automan

The Great Pretender

AutomanA violent hijacking leaves a man dead…and a truckload of the paper used to print money in the hands of a criminal organization. From behind his computer, Walter figures out who was behind the heist…but getting to that suspect through the layers of his enforcers and other henchmen will be a challenge. Automan proposes a solution: he will assume the guise of “Mr. Otto”, a rival crime boss, and begin stripping Brock’s supporters away from him until he’s exposed. It’s a brilliant plan that doesn’t take into account the fact that Automan’s only exposure to the criminal underworld comes from Walter’s collection of old gangster movies…

written by Sam Egan
directed by Kim Manners
music by Stu Phillips / Automan Theme by Billy Hinsche and Stu Phillips

AutomanCast: Desi Arnaz Jr. (Walter Nebicher), Chuck Wagner (Automan), Heather McNair (Roxanne Caldwell), Gerald S. O’Loughlin (Capt. Boyd), Robert Lansing (Lt. Jack Curtis), Clu Gulager (Brock), Michael Callan (Mayhew), Andrea Howard (Lauren Robinson), Ed Griffith (Laird), James Andronica (Parsons), Cliff Emmich (Zack), Paul Lambert (Robinson), Fil Formicola (Solt), Todd Martin (Gritch), William Long Jr. (Russo), Ken Sansom (The Minister), K.C. Winkler (The Blonde), Marc Vahanian (Carty), Richard Derr (Robinson), Barry Berman (Tate), Talbot Simons (The Taxi Driver)

LogBook entry by Earl Green