Day: August 16, 1972

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Ace Of Wands Season 3

The Power Of Atep – Part 2

Ace Of WandsWhen Tarot fails to surface while practicing a stunt involving breaking free of a straitjacket underwater, Chas leaps to his rescue and drags Tarot back to safety. Mikki breaks from her trance-like state in the psychic circle, revealing that her allegiances are to Tarot rather than Atep; when she, Tarot, Chas and Mr. Sweet go to visit the house where the ritual took place, there’s no evidence that anyone was ever there. Worse yet, Mr. Sweet discovers that the obscure book, “The Power of Atep”, has been stolen. All clues seem to point to Egypt, in the Valley of the Pharaohs, and Chas and Mikki convince Tarot that he must go there. John Pentacle, the leader of the sinister psychic ritual, knows that Tarot will go to Egypt as well…and he will be waiting.

written by Victor Pemberton
directed by Nicholas Ferguson
music by Andrew Bown

Cast: Michael Mackenzie (Tarot), Roy Holder (Chas), Petra Ace Of WandsMarkham (Mikki), Sebastian Graham-Jones (John Pentacle), Donald Layne-Smith (Mr. Sweet), Michael Mulcaster (High Priest), Frederick Beauman (Worshipper), Margot Field (Worshipper), Catherine Brandon (Worshipper), Michael Rose (Tramp), and Fred Owl (Ozymandias)

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
Hyperdrive Season 2

Convoy

HyperdriveThe Camden Lock joins a convoy to escort a British-built space superweapon to a classified location. Henderson naturally takes the opportunity to flirt with the female commanders of the other two ships in the convoy, and with his attention on that matter, the Scrane’s sudden overwhelming attack to seize the weapon for themselves comes as a bit of a surprise. The Scrane are driven off, and a prisoner is taken who claims that there is a traitor among Henderson’s senior crew – an accusation that York finds evidence to back up in the wreckage of the Scrane ship. But who among Henderson’s crew would sell out Earth?

Order the DVDsDownload this episode via Amazonwritten by Kevin Cecil & Andy Riley
directed by John Henderson
music by Mark Thomas

HyperdriveCast: Nick Frost (Henderson), Kevin Eldon (York), Miranda Hart (Teal), Dan Antopolski (Jeffers), Stephen Evans (Vine), Petra Massey (Sandstrom), Wren Shepherd (Captain Helix), Paterson Joseph (Space Marshal), Clare Thomson (Commander Roche), Thalia Zucchi (Commander Gulati), Alisdair McKee (Scrane), Ewan Bailey (Voice Over), Maggie Service (Voice Over)

Notes: This is the final episode, to date, of Hyperdrive. Although Kevin Cecil and Andy Riley Hyperdrivedeveloped outlines for a third season, a third year of the show was never commissioned. Nick Frost has gone on to appear in, among other things, the 2014 Doctor Who Christmas special (as Santa Claus, no less), while Miranda Hart moved on to greater fame in both Call The Midwife and her own self-titled sitcom (and has been mooted as a possible female Doctor Who every time the subject of selecting a new star for that show has come up since Hyperdrive’s conclusion). Kevin Eldon also moved on to a self-titled sitcom, and has more recently been the voice of Penfold in the revived Danger Mouse series and appeared as Camello in Game Of Thrones.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Mystery Science Theater 3000 Season 01

Experiment #103 – The Mad Monster w/ Molten Terror

Season 1
MST3K Story: The Mads are discussing the events that drove them mad just before calling Joel, who has a nifty invention: the Hell in a Handbag. The Mads counter with the Acetaline-Powered Thunder Lizard. After watching the serial episode, Tom comes across the love of his life: a blender. He is put off by Joel drinking out of her head. The movie confuses Tom because it doesn’t make it clear as to whether the monster is killing people or just mauling them. Joel explains that older movies left that to the viewers imagination. They continue discussing the various aspects of lycanthropy. Later on, Joel is inspired by the movie to switch Crow and Tom’s heads, much to their annoyance. After the film, Joel offers the bots RAM chips if they can name a good thing and a bad thing about the film. But they keep arguing, so Joel decides no one deserves them. Not even the Mads are pleased, given the death of the film’s mad scientist.

Molten Terror Story: Cody is able to escape from the villainous moon leader, Retik. He consults with his crew and then returns to the moon base and steals Retik’s ray gun. But as he makes his escape, Cody hides in a cave where Retik is able to turn the rock into molten lava, trapping our hero inside.

Mad Monster Story: Dr. Lorenzo Cameron has been experimenting on his handyman, Petro, injecting him with a serum derived from wolves. After Petro transforms into a wolfman, Dr. Cameron imagines a conversation with his fellow scientists who rejected him and his theories. Dr. Cameron’s daughter Lenora, meanwhile, expresses her concerns over his activities and her desire to return to the city. When he next uses the serum, Dr. Cameron lets Petro loose in his wolf form and the monster kills a child. This arouses the suspicions of Tom Gregory, Lenora’s reporter boyfriend, who visits Professor Blaine, one of Dr. Cameron’s detractors. Shortly after this meeting, Dr. Cameron arrives with Petro in tow, supposedly to prove his theory to Blaine. He leaves Petro to kill Blaine, intending to use the monster to settle all of his old scores. Despite the doctor’s efforts, Tom’s investigations inevitably lead straight to Dr. Cameron, who has continued to use Petro in his plans for revenge. But Petro eventually goes wild, attacking Lenora, setting Dr. Cameron’s house on fire and killing the doctor.

MST3K segments written by Trace Beaulieu, Joel Hodgson, Jim Mallon, Kevin Murphy, Mike Nelson & Josh Weinstein
MST3K segments director unknown

Molten Terror written by Ronald Davidson
Molten Terror directed by Fred C. Brannon
Molten Terror music by Stanley Wilson

The Mad Monster written by Fred Myton
The Mad Monster directed by Sam Newfield
The Mad Monster music by David Chudnow

MST3K Guest Cast: none

Molten Terror Cast: George Wallace (Commando Cody), Aline Towne (Joan Gilbert), Roy Barcroft (Retik), William Bakewell (Ted Richards), Clayton Moore (Graber), Peter Brocco (Krog), Robert R. Stephenson (Daly), Don Walters (Mr. Henderson)

The Mad Monster Cast: Johnny Downs (Tom Gregory), George Zucco (Dr. Lorenzo Cameron), Anne Nagel (Lenora Cameron), Glenn Strange (Petro), Reginald Barlow (Professor Warwick), Robert Strange (Professor Blaine), Gordon DeMain (Professor Fitzgerald)

LogBook entry by Philip R. Frey.

Categories
7th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

Black And White

Doctor WhoNo sooner have Ace and Hex found refuge in the black TARDIS then they realize they’re not alone inside it: Captain Lysandra Aristedes, formerly of the Forge, seems to be in control, along with Private Sally Morgan, a soldier the Doctor once rescued from the Bluefire Project. Aristedes and Morgan claim to have been traveling with the Doctor for some time, hunting down and fighting the same kind of elder gods from which Ace and Hex have only just escaped. The black TARDIS then materializes within the white TARDIS, but neither pair of the Doctor’s companions trusts the other enough to let them take off with a working TARDIS. Aristedes allows Ace to accompany her, while Morgan is assigned to go with Hex. Each TARDIS, black and white, arrives several years apart on seventh century Earth; Ace and Aristedes meet a brash future warrior king named Beowulf, while Hex and Morgan meet Beowulf at the end of his reign (and his life). An alien arms dealer named Garundel is also on Earth in this time period, peddling wares beyond human understanding. With teams from the TARDIS at the beginning and end of his rule, King Beowulf’s life could become a tale beyond belief…

Order this CDwritten by Matt Fitton
directed by Ken Bentley
music by Jamie Robertson

Cast: Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor), Sophie Aldred (Ace), Philip Olivier (Hex), Maggie O’Neill (Lysandra Aristedes), Amy Pemberton (Sally Morgan), Stuart Milligan (Garundel), Michael Rouse (Young Beowulf), Richard Bremmer (Old Beowulf), John Banks (Weohstan), James Hayward (Wiglaf)

Notes: The white TARDIS first appeared in The Angel Of Scutari, while the black TARDIS first appeared in Robophobia. Garundel recovers from this story and encounters the seventh Doctor much later in Starlight Robbery (2013).

Timeline: after Protect And Survive and before Gods And Monsters

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green

Categories
7th Doctor Doctor Who The Audio Dramas

Starlight Robbery

Doctor WhoThe Doctor, Klein and Will discover that Schalk’s Persuasion Machine design – and possibly even Schalk himself – are up for grabs in an auction of rare weapons of mass destruction. Such a sale of salacious merchandise has already drawn the attention of such unsavory suitors as the Sontarans and other assorted warmongers. Hosting the auction is the equally unsavory Garundel, unaware that his own underling, Ms. Ziv, is planning a double-cross of her own. The Doctor adopts a curiously hands-off approach to this TARDIS trip, assigning Klein and Will to stage a heist of their own to steal the Persuasion machine and Schalk himself. But things quickly go wrong, leaving the Doctor with little choice but to take a more direct hand in events, and risking the lives of his companions.

Order this CDwritten by Matt Fitton
directed by Ken Bentley
music by Howard Carter

Cast: Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor), Tracey Childs (Elizabeth Klein), Christian Edwards (Will Arrowsmith), Stuart Milligan (Garundel), Dan Starkey (Marshal Stenn / Major Vlaar / Sergeant Gredd / Asallis), Jo Woodcock (Ziv), Lizzie Roper (Krakenmother Benarra)

Notes: Actor Dan Starkey is the voice of the Sontarans for both Big Finish and the BBC, having played the eleventh Doctor’s well-meaning-but-still-Sontaran ally Strax in television Doctor Who, and having appeared as other Sontarans since the creatures’ return to modern Who in The Sontaran Stratagem (2008). Starkey also plays the magical imp Randal Moon in Russell T. Davies’ CBBC series Wizards Vs. Aliens. Stuart Milligan, who appeared in previous Big Finish audio stories The Reaping and Lurkers At Sunlight’s Edge, also appeared in televised Doctor Who as President Richard Nixon in The Impossible Astronaut and Day Of The Moon; he first played Garundel in 2012’s audio story Black And White.

LogBook entry and TheatEar review by Earl Green