Following on from the
previous article (which you should go and read if you haven't already
– it explains a lot of the background to this) I thought I would
lay out my preferred viewing order for UFO. It's probably also worth
reading my article about the episode order of Space: 1999, which also
covers a lot of the issues around the sequencing of film series.
I don't feel that
re-ordering UFO is as complex a task as Space: 1999, but there are
nevertheless some interesting anomalies that need to be addressed.
One thing to note from the start is that the series was filmed in two
distinct production blocks: after the first seventeen episodes were
completed, filming was suspended for several months while the
production relocated to a different studio. As a result of the
enforced break, there were a number of cast changes, and also quite a
few stylistic differences with what had gone before. Although the
show is generally regarded as a single season, I personally feel that
the two blocks are so distinct as to regard them as two different
seasons.
As with Space: 1999,
the default position in fandom these days is to go with production
order. This is how the DVDs are arranged – with one exception
which we'll come to shortly. For the first block, the production
order is as follows:
1. Identified
2. Computer Affair
3. Flight Path
4. Survival
5. Exposed
6. Conflict
7. The Dalotek Affair
8. A Question of Priorities
9. Ordeal
10. The Responsibility Seat
11. The Square Triangle
12. Court Martial
13. Close Up
14. Confetti Check A-O.K.
15. E.S.P.
16. Kill Straker!
17. Sub-Smash
On the DVDs, this order
is maintained except for reversing the sequence of Survival and
Exposed for “continuity reasons”: Exposed introduces the
character of Paul Foster, whereas in Survival he's already a
fully-fledged officer in command of the Moonbase. What happened was
this: the Andersons had originally cast the Italian actor Franco De
Rosa as the Moonbase Commander, but sacked him after a couple of days
of filming – apparently because of his “ego and temperament”.
Whether that just meant he was a prima donna pain in the arse on the
set, and thus holding up the tight shooting schedule of a tv series –
or if it's a polite way of saying he couldn't act for toffee – I
really couldn't say. It's interesting to note though that De Rosa
had also appeared in the Andersons' feature film Journey to the Far
Side of the Sun, as did many of the subsequent cast members of UFO.
He's listed pretty high up the cast list (above both George Sewell
and Ed Bishop!) and yet speaks one line and appears for about thirty
seconds. He was supposed to the focus of a major subplot that got
deleted from the movie – we'll never know why, I guess, but he
really doesn't have a good record in Anderson productions. There's
probably a lesson there not to just cast someone based on their
pretty boy looks alone!
Well anyway, De Rosa
was out and that left a hole in the production. With the first
several scripts already completed and itching to get into the studio,
there was no time to pause production and recast. They managed to
cover this for the first few episodes by promoting Gabrielle Drake's
character up from a humble Space Tracker to Moonbase Commander,
inadvertently making the series more progressive for its time that it
was actually intended to be. But the fourth episode was intended to
be a sci-fi version of Hell in the Pacific, with the Moonbase
Commander stranded on the Moon's surface after a mission goes wrong,
and forced to work with an equally stranded alien to survive. It was
felt to be an unsuitable role for a female character (so I guess
progressiveness only goes so far!) – and the solution was to write
in a different male character to take on the more macho functions
that had been envisaged for De Rosa. By now, they've had time to
cast new actor Michael Billington, and Survival can get straight into
the studio with the name Paul Foster hastily scribbled onto the
script.
The problem is, Foster
isn't just a background Interceptor pilot, he's destined to be a
major character, and since he wasn't featured in the opening episode,
the producers decide he needs to have his own specific introductory
episode. The answer is to pull forward an upcoming script about an
investigative journalist who gets too close to the heart of the SHADO
set-up and has to be dealt with; give it a few tweaks so that Foster
becomes the lead character, a test pilot who witnesses a UFO
incident, investigates what's going on, and eventually gets the
chance to join SHADO. The hasty rewrite perhaps explains why the
title Exposed, which would have been appropriate to the investigative
journalist storyline, doesn't make a lot of sense any more.
Well, that explains why
Exposed needs to be viewed out of production order – but I still
find the simple reversal of episodes 4 and 5 unsatisfactory. Exposed
ends with Foster about to start his SHADO training. Even if he's
being fast-tracked through the process under Straker's sponsorship,
you'd think that some time ought to elapse before he's ready to take
charge of Moonbase. The obvious answer is to move Exposed back to be
the second episode – since it's specifically designed to be viewed
out of sequence, why not go the whole hog? Then Foster is introduced
to the series as soon as possible, and is plausibly absent for the
next couple of episodes. During that absence, we also get to
establish the character of Lieutenant Ellis as Moonbase Commander
before she's unceremoniously replaced by Foster for a few episodes.
(I'll talk a bit more about that later.) There's even a scene in
Exposed where Straker, concerned about slow interception times, tells
Freeman to make inspections of Moonbase to improve their efficiency –
something we actually see him doing in Computer Affair.
The next major issue I
have is with Confetti Check A-O.K. It's a flashback episode showing
the early days of setting up SHADO and the disintegration of
Straker's marriage. Now in a modern arc-based show, you might have a
reason for featuring a flashback episode so late in the season, in
that it might be the pay-off to unexplained character behaviours
earlier in the show. In UFO, it's simply the case that the producers
thought A Question of Priorities worked really well, and wanted to
explore more of the background to Straker's character. Due to the
episodic nature of an ITC film series, neither episode particularly
depends on the other. You can watch A Question of Priorities as a
self-contained piece, since all the information you need is there in
the episode – likewise, Confetti Check A-O.K. can be viewed on its
own. But viewing the two episodes as a pair does deepen one's
emotional involvement in the story of either. As to which way round
they should be seen – well, as I've said, there's no particular
revelatory reason for placing Confetti Check later on. I personally
feel that seeing it earlier in the series gives more emotional depth
to A Question of Priorities, as we already know what Straker has been
through to get to that point. It's an individual preference, but I
would drop Confetti Check back to the fourth slot. (It also helps to
pad out the “Foster in training” gap.)
These are the two big
changes I would make. Otherwise the production order is broadly
sensible, though I would make a few minor tweaks here and there to
aid the flow of the narrative. One of the notable things about the
show is its large semi-regular cast of SHADO operatives. Not
everyone is in every episode, but that helps to sell the idea of a
large military organization, where people could be on leave or
re-assigned (or even, we might be left to imagine, killed during an
off-screen mission). Occasionally, a character fills a different
position to his regular assignment, usually a temporary secondment as
a mission specialist – such as when Gay Ellis and Mark Bradley take
part in Freeman's ground mission in Computer Affair; Lieutenant
Masters works on the long-range camera probe in Close Up; or Nina
Barry is assigned to the Skydiver mission in Sub-Smash. The only
character who gets permanently re-assigned to a new role is Lew
Waterman, initially an Interceptor pilot, and later promoted to
Captain of Skydiver. And yet, after his first two episodes in charge
of the submarine, he suddenly reappears as an astronaut in The Square
Triangle – I suspect because stock footage of an interception was
used. Now, I'm perfectly happy with characters changing jobs during
the series, but I find it jarring to see Waterman yo-yoing back and
forth. The simple solution here is to shuffle The Square Triangle up
slightly to place it before Ordeal.
Paul Foster is the
exception to this pattern, as he bounces around through different
roles depending on the episode. I see Foster as being utilized by
Straker in a troubleshooter role, being sent into the most complex
and dangerous situations as the “man on the ground”. So, for
instance, in Ordeal he's stationed aboard Skydiver because it's Lew
Waterman's first tour as Captain, and Foster is there to oversee the
transition in command. He also replaces Gay Ellis as commander of
Moonbase for several episodes – although Ellis comes back in later
episodes, which is not something that usually happens. As it's a
film series, we don't get any explanation within the narrative for
why Foster has replaced her – (I've discussed the real world
reasons earlier) – one of the novelizations suggests that Ellis has
contracted a cold whilst on leave, and is thus forbidden from space
travel, which is as good an explanation as any. Later, in The
Responsibility Seat, Foster is doing another tour on Moonbase whilst
Gay Ellis remains in command. A little narrative oddity occurs
between E.S.P. and Kill Straker! The former ends with Foster
preparing to depart for a tour on Moonbase, and the latter opens with
him on his way back to Earth, the tour concluded. So to help smooth
the narrative flow, I'd move The Responsibility Seat between these
two episodes, creating a little arc for Foster's second Moonbase
tour.
Going back to those
three episodes where Foster is Moonbase Commander, it's interesting
to note that The Dalotek Affair is done as a flashback – Foster
recounting to Freeman events that happened “six months ago”. To
sell this better, I would move Flight Path (a Foster-free episode)
between Conflict and The Dalotek Affair. This would suggest that
Foster has been on leave following his stint on Moonbase, and is
meeting up with Freeman prior to resuming his duties.
So, with those
adjustments, we're left with an order like this:
1. Identified
2. Exposed
3. Computer Affair
4. Confetti Check A-O.K.
5. Survival
6. Conflict
7. Flight Path
8. The Dalotek Affair
9. A Question of Priorities
10. The Square Triangle
11. Ordeal
12. Court Martial
13. Close Up
14. E.S.P.
15. The Responsibility Seat
16. Kill Straker!
17. Sub-Smash
18. The Sound of Silence
19. The Cat with Ten Lives
20. Destruction
21. The Man Who Came Back
22. The Psychobombs
23. Reflections in the Water
24. Timelash
25. Mindbender
26. The Long Sleep
I certainly find it
disconcerting to have the two most bizarre episodes, Timelash and
Mindbender back-to-back like that – you'd really want to spread
that much weirdness out more.
The Sound of Silence,
with its minimal cast and relatively straightforward (for UFO) alien
abduction plot, serves as a nice transitional episode between the
blocks – you'd certainly notice the absence of Alec Freeman, but
it's not as bad as having a new second-in-command already in post
without an introduction. (We'll save that for the next episode.)
The second block's most
obvious cast change is that Virginia Lake, the scientist who designed
SHADO's tracking system way back in the first episode, is now filling
the Freeman role. Meanwhile, the absence of Lieutenant Ellis sees
Nina Barry promoted into the role of Moonbase Commander. But there's
one episode which seems to be based on a completely different format,
and that's The Man Who Came Back. In this episode, the
second-in-command role is filled by the character of Colonel Grey,
much more obvious as a straight replacement for Freeman; and Virginia
Lake is serving as Moonbase Commander, and seems to have been in the
role for a while. She also has a relationship with Paul Foster –
himself on another Moonbase tour – although given that this is
never mentioned again, and the two continue working together in
future episodes without any animosity, we can probably assume it was
brief and ended amicably.
Because of these differences, I'd actually suggest this episode should be moved right after The Sound of Silence. So, in this narrative, Virginia Lake is initially assigned to be Moonbase Commander as replacement for Lieutenant Ellis – my thinking is that she might be overseeing a major upgrade to the tracking systems, which is her area of expertise after all – and Colonel Grey is most definitely replacing Freeman. It's only after the events of this episode that Grey – presumably – moves to a different role; Virginia (once her Moonbase tour is complete) takes over the second-in-command position; and Nina Barry is permanently promoted to command of Moonbase. It certainly feels a more natural progression than having established characters jumping back and forth through assignments. (As a side note, I will note that Nina does seem to be serving as Moonbase Commander in The Sound of Silence, but it's easy enough to assume she's just filling in until the new permanent Commander arrives.)
Because of these differences, I'd actually suggest this episode should be moved right after The Sound of Silence. So, in this narrative, Virginia Lake is initially assigned to be Moonbase Commander as replacement for Lieutenant Ellis – my thinking is that she might be overseeing a major upgrade to the tracking systems, which is her area of expertise after all – and Colonel Grey is most definitely replacing Freeman. It's only after the events of this episode that Grey – presumably – moves to a different role; Virginia (once her Moonbase tour is complete) takes over the second-in-command position; and Nina Barry is permanently promoted to command of Moonbase. It certainly feels a more natural progression than having established characters jumping back and forth through assignments. (As a side note, I will note that Nina does seem to be serving as Moonbase Commander in The Sound of Silence, but it's easy enough to assume she's just filling in until the new permanent Commander arrives.)
Timelash features
Straker picking Virginia Lake up from the airport upon her return
from Moonbase – and they talk about it as if it's a new experience
for her. So in keeping with the narrative structure I've suggested
above, I think this episode needs to be placed right after The Man
Who Came Back. In effect, it means we get two episodes with Virginia
before she officially takes up that second-in-command role. I also
think that The Psychobombs should be seen next – it may just be me,
but I always feel that Virginia's reaction to Straker's
single-mindedness indicates that she's still getting used to seeing
his command style at close quarters. So I would place those three
episodes between The Sound of Silence and The Cat with Ten Lives to
form an arc reintroducing Virginia Lake to the series.
(I would be remiss if I
didn't point out the flaw in this scheme. In The Cat with Ten Lives
and The Man Who Came Back, Straker has a temporary replacement
secretary, Miss Holland. There's a scene in The Cat with Ten Lives
clearly intended to introduce the character, where Straker thanks her
for standing in – and indeed, his regular secretary Miss Ealand
later returns. In my re-ordering, we unfortunately meet Miss Holland
in The Man Who Came Back, then we get Miss Ealand back in Timelash,
then we have Miss Holland again in The Cat with Ten Lives and only
here does Straker acknowledge her. It is a little jarring, but I
consider it the lesser of two evils compared to trying to smooth
Virginia Lake's reintroduction to the series – and creating a more
plausible narrative for the major characters. There it is. There's
no reason why Straker shouldn't have a relief secretary from time to
time, and maybe Miss Holland had been there a while in The Man Who
Came Back – but only recently returned for a second stint in The
Cat with Ten Lives.)
The other change I'd
suggest is to move Mindbender slightly earlier, and the reason for
this goes back to that same problem of character continuity from the
first block. Lew Waterman is briefly seen as Captain of Skydiver in
Mindbender, through the use of stock footage once again – whereas
we establish a new (unnamed) Captain in Destruction, played by David
Warbeck. There's a little bonus though: we've now spread out
Timelash, Mindbender (and indeed The Long Sleep) – the most
“trippy” episodes.
So, we're left with
this sequence:
18. The Sound of Silence
19. The Man Who Came Back
20. Timelash
21. The Psychobombs
22. The Cat with Ten Lives
23. Mindbender
24. Destruction
25. Reflections in the Water
26. The Long Sleep
Alternatively, you
could reverse the last two episodes. I like to give to give myself
the choice, depending on my mood at the time, between concluding the
series with a bleak, downbeat character piece (The Long Sleep) or
with a large-scale battle against massed UFOs (Reflections in the
Water). Of course neither is a proper conclusion in the narrative
sense, because this is an ITC film series – the story just goes on
forever...