Close-UP

I agree with Marc. This one was a stinker. Nothing worse than being left
hanging. The plot in the ViewMaster reel was actually better! Of course
the all-time worse episode had to be the one (can't remember the name
offhand) where Foster checks into the fat farm, gets captured by the aliens
and (surprise) it's all a dream. Aaargh.

But to end on a positive note, Psychobombs was pretty good. (Even though
Foster's girlfriend Miss Chesty gets fried at the end).

"How did you know they'ld get that UFO?"
"I didn't"

(Insert cool music here).

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> I agree with Marc. This one was a stinker.

I see I've been misunderstood -- I actually don't think CLOSE UP was
that bad of an episode, but I've seen plenty of people who think it's
the worst. I think even my wife (who only saw the series once after it
came out on DVD) thought it was a terrible episode, because she said
there was no point to it.

> the all-time worse episode had to be the one (can't remember
> the name offhand) where Foster checks into the fat farm, gets
> captured by the aliens and (surprise) it's all a dream. Aaargh.

Now this I will agree with -- ORDEAL was the worst...

> But to end on a positive note, Psychobombs was pretty good.

I liked A QUESTION OF PRIORITIES the best, probably followed by
MINDBENDER...

Marc

Yeah, ORDEAL tanked. 10 minutes of listening to
Forster singing Beautiful Dreamer at the end was
enough to make me never watch that one again. :)

Awww, he sings and the working out fat SHADO guys are
smiling!

Priorities is great and TIMELASH is a favorite, too.

Scott

At 12:24 PM 8/12/2003 -0700, you wrote:
>I liked A QUESTION OF PRIORITIES the best, probably followed by
>MINDBENDER...
>Marc


My favorites change all the time, but right now it's a 1 - 2 punch of
Mindbender and Timelash. Is your choice of AQOP there because it plays so
well in Mindbender? Also, as the USA's expert on UFO (Okay, how about USA
Superfan??? Eh, you know what I mean Marc....As someone who has been
involved with UFO fandom on the Internet for over ten years and was
involved with UFO fandom prior and has this honking great website and has
Ed Bishop asking after him at conventions.....)

Okay...as this dude who digs UFO for a really long time, do you find
yourself switching favorites over the years?

I think AQOP and MB make a great double feature just like Identified and
Exposed make a great double feature. But I've also found my favorites
switching as I watch the show more on DVD or from what I learn on the net
and the various fan sources like FAB. I think some my real appreciation of
Mindbender came when I read an interview with the director Ken Turner. Has
the DVD extras changed your opinion on some episodes?

> Is your choice of AQOP there because it plays so well in
> Mindbender? do you find yourself switching favorites over
> the years? Has the DVD extras changed your opinion on some
> episodes?

I don't think my favorite episodes change over time, but perhaps if I
look through the message archives I'll find myself saying 10 years ago
that I liked THE LONG SLEEP or TIMELASH the best... :-)

The thing is that it's a really close call -- I like so many episodes
that it's difficult to pick one or two that I might (just barely) like
more than some other episode.

But no, my choice of AQOP and MINDBENDER had nothing to do with them
being a "good pair". And no interview or DVD extra has changed my
opinion either...

Marc

Ookla, am I to understand that you actually liked PsychoBombs?
Oh my, let me count the ways. 1. Why didn't the fake Captain's hands rip off when he "forced" the trap door? Why, since the guards already knew that he was a fake, did they wait to spring the voice print trap on him? Doesn't it have a manual override, for occasions like this?
2. How did the people become hypnotized by the green light, before they ever saw it? How were those three people, and only them, attracted to the UFO? Why did "Miss Chesty" kill the cop? Why weren't twenty cops waiting for her at home since the first thing the cop did was radio in her info, then report that he was chasing her.
3. Were the SHADO guards guns loaded with blanks, or something, so that they couldn't have shot either of the two, that they had a chance to do so?
4. Was Foster claiming that Chesty (No I can't remember her name off hand either) had hypontized him, and that is why he brought her to SHADO with out hand and leg irons?
I could go on, but I am sure that you get my point.
By the way, I have never seen Ordeal, so I can not judge the realative merits of it.

Ookla Mok <[hidden email]> wrote:

I agree with Marc. This one was a stinker. Nothing worse than being left
hanging. The plot in the ViewMaster reel was actually better! Of course
the all-time worse episode had to be the one (can't remember the name
offhand) where Foster checks into the fat farm, gets captured by the aliens
and (surprise) it's all a dream. Aaargh.

But to end on a positive note, Psychobombs was pretty good. (Even though
Foster's girlfriend Miss Chesty gets fried at the end).

"How did you know they'ld get that UFO?"
"I didn't"

(Insert cool music here).

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[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Out of the 26 extent eps of UFO most of them "tank" as someone on this site
commented. I only purchased a small number of them as I dislike so many of
them. Psychobombs only served one purpose in my mind - to prove the aliens
can mind control humans. However they do it (which I think is likely more
sophisticated and how they show it on PB), it happens. Ordeal, Close Up and
so many others don't work for a variety of reasons, and don't get me going
on Mindbender and Timelash, not to mention Cat with 10 Lives (the one I hate
the most). As someone commented about Close up - the info revealed was never
shown to be utilized (so what was that whole exercise for if not to find the
alien home world and carry the war to THEM?). The whole business with the
Interceptors not moving away from the Moon was strategically and militaryly
silly of course. I have to agree with all the comments I've seen posted in
the last bit here.

So, because I've managed to diss alot of UFO, why do I like it? There were a
few eps which "worked" for a number of reasons (SubSmash), there were "bits"
in some which I liked because they gave us info about the characters and
their depth (i.e. CC-AOK and AQOP), and most of all, I felt the show always
had tremendous, if unrealized, potential. I think that unrealized potential
is why so many of us write UFO fanfic. I've had discussions with Jessica
Ramage and Fenise Felt and they've expressed similar POVs, not to mention
the lack of much canon makes UFO more creatively challenging than Trek or
X-Files which are pretty hamstrung with canon.

I'm always amazed when I watch eps or think back to some of them, how
loosely written alot of them were and how incomplete the storylines. It all
goes back to my already stated POV that the so-called creative-production
people were not giving UFO the attention it deserved. In a way, I'm hoping
if a re-make is ever made of the show, either as a mini-series or M4TV
movie, that GA will be kept as far away from the making of it as he has been
on Thunderbirds and that people with a real love and reverence for the show
will realize what we've all be saying on this site and write a fine
screenplay which will ties up all the ideas that need to be expanded or
fixed from the original. Maybe it won't have purple wigs or Nehru jackets,
but wouldn't it be nice to see the show given the full (and UFO-loving)
treatment by today's standards?

Pam

Somebody wrote (pls forgive me for forgetting who) that they didn't expect
to hear anyone singing in an SF show, but actually there have been a variety
of SF TV shows and films which featured music. TOS, TNG, DS9 certainly
featured music (don't know about VGR or Enterprise), and the original BG
movie featured music and a three breasted night club singer! Logan's Run
(the movie not the TV show) had some music in it, and look at A.I. which was
produced recently - there was some music in it as well. MIB II had the
singing DOG (how's that for imagination?) - doing "I Will Survive"
originally recorded by Gloria Gaynor!

I can see it happening sometimes in SF if it warrants it - altho I'm still
not a fan of Klingon opera ( sorry Yuchy).

Pam

Oh, I have seen plenty of singing in SF adventure
programs, but it usually seems out of place.
Personally, I hated when Trek took time out to sing.
Get on with the episode already. "Charlie's our new
darLING, our darLING our darLING!" At least Foster
waiting until the end of the show. :)

The Logan's Run movie didn't have a musical number,
but it did have an orgy scene with electronic music.
It was integrated into the chase, but it's a strange
scene. MIB II was a comedy. Anything goes in a comedy.
A:I's music was, again, integrated and part of the
landscape of the story.

When they stop part of an episode to sing, then I get
ansty. Foster's song was appropriate but too long. It
should have segued into Barry Gray exit music after
the first verse and it would have been a light capper
to a crapper episode. As it is, they linger on him
singing and everyone standing around with their grins.

Just my feeling, of course. :P

Scott

Scott

> If Alan Perry doesn't like the episode there is no one to blame but
> himself he being the director.

Alan hated the script, and thought that no director could save such a
bad script.

Of course, he could have done what Ken Turner did on MINDBENDER, which
was essentially to modify the script to make it a better episode, but
Ken also did get fired by the Andersons for taking this initiative
(reportedly Sylvia became angry when she found that they were filming a
cowboy shootout scene, which wasn't in the script)(it probably also
didn't help that they had to shutdown filming of this episode for a
short while after Mike Billington stepped on Ed Bishop's ankle during
the filming of this scene)

Marc