The Square Triangle

“The Square Triangle” features the old love triangle
in one story line, but the second story line is of
course about SHADO, and the two story lines intersect
near the end of the episode. The overall theme, if
there is one, is one of plans that don’t work out
quite the way one expects.

This one has been a tough one to write about. I write
something, I read it, I ditch it because it sucks. I
think part of the problem is that I’m having trouble
figuring out what I want to focus on, plus the parts
of the story are a bit disjointed and don’t lend
themselves to looking at them in sequence. We’ll see
how this thing goes this time.

The story begins with a woman driving alone along a
country road when a man’s apparently menacingly hand
reaches out of the back seat of the car. It quickly
becomes obvious that she knows him very well. The
SHADO part of the plot begins with a UFO sighting.
Its termination is southern England. And what is
Waterman doing back flying interceptors? Was his
promotion to Skydiver Captain a figment of Paul’s
imagination, too?

I guess if I’m having trouble with this, the place to
start is Straker. When Straker gets the termination
for the UFO’s course, he tells Paul he will give the
attack order as he performs some quick calculations.
It’s apparent to that he has some plan he wants to
implement. Paul and everyone else is surprised when
Straker gives orders to not fire on the incoming UFO.
As a witness to their faith in their Commander they do
follow orders, even if they are puzzled by them.
Straker seems just a wee bit anxious about his plan.

Alec arrives and Straker looks a bit like the cat that
just ate the canary. Alec suggests they invite the
aliens in for drinks as a way to question Straker’s
decision. It’s a set up so Straker can explain his
plan to us. His objective is to get more information
on the aliens by capturing a UFO intact and before
deterioration sets in.

I think this scene gives us a measure of the closeness
between Alec and Straker in an indirect way. Earlier,
when Paul verified Straker’s orders not to fire on the
UFO, Straker’s response was curt. When Alec made a
smart remark about those orders (making him a smart
alec! OLD slang The day my parents met, my mother
told my grandmother she had met a smart alec.),
Straker invites him into his office and discusses the
decision with him. Alec points out that Straker has
let a potential killer loose by letting the UFO land.
Straker says it’s in a remote area, the danger must be
slight. We’re getting a bit here about the morality
of individual choices.

Right behind this we get into a side story about a
game warden who encounters the alien. The game warden
is killed to underline Alec’s point about the danger
involved in Straker’s gambit. The alien uses the game
warden’s body and destroys the UFO in an attempt to
hide his survival. I was puzzled about this action at
first. My guess is that once he had broken the glass
in his helmet he couldn’t go back into space and that
he knows SHADO has to be hunting for him.

Paul finds the UFO, but it has been destroyed. He
calls in his find. There is a moment when Straker’s
disappointment shows. He glances at Alec, who
understands the reason for his reaction. Then it is
back to business. Straker orders Paul to investigate.


Straker and Alec retreat to the office, discussing why
the UFO was destroyed. Here’s another hint about
Alec’s status with Straker. He just walks in and sits
down. Unless I’m mistaken (which happens with
alarming regularity), Alec is the only person who
presumes to just walk in and sit without invitation.

Paul figures out that the body in the wreck is not an
alien. Straker seems a little worried. His attempt
to learn more about the aliens has failed and now an
alien is on the loose somewhere. Alec was right.

Paul finds the dog and evidence of a struggle and
reports it to Straker. Paul manages to track the
alien with the help of the game warden’s dog and
follows him to the “cottage”.

In the other plot line, we find out that Liz and Cass
are plotting to kill Liz’s husband. He is being lured
to the “cottage” and will be shot as a supposed
intruder. It’s obvious that it is Cass’ idea and he
is pushing Liz into it. His plan seems incredibly
elaborate.

The picture that emerges of Liz is that of an aging
trophy wife. She’s still attractive, but past the
youthful blush of beauty. Her husband is the
stereotypical pompous Englishman and talks down to
her. However, when he calls her, he seems to have
some genuine affection for her and she seems to
rethink her actions. Her downfall is her lover,
though. He is a scheming scumbag and pressures her to
go through with the murder. Oh, he’ll be right there,
but he makes sure she is the one holding the gun.

Why is she involved with him? I imagine she was
feeling a bit neglected and unsure of herself as she
gets older. Cass showers Liz with attention and makes
her feel young and beautiful again. He is a
manipulator and doesn’t really care for her. The fly
in the ointment of their scheme is that the alien
shows up and gets murdered instead of Liz’s husband.

It becomes readily apparent to me that Liz has made a
deal with the devil. When Liz shoots the alien and
they realize the mistake, Cass smacks her and runs,
leaving her to face the consequences alone. Paul
arrives shortly, hot on the trail of the alien. He
tells Liz to get her coat and they take her out. We
find out they’ve grabbed Cass, too. They are taken to
SHADO for a little amnesia treatment.

Liz’s husband arrives at the cottage and finds – Paul.
Yes, his wife was expecting him. Yes, he keeps a gun
there. The only person he knows for sure who knew
about the gun is his wife. Paul becomes suspicious of
just what was going on there. Paul gets high marks
for figuring things out.

I love it when we pop back to Straker finishing his
little talk with Liz and Cass. He’s been a thoughtful
host and supplied them with coffee. The general
public must never know about the aliens. SHADO is
going to help them forget their horrible experience
with an amnesia drug. It’s perfectly harmless and,
oh, and it’s tasteless, too. LOL

Straker returns to his office to find Alec and Paul
waiting for him. He realizes something is wrong. He
hears about Paul’s theory that Liz and Cass were
planning to murder her husband. There may be just a
hint of Straker being scandalized. It’s a question of
moral responsibility to Paul and Alec. Straker is
sarcastic about their concerns. What are they to do?
They can’t prove anything. They just erased the past
12 hours. Straker acts as though the events are none
of their concern and sends Paul and Alec back to work.
Then in one of those weird Straker things, as soon as
Paul and Alec are gone, he expresses his moral outrage
by having Liz and Cass almost thrown out.

And then there is the eerie ending with Liz standing
looking at a headstone over the credits. I can’t
believe she’ll be happy with her choice. Will Cass
murder her later? Will he blackmail her? She’ll wish
she hadn’t ever seen him.

Diorite

 
In a message dated 11/11/2007 9:09:16 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,  
[hidden email] writes:

And then there is the eerie ending with Liz standing
looking at a headstone over the credits. I can’t
believe she’ll be happy with her choice. Will Cass
murder her later? Will he blackmail her? She’ll wish
she hadn’t ever seen him.

Diorite




Agreed, but I thought that was the best part of the episode. And I kind of  
like the idea the Straker had to make a human decision about letting these  
people go, knowing what they were planning. It would have been hard for me to  
even consider doing that, but Straker had to look at the bigger picture and  
possibly sacrifice one life for many. For me, it was the moral decision that  
makes it a really good episode.
 
Wendy



************************************** See what's new at http://www.aol.com


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

I really love the ending of this one. It's another one of those dark
endings that are usually so rarely seen and one reason I love this
show so much. When the biggest problem I have with this episode is
that I don't get to see quite enough of my favorite SHADO people, it
can't be too bad.

When I watch TV or a movie, I tend to think too much. I'll be thinking
back about something that happened earlier or trying to come up with a
theory while things are going on, and then I'll realize that I've
missed something important. Maybe that's what always happens in this
episode because I never caught that the alien had destroyed his own
ship. It makes a lot more sense now. I always wondered why it had
disintegrated so quickly.

This is a rather random and insignificant observation, but the map
they use in this episode has its coordinates read (y,x) for some
reason. Just something I noticed.

Here's a question: why would Liz and Cass go with the SHADO guys? If
they showed them their SHADO ID (although Liz didn't wait to see any
at all), wouldn't they be suspicious, never having heard of SHADO
before? And why are they wearing their little SHADO logos anyway?

I think it's interesting how, at the end, Straker disapproves of the
suspected plot, but for once, there's nothing he can do about it…not
really. Knowing the writing style of the series, I was not surprised
at all that Liz did kill her husband (then again, there is no actual
proof of it), but I wouldn't think that she would have gone through
with it after the mess-up the first time and finding out what it's
like to kill someone.

By the way, doesn't The Responsibility Seat come after Ordeal? No
problem with doing this one first, but I don't want you to have
accidentally skipped it since I have some questions about that one
that I've been waiting until your comments and review to ask.

>Alpharaptor

--- Alpharaptor <[hidden email]> wrote:

> Here's a question: why would Liz and Cass go with
> the SHADO guys? If
> they showed them their SHADO ID (although Liz didn't
> wait to see any
> at all), wouldn't they be suspicious, never having
> heard of SHADO
> before? And why are they wearing their little SHADO
> logos anyway?

My guess is that Cass and Liz were both pretty shook
up when they saw the alien. That he was a surprise is
an understatement. Then the SHADO guys showed up
acting like authorities. The general tendency,
particularly back then, would be to go along with what
you were told.

I'm going through the US/A&E DVDs in order. After you
asked, I noticed that The Responsibility Seat is
listed after Ordeal for several possible orders, but
it doesn't come up in the US/A&E DVDs until disk 5 of
8.

Diorite

> I'm going through the US/A&E DVDs in order. After you
> asked, I noticed that The Responsibility Seat is
> listed after Ordeal for several possible orders, but
> it doesn't come up in the US/A&E DVDs until disk 5 of
> 8.

Heh, heh... well there seems to be many possible UFO episode
orders, although there is no real official order. A&E
had to switch some episodes around compared to the UK
DVD order because A&E hadn't received all the episodes
in time for the release of their first UFO DVD set
(at least, that is what I heard).

Marc

"Here's a question: why would Liz and Cass go with
> the SHADO guys? If
> they showed them their SHADO ID"

I've always thought that the "SHADO ID" passes were probably MI5 or MI6 ID's.
I'm sure the English members would have a better idea about which one. Or maybe by SHADO's
time in the "future" there would have been something different but equally well known. Their cover
for incidents was often "military manoeuvres". Whatever the case I'm pretty sure that if people in military uniforms armed to the teeth came busting in my door, I'd do whatever they told me.
We members of the British Commonwealth don't have the same rights and freedoms as the US Constitution gives it's citizens and as a people in general, we aren't as likely to question or stand up to authority.
In Australia for example we don't have "The right to remain silent", or refuse DNA or blood tests etc.
And as Diorite says, it was also a different time.
Lyn

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

In a message dated 11/13/2007 8:17:24 P.M. Eastern Standard Time,
[hidden email] writes:

In Australia for example we don't have "The right to remain silent", or
refuse DNA or blood tests etc.




If you are a person of interest in a crime you can be picked up by an
officer for questioning without being arrested and remaining silent can still lead
to an arrest. And while there is no way a court can order you to speak, they
can order those tests you mentioned and at that point you can't refuse. Just
call me a very jaded US legal assistant.

Beyond that, all I will say is that Canadians do not have that right either.
They also own more guns and don't lock their doors. Their crime rate is 75%
less than ours per capita. If you feel safe walking alone in Sidney at 3:00
am, then all I can say is that no one I know would do the same in Philadelphia.

Wendy




************************************** See what's new at http://www.aol.com


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

--- In [hidden email], "Alpharaptor" <segara0@...> wrote:

<snip>

> I think it's interesting how, at the end, Straker disapproves of the
> suspected plot, but for once, there's nothing he can do about it…not
> really. Knowing the writing style of the series, I was not surprised
> at all that Liz did kill her husband (then again, there is no actual
> proof of it), but I wouldn't think that she would have gone through
> with it after the mess-up the first time and finding out what it's
> like to kill someone.
<snip>
> >Alpharaptor

If she was given the amnesia drug and it worked, she *wouldn't* know
what it's like to kill someone. It would all be new to her again.
Lorraine

--- In [hidden email], "montgolfier100" <airtime25@...> wrote:
> If she was given the amnesia drug and it worked, she *wouldn't* know
> what it's like to kill someone. It would all be new to her again.
> Lorraine

You're right—I didn't think about that.
>Alpharaptor