The future.... 30 years ago! (Space 1999)

Member Name: T4imbo3107

Product:	Space 1999
Date:	20/09/08 (210 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: An original premise.

Disadvantages: Some poor episodes and laughable aliens

It seems a lot of the TV series that were originally shown in the 1970's have all made a bit of a recent comeback, mainly on ITV4 who seem to have purchased the whole ITC back catalogue. Another shining example of a series that should have gone further was Space 1999. The future was always a bit of a grey area when it came to seventies sci-fi, you could work on the lunar surface and travel between the Earth and the Moon easily and yet seventies fashions hadn't actually gone out of style!! It was a shame that this program, which was a high budget Gerry Anderson Production never went on for a third series, if a third series was made it would have ironed out the majority of the issues from the series before that caused the cancellation of the program itself.

The premise of the story is good and an angle that hadn't been approached before in any type of science fiction show. Obviously this show is going to draw the inevitable comparison to Star Trek, and then in my opinion Space 1999 is a lot darker and frankly far grittier in looks and stories than what Star Trek was before the original series was cancelled in 1969.

Space 1999 tells the story of Moonbase Alpha; a lunar based station that oversees the placement of nuclear waste from Earth being stored beneath the lunar surface. Newly appointed Commander, John Koenig arrives to take command of the station and uncovers a dark secret; pilots which begin to act erratically while on duty and are slowly dying from excessive radiation poisoning. An investigation takes place and finds that all pilots worked on or around Nuclear Disposal Area Two. On September 13th 1999, Nuclear Disposal Area Two explodes with such force that the Moon is blown out of Earth orbit across the Solar System and out into unexplored reaches of the universe. Contact with Earth had been lost and the people of Alpha had unwittingly become space explorers. It's also interesting to note that the final scenes of Earth are from a newscast that is reporting the problems being experienced on Earth, such as earthquakes, extreme weather and so on. So this sets up the first episode of Season one.

Further episodes dealt with the fact that the Moon was now an exploration ship and new life forms whether peaceful or aggressive were being discovered., bottom line is that the physics of the story were not correct at all, as the Moon would very unlikely to have survived intact after an explosion of such force. Let alone actually be shifted from Earth orbit. The tone of the episodes were different from anything before, much more darker and very sombre, perhaps this was a deliberate attempt at reflecting how the characters felt at the time, however in some cases this does slow some of the stories down in places.

For a series that was developed in the mid seventies the production values are very high indeed, in fact with the use of miniatures and a number of impressive sets the series was by means of production surpassing other shows such as Star Trek and Mission Impossible. In fact this was really down to Gerry Anderson, his previous show called UFO was canned after just one season, the designs for the Moonbase that had featured in UFO had already been planned for the second season that would have really lifted the lid and make the sets bigger than what had been seen before, so with these in hand the genesis for Space 1999 had been set.

One of the outstanding features other than the sets was the design of the Eagle space craft. They are not what you would normally associate with sci-fi at all. The design is more industrial as these were primarily used for transportation of cargo and goods. Not only are they a departure from the normal smoothed surface type of ship that we saw in Lost in Space or even Star Trek, but have a lot of details placed on them such as the external frame and the landing legs that never retract. This was a far rougher and grittier designed ship than what we had seen before. This also allowed the audience to see one of the best characters in the series, Alan Carter, who was played by Australian actor Nick Tate, who was the Chief Pilot of the Eagle aircraft.

Gerry Anderson knew that he could have a serious hit on his hands with this show and to make it marketable, Lord Lew Grade, who was head of ITC at the time wanted to make the show universal to all countries and so castings that were made meant that names were well know to viewers already.

Commander John Koenig was played by Mission Impossible star Martin Landau, Landau played Koenig as a highly tempered man in Season one, but a different approach was taken in Season two when the character was shown to have a lighter side to his nature that seemed to change his character completely from that of Season one. He also showed that he was capable of making mistakes in a number of episodes. I liked the way Landau played the part but felt in the first series that the he had far too much on his shoulders to deal with.

The female lead is Dr Helena Russell played by Landau's real life wife Barbara Bain. Even though she was there for Koenig on a number of occasions in her role as Chief Medical Officer, her role was expanded upon throughout as she was one of the dependencies of the story. And works with others in a team rather than alone. Bain plays her well but can come across on screen as somewhat cold in nature, Season two opened the possibility that Koenig and Russell had great affections for each other.

Veteran English actor Barry Morse played Professor Victor Bergman, best known for his re-occurring role in the 1960's version of The Fugitive as Lt Phillip Gerrard. Victor was Alpha's Scientific Advisor and saved Alpha a number of times throughout Season one. Strangely he didn't appear in Season two at all as the character was believed to have dies between Seasons one and two, although this was never confirmed in the series itself. It was shame that the character didn't re-appear as he became a saviour of Alpha as well as someone who Koenig relied upon in situations that occurred that fell outside his scientific understandings. He was also the third in command.

Guest stars that appeared throughout the run were names that were well known for appearing in other TV series or film, actors and actresses such as Joan Collins, Leo McKern, Christopher Lee, even actors such as Patrick Troughton and Brian Blessed appeared in episodes. My personal favourite being ex-Blue Peter presenter Peter Duncan whose voice was dubbed over for his role he played as a terrorist.

Season two bought about some major changes, it was felt that the stories were too cerebral and although made good TV were somewhat quiet when it came to action and preferred to take the dramatic path. Season two changed that completely, with Barry Morse deciding to not return, this meant a cast shake up. In came Tony Anholt, an ITC regular who had previously appeared with Robert Vaughan in "The Protectors" series, here he plays Tony Verdeschi, the new second in command. It was never mentioned where he came from at all as it was unknown as to what part of Alpha he was originally posted beforehand, so seeing him on screen didn't really make sense at all. It was believed at the time that the character was created just so there were two male leads on the show and overall the character does work well with Verdeschi being a likeable character who is usually the first person who is willing to make a stand for the good of Alpha.

Also an alien was introduced as part of the crew of Alpha. Actress Catherine Schell played Maya, a member of the Psychon race with the ability to shape shift into other forms such as a Tiger, Panther or even a doppelganger of a member of the crew. This was a fresh thing which opened up new doors for the scripts and allowed a point of view to be taken from someone who isn't human. Throughout Season two it is these two characters that play off each other very well with the flirting and mannerisms. To be honest it wasn't going to be unexpected that characters were going to eventually pair up as the subject of pregnancy and births was mentioned a number of times.

With new theme music, a serious upgrade of the opening titles that did away with Landau and Bain turning to the camera with blank expressions, the series really stepped up a gear. The second Season was really everything that the latter half of Season one should have been as it was brighter and more colourful, but also more importantly the cast were given something to do rather than stand there looking at the screens talking dialogue. Even the rather bland Beige and Blue uniforms were changed as well as new Orange and Blue designs were introduced allowing the actors to stand out from there surroundings whilst the story unfolds. Additional jackets and skirts for the female crew members was added which meant a level of individuality was given and allowed the cast to appear differently rather than the same uniform, different face approach.

Unfortunately due to some poor scripts and in some cases laughable aliens, the show was not renewed for another and just a total of 48 episodes were produced. At the time the ITV were never showing these at the same time, for example LWT showed this on a Saturday morning after Tiswas at 11.30, yet other regions never aired any episodes at all. Internationally the show struggled to be sold and in the end was forced to go into syndication which for ITC was more of a secondary option and this would not necessarily maintain finances for future productions.

Overall it does look dated as Beige flared trousers when fighting invaders in a Moonbase is something that is just not seen much really these days! That said the thought and preparation that went into this project, didn't really pay off, but established the scenario of Space 1999 as a definite cult status program to which a loyal fan base is still evident today. To give some idea fans made a short film called "Message from Moonbase Alpha" that featured series regular Zienia Merton who once again played the part of Sandra Benes, this was intended to bring closure to Space 1999 and tell what happened in the end to the crew of Alpha, not going to spoil it at all but it worth a look on You Tube, it is quite moving to watch and also this explains what could have been the strange signal that was received in the first episode as well.

I was thinking the other day that maybe it is time for this to be remade; Space 2059. After all they did a great job with Battlestar Galactica, so it would be about time that this was due a remake or re-imagining.

Summary: A cult classic, now shown on ITV4.