Colonel Foster and a 'red shirt' are on a mission. Oddly, however, the Moon base loses radio contact with them for 16 hours. But, fortunately, they do arrive safely. In the intervening time, something odd happened to the two men, as they both are insanely angry at Commander Straker. The red shirt tries to even blow up the base just to kill Straker. As for Foster, he's bent on ruining Straker's reputation and getting him fired. When that doesn't work, he's willing to settle for shooting Straker instead. It doesn't take ESP to assume that somehow they were abducted and forced to do the aliens' bidding.
Despite sounding like a mega-super-cool idea for an episode, it wasn't great. Most of the reason I wasn't thrilled was that it was obvious early on that the two men had been altered somehow--yet it took the SHADO folks an amazing amount of time to realize this! Even when Straker's friend, Foster, began acting very, very abnormal, no one seemed to put two and two together to realize that aliens had kidnapped the men during the missing 16 hours. Duh. Had the indoctrination been more subtle and their behaviors more believable it would have been a better episode all around--as the basic story idea is cool. As is, it's only mildly interesting, but I must admit that the gun scene at the end is pretty exciting.
Despite sounding like a mega-super-cool idea for an episode, it wasn't great. Most of the reason I wasn't thrilled was that it was obvious early on that the two men had been altered somehow--yet it took the SHADO folks an amazing amount of time to realize this! Even when Straker's friend, Foster, began acting very, very abnormal, no one seemed to put two and two together to realize that aliens had kidnapped the men during the missing 16 hours. Duh. Had the indoctrination been more subtle and their behaviors more believable it would have been a better episode all around--as the basic story idea is cool. As is, it's only mildly interesting, but I must admit that the gun scene at the end is pretty exciting.
