Sounds like an electronic dictatorship.

The Avengers

4.7 The Cybernauts

This seemed like the best thing ever when I saw it on Channel 4 in the mid-80s, but the truth is, it’s rather threadbare beneath the unusual (for the show) sci-fi trappings. Of course, those trappings were exactly its appeal: the closest the series came to Cybermen (and a year before they set foot on the South Pole).

Nu-Who’s Rise of the Cybermen arguably owes more to this Avengers story, with its clanking killer(s) and crippled genius initiating huge scientific advances (including “Computers no bigger than a cigarette box”) and planning to take over the country, than Gerry Davis and Kit Pedler’s real deal. It takes its time to reveal the face of the metal monster, but the episode is actually better in the early passages, before the title characters and Michael Gough’s mad scientist Doctor Armstrong take centre stage.

Sensai: You attacked her as a woman, but she has the skill of a man... A bad mistake, Oyuka.

Maybe I’m just biased, though, as my favourite The Cybernauts scene by far offers none other than John “Sondergaard” Hollis (previously in Warlock) as the head of a karate school given to sage sayings (“Interest is for the onlooker. In students, we require dedication”) and unbridled pride in Emma’s performance when she bests Katherine Schofield’s Oyuka. SENSAI ROCKS!

The early part also features several guest spot deaths, including Burt Kwouk (Lobster Quadrille) and Ronald Leigh-Hunt (The Seeds of Death, Revenge of the Cybermen – we’re dodging a bullet that he’s one scene and done here). The cast in general is impressive, also featuring Bernard “Goth” Horsfall, Frederick Jaeger (Death of A Great Dane).

Sidney Hayers does a good job directing too, his first for the series, and the climactic showdown with two Cybernauts facing off is particularly effective, as Steed plants the signal device (a method of murder just seen in The Master Minds) on one while the other lays into it (I wonder if this was the inspiration for The Robots of Death scene where the Doctor achieves similar results with his scarf and hat) and Emma topples the surviving, now immobile Cybernaut with but a finger.

There are some decent lines (“Whichever way you aim it, you hit the chandelier!” comments Steed of a shotgun bent into a u-shape) but it all feels a little under-nourished. Everyone’s reliable (even Ronald Leigh-Hunt dies decently), and Hayers deserves considerable credit, but The Cybernauts is a little pedestrian, if that’s the word, given the show usually sidesteps straight science fiction.

Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.

Comments

Nanobots aren’t just for Christmas.

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Maybe the dingo ate your baby.

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They Live * (1988) (SPOILERS) Don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of They Live – I was a big fan of most things Carpenter at the time of its release – but the manner in which its reputation as a prophecy of (or insight into) “the way things are” has grown is a touch out of proportion with the picture’s relatively modest merits. Indeed, its feting rests almost entirely on the admittedly bravura sequence in which WWF-star-turned-movie-actor Roddy Piper, under the influence of a pair of sunglasses, first witnesses the pervasive influence of aliens among us who are sucking mankind dry. That, and the ludicrously genius sequence in which Roddy, full of transformative fervour, attempts to convince Keith David to don said sunglasses, for his own good. They Live should definitely be viewed by all, for their own good, but it’s only fair to point out that it doesn’t have the consistency of John Carpenter at his very, very best. Nada : I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick a

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He tasks me. He tasks me, and I shall have him.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982) (SPOILERS) I don’t love Star Trek , but I do love Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan . That probably isn’t just me, but a common refrain of many a non-devotee of the series. Although, it used to apply to The Voyage Home (the funny one, with the whales, the Star Trek even the target audience for Three Men and a Baby could enjoy). Unfortunately, its high regard has also become the desperate, self-destructive, song-and-verse, be-all-and-end-all of the overlords of the franchise itself, in whichever iteration, it seems. This is understandable to an extent, as Khan is that rare movie sequel made to transcendent effect on almost every level, and one that stands the test of time every bit as well (better, even) as when it was first unveiled.

It's something trying to get out.

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Isn’t sugar better than vinegar?

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Beer is for breakfast around here. Drink or begone.

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Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

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