The Starlost (1973) Harlan Ellison's Canadian Science Fiction Television Cult Oddity

UPDATE September 2017: Took a look at this post for the first time in two years & note that YouTube pulled, blocked or otherwise deleted the episode links I'd included, bummer. Am replacing them with still pix made from my own VCI DVD box set and getting on with life. Cheers!

UPDATE June 30 2018 : It is with sadness that we on this planet mark the passing of Harlan Ellison. WHAT A CAREER! And I would never ever EVER presume to "pay tribute" to Harlan by evaluating a show that screwed him over. He was one of the best that Humanity has yet to conjure forth, and the show still sucks even when figuring in the significance of our loss by having his voice fall silent. But I have made some alterations below to expand on certain ideas originally addressed, and please do feel welcome to chime in at the end with comments. Favorable or not.

"Save a seat for me, Sir."

Cordwainer Bird's doomed Canadian science fiction television venture about the inhabitants of a generational survival ark realizing that their home world is just a chamber in an immense space ship roaming unguided amongst the stars is a pet favorite of mine. Premise of the series goes that 300 years into the future Earth is faced with a final unknown catastrophe from which there was no hope of survival. Earth's leaders joined together to place representatives of all human cultures on the massive Earthship Ark, described as "some eight thousand miles in character" constructed in orbit between the Earth and Moon, to then roam the stars and seed suitable planets with the surviving cultural Biospheres.

Now five hundred years have passed since Earth was destroyed, during which generations of the Ark's millions of inhabitants have forgotten where they were or why, the command crew long dead after a post-launch accident and the main engine reactors extinguished. The automated machinery keeping things functioning all on their own as the ship hurtles rudderless towards destruction via collision with a distant star that the Ark's main computer is well aware of but unable to avoid. All of humanity will be extinguished unless someone does something, and to make matters worse nobody knows how soon the collision will happen due to computer malfunction. Every hour could count.

So far so good. The three principal characters and their love triangle (Keir Dullea sporting one of the worst space mustaches ever as the often out-of-breath social castoff Devon; pretty Gay Rowan as the politely fragrant + helpful Rachel, with whom he is in love; plus later game show host, television weatherman, and respected cartoon voice actor Robin Ward as the constantly pissed-off blacksmith, Garth, to whom she has been betrothed) leave their rural Amish home Biosphere -- having zero working experience with any modern machinery -- to explore and hopefully save the Ark. Each episode finding them entering a different compartment of the ship in a desperate search for the knowledge of how to re-start the Ark's main reactors & get it back on some sort of controlled course.

Photo illustration of the large model rig of Earthship Ark viewed from above in a space environment. To give an idea of its proposed scale each domed biosphere is 50 miles wide.

If only it had been that easy. Creator Harlan Ellison disowned the series before taping even started after becoming disgusted by endless production difficulties, severe budget cutbacks, lack of quality control over scripts by contracted writers. And a modestly sized Canadian television studio equipped to produce daytime soap operas unable to cope with a project of such proportions staffed by executives indifferent to his needs as the series' creator. Plus outright chicanery on the part of the producers to then sell the show as a syndication cheapie after falsely promoting it to him (and others) as a high-tech, revolutionary, shot-on-film approach to television tailor made for his unique talents. 

Oscar winning effects designer Douglas Trumbull invented a video matting system just for the show which allowed actors to be inserted into miniature sets and the studio technicians couldn't get it to work right. As a "Thank You, Mr. Sucker" they then stuck him with an Executive Producer credit to help sell interest in the syndicated results via his professional reputation. Science fiction legend Ben Bova was also suckered into being pegged as the series' "Scientific Advisor" then found himself unable to remove his name from the show's credits when his advice was not followed. The series was publicly declared a disaster by those who had birthed it and not one complete episode had yet been taped.

Seven minute promotional film created to sell the show as a syndication pickup, using effects footage from "Silent Running" to further the con. Either the shit hadn't hit the fan before they filmed it or Kier Dullea has one hell of a poker face, and poor Douglas Trumbull.

When they were the disappointment was unanimous. Special effects were created using the same technology local television weather reporters employ to stand in front of a map, with the production design limited to re-usable vacuformed set components, neo-moderne office equipment, bad 70s space art, funky lounge furniture, and lots of green foam padding from supermarket apple crates to make futuristic chair cushions. Ellison's entire premise for the series -- a weekly quest to find the bridge -- is solved approximately forty minutes into its first episode with no explanation; The characters apparently just leave the bridge to wander around the Ark knocking on bulkhead doors. Subsequent episodes refer to a search for a "backup bridge" likely to contend with legal action by Ellison for fraud in addition to the mess of having his name removed by Writer's Guild arbitration. The story of which he entertainingly shared in the introduction to the novelized version of his pilot episode script, "Phoenix Without Ashes". It remains his only authorized acknowledgment of involvement in the entire debacle.

Feelings were hurt and reputations tarnished in the aftermath, with the final results being both critically dismissed and a ratings non-entity. The show didn't just bomb, it was a bummer: Clunky looking chintzy low budget junk with boring stories and some of the most disturbing music ever created for a family television project. Children likely watched in wordless, baffled, open-mouthed confusion as my brothers and I did before their parents got tired of putting up with the nonsense and changed the channel. Older SF fans found other things to do.

Robin Ward, Gay Rowan and Keir Dullea. They'd all do better.

The show has the look of community access cable programming shot on video by bright college kids studying TV/radio/film but without the charm of classic 1970s era "Doctor Who" steampunk. Or its writing. The Survival Ark idea had been pursued before on a smaller scale with favorable effect in a "Star Trek: The Original Series" 3rd season episode poetically titled "For The World Is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky". And on the large screen in a phenomenal Czech made film from 1963 known as "Ikarie XB-1", with other examples staples of the pulp science fiction traditions that series creator Ellison had been raised on. But this would be an ongoing weekly adventure requiring original scripts by Canadian story editors more familiar with courtroom dramas, cop shows or hospital room soap operas, and the results show it. Most importantly the series' ultimate form rarely fit the breadth of the ideas being suggested, leaving an awkward watching experience which will likely alienate contemporary viewers expecting the dynamic visuals + high tech heroism associated with competently made science fiction programming.

Which is exactly why I love it; This was one of the most uncommercial television spectacles ever created, unable to even sell the toilet paper and bar soap which would have been advertised during its broadcast because almost nobody watched, and it was comparatively quickly pulled from the air before an entire season was in the can; Fan sites document at least three other episodes which were never taped, and my understanding is that the objective was a 22 installment season. (I would enjoy seeing any of the unrealized scripts if anyone has links to share below in comments.) Saddest part about it all is that the producers insisted on following a ploddingly serious tone for the series, and other than a few glimpses of random insight into the farce it really was ended up ponderously empty. A total of sixteen episodes were committed to production before the series was cancelled by 20th Century Fox, and without a resolution of its basic story arc. They're still out there, somewhere.

Print ad from "The Starlost's" brief run as a local syndication pickup on NBC. 

My admiration for the series is nostalgic rather than an empirical evaluation of its form: The show ended up on our local NBC affiliate on Sunday afternoons when my brothers and I were kids, would watch anything we were allowed to and it creeped the living hell out of us. I liked how the spaceship was broken and the idea that every week they went into a new chamber looking for help fixing it, and loved the Douglas Trumbull produced model shots linking the static studio bound storylines. 

Other than the boxy looking main body of the Ark the only thing I specifically recalled for years was an image of the heroes finding a skeletonized body in a space suit, which at age seven was about the coolest thing I'd seen this side of "Caltiki: The Immortal Monster". And the Talking Head computer terminal "Sphere Projector", with its oversized minister-like human face (Canadian character actor William Osler in what might be the show's best casting decision) offering guidance and issuing instructions with sonorous authority ... He's kind of like a grown up older "Siri" only you don't have to wait for iPhone to unfreeze between simple tasks.

"Can I help you?"

We watched every week for as long as we were allowed, referring to the show as "Earthship Ark" as the spacecraft is identified in the opening monolog. Nobody in homeroom on Monday knew what I was talking about when bringing it up regardless of what it was called, they were watching cool stuff on cable or out having fun. I came upon it again quite by accident when released on DVD last decade, utilizing it as Hangover Viewing Material chosen to soothe the brain after weekly booze benders as so little happens. Much of it quietly. Got to know every episode inside & out over the ensuing years, enjoying the show even after hopping on the proverbial wagon a few back. There are also "Movie Versions" of combined episodes floating around with slightly re-worked audio but not much more to merit investigation. Stick with the individual episodes as presented by VCI if so inclined to take a leap by giving the show a try. An online rental of the first couple episodes might be the best way to get started. You'll either be hooked by the awesome badness of it all, or only out a couple dollars and able to make fun of it whenever you want too.

Make no mistake: "The Starlost" will rightfully always end up on lists as one of the dumbest or worst science fiction television shows ever created, because it really is (up there with "Supertrain", which I also adore <3). Yet has a sort of eerie, aloof nature about it which I admire, punctuated by overtly haunting electronic music, goofy production design, doses of both 1970s paranoia & psychedelia, a touch of pop culture doom + gloom, and some decent looking women in snug foil space suits. 

I'll take it.

Now THAT is cool.

1) VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY: Dumbed-down and awkward small screen adaptation of Harlan Ellison's "Phoenix Without Ashes" is the only episode story to which he contributed directly and appropriately sets the premise for the rest of the series. Could have been a low-budget classic but exists only as a pedestrian introduction to the show's premise. Has a very telling sequence where an enraged mob of Amish townsfolk run around with torches & waving their arms excitedly like something from a Frankenstein movie. A functional demonstration of the lack of finesse in how the series was visualized which would only get worse once our heroes finally find their way into the Ark's service sections. Ellison was documented to have watched the episode in a state of enraged disbelief and never tuned back in for any more.

Good points do exist; Garth spends most of the episode completely pissed off, Devon is out of breath a lot, Sterling Hayden reprises his Jack D. Ripper character from "Dr. Strangelove" as a grim faced puritan zealot, and there's a funky scene where the heroes find a cheap plastic classroom skeleton in a space suit before zoning out on the stars passing by the wrecked bridge, never having seen stars before. That much I could believe. Also clocks some sort of record on how many different ways one can use the green foam padding from apple crates to make futuristic looking cushions, though the series was just getting started. They'd find more ways to use it. Lots more.

ADDENDUM 6/2018: This bit about Devon being out of breath so often is very odd, mostly because none of the other characters are likewise out of breath at these times. It seems to have been a unilateral decision related to method acting on Kier Dullea's part to leave the set before such scenes and physically exert himself in some manner so he would literally be out of breath once the cameras were switched on. He would then pant and gasp his way through the dialog, often visibly perspired, and I have this vision of him running laps around the studio like David Byrne ("Life During Wartime") before staggering on-set and shouting "QUICK! Start taping before I catch my breath!!"

A hatted Devon and scarved Rachel, with Garth looking on all pissed off about something. I like the consistency of Garth's character -- Perpetually hostile, impatient, bored, growling admonishments and wanting to get the hell on with it already. Anyone who interferes will get their asses kicked, or at least scowled at.

Not bad, but wasn't the weekly ongoing search to find the bridge supposed to be the premise of the show?

2) LAZARUS FROM THE MIST: Part relaxingly goofy fun about our three heroes meeting the cellar-dwelling halfwit mutants evolved from the Ark's service technicians in the lower decks, crossed with an overly serious subplot about a terminally ill Ark engineer thawed out from suspended animation after 400 years only to discover that his wife wasn't frozen too. Bummer, especially since he has just two hours to live & the unqualified knucklehead who thawed him out didn't take that possibility into consideration first, D'oh. But still sort of worth it to watch the antics of the Cellar Dwellers, who either kept re-wearing their ancestor's tattered service uniforms for 400 years or were a lot older than they looked ... 0.O

Without the medical drama plot device this could have been a good angle on how to address the series as the farce that it was but alas, all subsequent Cellar Dweller characters were disappointingly square. And we'd be back to the operating room soon for more broadcast-time consuming hand-wringing over pointless medical subplots. The musical question of why they didn't then try thawing anybody else out after learning to be more careful also remains unasked, as they apparently just leave. Nice happy ending though, with plenty of opportunity for Garth to get all pissed off about stuff & Devon to wind up out of breath while Rachel stands around being politely fragrant + helpful. Which is another way of saying the episode sucks, but still kind of rules for just being what it is. Dumb, cheap, tacky looking science fiction television from the 1970s. I live for garbage like this and there's apparently money to be made off such sentiment or VCI wouldn't keep pressing the DVDs.

Some decent SF as the Cellar Dwellers get their first look at a genuine apple.

Oh dear ... Then this. Am reminded of Peter Gabriel being re-born as The Slipperman from "The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway " tour.

3) THE GODDESS CALABRA: Somewhat awkward visit to an all-male society where women are worshipped in their absence as goddess figures and Rachel's politely fragrant arrival promises to be their spiritual second coming. The guys are quickly sentenced to death just for being there. Devon eventually has to fight a futuristic low-budget jousting match to free them all and spends a significant portion of the episode out of breath, while Garth stands around getting all pissed off about stuff with little to actually do. Rachel looks great in her wedding dress but the scene where she stands up to Devon on the subject of making her own decisions (they are not yet married, and indeed she has been promised to Garth) doesn't end with the scrotum-twisting he actually deserved for being jerky all of a sudden. The all-male society is also strange. Lots of tight spandex male unitards, muscular guards in chest revealing metallic v-neck shirts with foil hard hats, dancing acrobats performing for the evil despot's amusement as he lounges around with a wine flagon eating grapes, and not one openly gay guy amongst the lot? 

Baloney, with the episode's saving graces being "Star Trek" Klingon actor John Colicos as the maniacal despot who claims Rachel as his own, and "Space: 1999" human actor Barry Morse as the open minded temple priest who had the good sense to forgo the tights. Though sadly the writer failed to provide Colicos with even once chance to say the word "Vegetable." One of my less-preferred episodes from the series, but at least they tried something different and I like the hats.

The elite Inner Retinue Security Force, curiously resembling bouncers at the nightclub which now occupies our former loft in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. They're actually quite nice! Awesome DJ.

The great John Colicos, who can own the universe just by saying the word

"vegetable", with poor Barry Morse. They would do better as well.

4) THE PISCES: Potentially interesting premise ruined by both budget concerns and lapses of logic. The crew of the Ark scout ship Pisces returns after being swept up in some temporal anomaly which kept it adrift for most the 400 years since the Ark went off course, only to them it was 10 years due to traveling so near to the speed of light and everyone they knew or loved is long dead. Not a bad start, though credibility is quickly challenged as the crew consists of a strapping guy in his late 30s with two women in their 20s, adrift for ten years in a cozy little space probe, and nobody ended up sleeping together? 

Baloney, but slightly worth it for the presence of character actor legend Lloyd Bochner from "Point Blank" and "The Six Million Dollar Man" chewing the cheap pre-fab scenery before his acting is sunk by the bizarre "space senility" plot device -- created by a writer who had apparently been inhaling nitrous oxide right from the whipped cream can -- utilized as a method to impose broadcast-time wasting conflict among the characters via an incurable futuristic medical crisis. And why did they have to go flying off into space on their own just to alleviate the bogus condition? Couldn't the Pisces have sort of paralleled the Ark's course, kept in touch, maybe briefly docking from time to time to help solve the greater crisis threatening all of humanity? Of happier note is that Garth apparently scores with one of the ladies, or at least appears somewhat less pissed off than usual following their private tour of the space probe after drinking champagne together. Attaboy.

Lloyd Bochner, drinking on camera and it looks like for real. This should have been interesting.

Devon, finally wondering how the Captain didn't end up sleeping with either of these two during the ten years (ship time) they were all crated up together. Then again, maybe that explains all the drinking?

5) THE CHILDREN OF METHUSELAH: Our heroes' computer made space sandwich lunchtime is interrupted by an out of breath Devon announcing the discovery of a backup bridge control system manned only by children. Whom it turns out were given an anti-aging serum before the Ark had even launched, gifting the kids with psychic offensive weaponry to maintain order as a side effect. And with no one else to tell them what to do are still busily working away at simulated course corrections, convinced they are running the whole eight thousand mile long Ark. A serum to restore the natural aging process awaits in cold storage, to be administered once the ship makes landfall.

They are five hundred year old beings in the bodies of children, which should have been interesting except that other than reciting scripted technobabble in serious tones they still behave, look, and sound like kids, running around in bizarre Romper Room jumpsuits with big blue numbers clumsily sewn on the front and matching red Moon Boots. Boasts one of the series' few genuinely human moments when Garth runs back for his sandwich, but Devon's half-huffed out single breathy guffaw/laugh/creepy giggle of derision starts to become annoying fast, especially when the three are put on trial for treason by the whole Peanut Gallery. Has a cringe-inducing Freudian passage of dialog when the older of the girls describes "Inserting a cerebral probe directly into the pleasure center to stimulate the receptors." Oh really? and boy did I want to punch #1 in the nose for being such a jerk to her, the homicidal, crypto-fascist, pompous little brat. Still kind of fun, especially when Gath gets all pissed off and the kids put the whammy on just to shut him up. Twice.

Garth, pwned.

Apple crate foam padding: Check. 

Awkward suggestive dialog: Check.

Episode: Rules.

6) AND ONLY MAN IS SO VILE: Confusing, downbeat, muddled and plot-heavy episode about the heroes stumbling upon a slightly mad scientist's experiments into human behavior in a seemingly deserted leisure Biosphere, only to find themselves being tested by having their lifelong loyalties pitted against each other via manipulative suggestion. Almost works on the level of a 1970s paranoia play, with wooden acting, stilted dialog, lethargic pacing, boringly square Cellar Dwellers, unimaginative + claustrophobic small screen cinematography, and bland production elements undermining the viewer's ability to give a damn for very long. It is like watching some mean spirited soap opera set entirely in an airport waiting lounge without a bar.

Has a decent enough sequence where the always pissed-off Garth manages to cut himself on purpose with one of those rounded arrow tips we used for archery in gym class, and Simon Oakland gets to chew the vacuformed pre-fab scenery while just sitting behind a video terminal as the first of the show's several mad scientist characters: He's good. The chick is also kind of cute, and they had the good sense to costume her in a high cut space suit miniskirt for which the designers have my thanks. But this episode sucks and may likely be when most people who had been watching decided to see what was on "Wide World of Sports", "Lawrence Welk", fucking "Hee-Haw", or Christ maybe even PBS.  Anything.

Garth, finally finding someone on the Ark who doesn't completely piss him off. Note the green foam apple box padding. And his crossbow, which looks about powerful enough to staple customer receipts right to a pizza box.

And Garth, managing to cut himself on the rounded tip of a kid's target arrow point. Something my entire 6th grade gym class was unable to accomplish, and oh how we tried.

7) CIRCUIT OF DEATH: One of the better installments of the series both in terms of plotting and execution finds the heroes stumbling upon another slightly mad scientist's gambit to activate the eight thousand mile long Ark's chintzy looking self destruct mechanism to put the surviving elements of humanity out of their collective suffering, all on his own as a favor. Then blast off into space with his daughter in an escape pod to idillic solitary existence i.e. "The Tempest". He manages to bungle it up! and the race is on to figure out whether its the blue wire or the red wire they should cut while a digital readout clocks down the seconds until detonation. The father daughter team is also black, and for whatever reason the racial dynamic is completely ignored in favor of making the gal an epileptic prone to seizures for a lesson on tolerance for others who are different. Gee. 

Still, if they'd managed more installments like this the show might have amounted to something. Has a marvelous scene where Garth gets all pissed off at William Osler's infinitely patient computer interface Talking Head, who finally tells Garth to cram it. The mad scientist is also cool, depicted by actor Percy Rodrigues as quick-witted, confident + professional in demeanor even as he makes one blunder after another, finally atoning for his ineptitude by heroically taking one for the team to save the day. What's also super neat about the episode in a cyberpunk kind of way is the idea of shrinking down the heroes to microscopic size so they can enter the damaged self destruct circuit themselves to effect repairs, a feat accomplished by donning foil windbreakers & relaxing in a futuristic looking naugahyde lounge chair. Which, you know, is basically the approach we employed for all manner of such activities when we were seven. "Far out."

"Hey wait a minute! This wire isn't blue, or red ...?"

"CRAM IT."

8) GALLERY OF FEAR: Another successful episode in terms of plotting & delivery finds the heroes being drawn into a locked compartment of the Ark doubling as an art gallery curated by a sentient computer with a narcissistic personality disorder, intent on tricking them into altering its programming so it can take over the entire Ark. To do what? is sadly never really addressed, but in its madness the computer conjures the Male Gaze baiting presence of pin-up actress Angel Tompkins with glistening pink lipstick and bedecked in a snug foil space leotard which is exceptionally delightful to behold as she walks back and forth across the sets. She is absolutely magnificent! The visualization of certain story elements less so, but you can tell they were genuinely inspired here and managed to come up with a minor-grade classic of low budget SF kitsch.

Has a great sequence where the long dead commander of the Ark is summoned as a hologram and regretfully announces that he cannot help them out of their jam because he's not a man, just a collection of data representing whom he was when uploaded. An interesting notion in the Instagram age of online identities crafted from manipulated binary data, instantly accessible from anywhere on the planet as a representative proxy of who we are supposed to be. Sure, some of the low-budget television scale antics work against the overall success of the story's bid for cold hard SF cyber dystopia. But if the series had managed a few more episodes of such merit 20th Century Fox may have considered renewing "The Starlost" long enough to let them fix the damn Ark and go about their way. But no, and for me this chapter serves as the high water mark of the show. Worth a look even if the rest of the series seems too strange for casual viewers inhaling pure air.

Angel Tompkins can greet visitors to my space art gallery anytime. Will compensate handsomely. 

And Devon served, by Angel Tompkins. I'll take two, and could post pictures of her to the internet all day.

9) MR. SMITH OF MANCHESTER: More misguided 1970s paranoia as our heroes find themselves accused of being spies by the crazed, violence-obsessed governor of an industrial Biosphere society focused on the production of war goods. You'd think 800 years into the future we'd be using something other than submachine guns or tanks to confront aggression while still preventing explosive decompression from a hull breach via ballistic projectile (duhh??). The episode also has a nasty tone to it which never lightens up after an electronic waterboarding session which understandably leaves Devon very out of breath. Except of course for the scene where a bit character wheels his body cart by chanting "Bring out your dead" ... ???

Too bad Monty Python sent that idea up a year later, providing the series' biggest unintentional retconned laugh. But three cheers for guest star Ed Ames' foxy receptionist space babe, again clad in a thigh-revealing futuristic miniskirt uniform & providing the episode's three or four moments of genuine interest just by walking across the set to stand there holding a clipboard. Too bad they couldn't come up with more for her to do as her very easy to look at character comes off as pandering to sexist priorities in 1970s consumer-oriented pop culture forms. And we trust she (as well as all the actresses + female crew or studio technicians who took part in the production) was/were treated professionally and with polite regard by all those associated with the show. If not, I'll kick your asses. Bro.

Heck I'd hire her too. To do anything she feels is worthy of her time. Would include a reserved parking spot and lunch budget.

The Manchester Biosphere. Looks like a great place to set up subsidized studios for Central New York artists. You just have to wear a hazmat suit when outside. Like in Solvay.

10) THE ALIEN ORO: Misfit "Star Trek" actor Walter "Chekov" Koenig guest stars as a gold lame glitter suited, Go-Go booted, pug-faced alien menace whose dinky little salvage ship manages to crash into the eight thousand mile long space Ark during a scouting mission. You'd think he'd have seen it in time, but at least he had Euro Horror hottie Alexandra Bastedo on board to stand around during the episode looking superb in her form-fitting foil space suit. Or her somewhat formal space gown costume with the dress slit up to the hip. Or her more sensible saffron work dress costume with the plunging neckline. 

Good God she's hot, even managing to charm the perpetually pissed-off Garth before actually speaking a word to him. Though the writers made an unforgivable mistake by copping her with a sudden obscure medical condition for broadcast-time consuming plot drama before the two can manage to get themselves laid. Koenig utilizes a sort of lite version of his "Checkov" accent to sound alien, or at least foreign, though a video transmission from his home planet indicates that everyone back at home speaks Canadian accented English just fine. Pro's cheap-looking garage crafted death trap of a flying saucer also bears a curious resemblance to the one that the "Blair" character assembles in the 1982 version of "The Thing", which at least looked like it might fly. Could have been enjoyable in a droll, postmodernist kind of way, but the droll soap opera dynamic chosen flattens whatever intrigue may have been generated by meeting this scruffy, obnoxious little alien in his creepy Gary Glitter outfit. And poor Garth … I'd be all pissed off after missing out on that too.

"... Yeah, really. You'd think he'd have seen the Ark in time ..."

Gay Rowan (Rachel) and Alexandra Bastedo (Idonna, or whatever) demonstrating how to keep the interest of boys with your dopey science fiction bottom feeder -- Girls, dressed up in space clothes. We'll watch.

11) THE ASTRO-MEDICS: The bottom scraping low point of the series with more broadcast-time consuming hospital room soap opera medical drama as Devon manages to crack his noggin in a hydraulic door or something to that extent, and the perpetually pissed-off Garth has to to call in the Ark's crack medical rescue services for help or he'll kick their asses. Lots of hand-wringing and standing around talking about dire, futuristic sounding medical crisis in comforting stage voices while eerie unsettling music whistles, with very little for our three heroes to do. Yet plenty of time for an obnoxious sub-plot about the rift between a son and father doctor pair exacerbated by the arrival of snuffling, groveling aliens never seen in person whom the son chooses to save over Devon. Who, true to form, manages to wake up completely perspired + out of breath.

Or what EVER already, with bizarre futuristic doctors costumes, strange color schemes, kind of a leggy head nurse whom I would enjoy a therapy session with, and the presence of character actor Michael Zenon from the 1977 Canadian survival thriller "Rituals" in a bit role adding moderate interest for nerds like myself who are addicted to this kind of crap. We watch it, suffer, and say nothing, grateful to have anything else to watch other than sports.

The Astro-Medics, coming to the rescue in their flying thermos lunch box tilted on its side. Bad chintzy science fiction space ships usually have an endearing charm all of their own. This one does not.

Apologies for the patently sexist bent to some of my commentary on this show but it has so little else going for it -- Hard working medical professionals from the future, discussing anything but how to fix the damn Ark. 

12) THE IMPLANT PEOPLE: Unpleasant and boring episode about another crazed Biosphere meglomaniac who has enslaved the inhabitants of his society by conning them into having brain frequency implants installed onto their skulls. He carries a swagger stick along with a handy little box featuring a settings dial, and upon flipping a switch the supporting cast writhe about on the floor in agony as he laughs. What fun! and probably when my dad said enough & changed the station for good. Our heroes get involved after a young urchin steals Garth's crossbow, making him even more pissed off than usual, then find themselves caught up in a 1984-inspired story about an underground political revolt to unseat the maniac from power. None of which has anything to do with saving the Ark, a subject only mentioned in passing as a ruse to get Devon to allow an implant to be inserted into his cranium.

Less is usually more and this installment manages only to be slightly disturbing with a low entertainment factor while having far too much plot going on. The action is all set in static rooms or the underground tunnels making the proceedings claustrophobic and unimaginative looking. The psycho is OK and I actually kind of like the kid, but what's up with all the ridiculous looking arte-modern framed pictures on the walls? Looks like they'd just raided a dentists office.

In the future people will sit around in tacky looking 1970s lounge furniture with bad space art everywhere like they are waiting to have a root canal procedure. 

Fun fun fun! No wonder dad changed the station.

13) THE RETURN OF ORO: The show's producers pulled out all the stops for this one, an extravaganza / opus of science fiction soap opera and low impact character comedy which even has a big goofy looking robot with the voice of a foxy schoolteacher, and doesn't apologize for any of it. Walter "Chekov" Koenig dons the gold lame suit & Go-Go boots again as the meddling Oro, whose return without the delicious Alexandra Bastedo pisses Garth right off. Poor guy just can't get a break on this series after the Pisces left.

Canadian independent movie icon Henry Beckman ("Death Hunt", "Devil Times Five", numerous "Barney Miller" appearances) guest stars as a personable scavenger roaming the Ark looking for useful stuff to steal, and the producers finally demonstrated they had a sense of humor with some interesting gags involving censored speech, stun guns, and Walter Koenig's image as a science fiction celebrity. At one point he is armed with what appears to be a doctored up paper towel dispenser held upside down and the poor slob still plays it straight, which makes it even funnier. This was the best that they could do. A farce from start to finish with those responsible seemingly admitting what a mess this show really was and therefore one of the more enjoyable episodes of the lot. Even if it's all about as clever as a pile of burnt-out car batteries.

BIG GOOFY LOOKING ROBOT: CHECK.

AWKWARD SUGGESTIVE DIALOG: CHECK.

PAPER TOWEL DISPENSER RAY GUN BRANDISHED BY PAVEL ANDREVICH CHEKOV: CHECK PLUS.

THIS EPISODE: RULES.

14) FARTHING'S COMET: Dirt poor budgetary limits and related clumsy visual effects sink the show's big "space ships being fixed by space men in space" hard SF episode. Another egoistical scientist with an undiagnosed personality disorder puts the Ark in harm's way in a personal bid for glory at the close study of a comet (which he also modestly names after himself) with no consideration of the possible consequences. Or more accurately, he couldn't care less. The eight thousand mile long Ark is severely damaged by debris from the comet's million mile long tail -- D'oh -- and our three heroes have to don foil suits with upside-down fishbowl helmets to go outside and repair it under his reluctant (and therefore suicidal) assistant's guidance. Seems like everyone on this damn Ark is nuts. With the worst of the series' ultra klutzy electronic weather map visual effects turning Devon's bid to figure out if its the blue wire or the red wire into a stultifying mess of low-tech bluescreened Weather Channel craparoni. Where is Hal 9000 to just eject this shit from the pod bay door and end it all.

The flaw is not just a Suspension of Disbelief issue, watching the episode unfold is like coaxing your favorite turtle to win a turtle race. You know the damn thing isn't listening but you urge it on anyway, and when its over everybody sort of wins even if they wander off the track. Which is another way of saying that this series was doomed before they actors even set foot onstage, but those who stayed carried on anyway and you can't help but be slightly in awe of even the worst of the results. Still more fun than "The Astro-Medics", and here's to the show sporting a female character in a position of importance who sets aside personal feelings to be responsible and save the lives of the millions of humans onboard who know nothing of what is happening outside of their own biospheres. They don't even objectify her with a go-go minidress or anything, and given the bevy of other space babes trotted out for our Male Gaze prurience that alone makes the episode somewhat remarkable.

Pompous blowhard popinjay. Somebody needs to kick this guy's ass for being an idiot who endangered everybody's lives like a moron. And nice dopey looking Home Depot budget prop design; You control an 8,000 mile long space ark with an industrial sized popcorn machine? 

"... HAL? HEY, THE POD BAY DOORS AGAIN, OK? ... PLEASE, HAL???"

15) BEEHIVE: One of the most absurd chapters of the entire venture is also one of the more memorable -- Our heroes wind up trapped in another deranged scientist's surprisingly successful experiment to breed honey bees the size of Volkswagon vans & finds them communicating with him. They telepathically possess the scientist and he starts to aid their scheme to turn the entire Ark into a giant honeycomb, while Garth gets all pissed off about being unable to kick anyone's ass over it. None of which has anything to do with saving the Ark from destruction, which by this point in the series had sort of been put on the back burner while the television studio story editors chummed submitted scripts for familiar territory. In this case, Mad Scientist melodrama. With lots of Beaker Scenes showing rows of jars half filled with different colored fluids bubbling away while technobabble jargon is recited.

Yet somehow it all works: Bizarre costuming, weirdo color schemes, odd dialog, disturbing 70s macro-lens bee footage and stranger than usual music transform the events into a sort of cartoon vision with viewers aligning themselves with either the bees or the people. I pick the bees, they didn't ask for what was happening to them. Hearing Kier Dullea recite the line "It sounds like handfulls of gravel pelting against the door" is a remarkably surreal moment for reasons I cannot put into words. Estranged series creator Harlan Ellison referred to this as the requisite "Giant Ant Episode" when speaking disparagingly of the series after parting ways with the producers. Only thing is people remember crap like giant ants or talking bees and it remains a fan favorite in spite of his very learned dismissal of the results. Giant bees just sell.

Giant intelligent talking space bee. You move out of the way.

"... You're going to need a bigger syringe."

16) SPACE PRECINCT: Perhaps the strangest episode of the lot reportedly hints at what the producers had in mind as a reboot of the show for Season Two as a Cop Show in space had the series been renewed by 20th Century Fox. They didn't bite, and this was how the series ended -- An amusingly bored looking Garth finally gets pissed off enough to finally tell Devon to go stuff it, splits to go back home but finds himself first detained by then recruited to work for the Ark's Space Police, who are costumed even more strangely than the Astro Medics. Seems there's a space war on and the local POPOs recruit command staff by selecting random people wandering about the Ark without authorization. A meaningless subplot about the other two heroes trapped in an elevator (??) distracts from scenes where the sneering, evil, totally hot little Ark police space babe technician parades around onscreen in a miniskirt uniform, which would have made for fine television by itself: Give that gal a series of her own. 

Thrown in is an even more meaningless broadcast-time consuming subplot about an alien invasion related to the space war, none of which has anything to do with the show's prior objectives but pads out the thin soup cop show drama to full episode length. Complete with an obnoxiously bogus "launch window" plot device which lasts about fifteen seconds after being discussed endlessly for the duration of the proceedings. At least nobody had to discuss saving the Ark which is the least of the concerns of those involved, including Devon and Rachel, understandably more concerned about the prospect of suffocating while trapped in a fucking elevator. Strangest of all is how watchable it still managed to be, hypnotically bad and a messy conclusion as the series was abruptly cancelled once the episode was in the can. They're still out there, you see ...

The series alleged star, Devon (Kier Dullea, whom I assure you would do better) and the fragrant Rachel (Gay Rowan, the same) about to enter the service elevator which the series would leave them in while attending to all the other nonsense pile-driven into the plot.

Garth's last bit of low budget science fiction eye candy before she is revealed as a scheming bloodthirsty femme fatale. Poor slob, I'd have been all pissed off about not getting any regular action out of this series too.

Garth and Rachel, as the series left them, in their elevator. Conceptually they are still there, waiting.

In a bid to reclaim some lasting syndication potential the show was later edited into six two hour "movie" versions by Glenn/Warren Productions, each featuring two of the episodes clumsily combined together without much ado. That didn't work either, though the show did find a cult status of some sort on home video and now DVD. Entertainment company VCI has the sixteen episodes on a DVD box set that's worth a rental from Netflix. You may even find yourself ordering the set from Amazon.com using this link here. Once caught by the series' scant charms you'll watch it again sometime, I wager.

Click here for a Wikipedia page on the show.

Or click here for the definitive Starlost fan page including the fascinating story of the enormous main model rig of the Earthship Ark.

And click here to visit Harlan Ellison's Webderland, his official authorized presence on the net, and word has it he read this over to favorable response. Megacheers, Sir!