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| Colonel Foster receives a warm send-off as he leaves Skydiver 1. He has been spending the past few weeks learning the ropes. Lew Waterman wishes him a good furlough and Foster says he plans to really let his hair
down. The scene switches to a very hip party already in full swing. Paul walks in and the hostess, Sylvia Graham, is all over him in seconds. Around 4:30 in the morning, the last of the party guests leave except Paul. There's no time for hanky-panky with Sylvia because he has to be somewhere at 7:30 am. He gets the pleasure of a couple hour's kip on her sofa. Meanwhile on Moonbase, the girls get a warning from SID about a UFO sighting... |
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| A much worse-for-wear Foster hauls himself out of the sofa and drives to the Resource Centre. He meets the jovial jelly belly Joe Franklin in the waiting room. The colonel keeps on his sunglasses while he has an interview with Dr. Fraser. "Getting plenty of sleep, Colonel?" the doctor inquires. "Oh yes, most of the time," Paul answers with a cheeky grin. While Franklin and Foster get a massage and have a giggle a nanosecond, Lieutenant Ellis programmes the computer for a missile firing sequence. An Interceptor hits the UFO and damages it but the thing maintains its course towards Southern England. The commander keeps Moonbase on red alert. Paul goes into the sauna and the searing heat goes to his head. He has flashbacks of the raucous party. He tries to get out of the sauna but the door will not open. He falls down and bangs his head. An alien comes in and whisks Paul away into the spacecraft. Everybody is dead at the Resource Centre. |
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| At SHADO HQ, Alec points out the aliens have landed less than fifteen miles away from the Resource Centre. Straker does not think the green-faced men would want to check into a 'Glorified Health Farm' but Alec stresses, "Didn't Paul Foster check
into there this morning?" Straker changes his tune and orders Lt. Ford to get Dr. Fraser on the phone. When there is no answer, Straker sends Alec to investigate. Sure enough, Alec finds bodies all over the keep fit equipment and Foster is missing. |
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Straker informs Skydiver of the situation and wants Waterman to be ready for an
emergency launch. Freeman is very concerned that Straker wants to destroy the UFO with Paul inside it. "You just better hope I'm never in a position to press the button on you," he urges. But Straker is adamant about it. Foster was trained to resist interrogation but no one knows what the aliens will do to get information out of him. Paul is better off dead. |
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Lew Waterman flies off in
Sky One but misses the UFO. Straker is livid but Freeman understands that Waterman "could feel emotion for someone he's been serving with for two months." Lt. Barry notices the UFO might be heading back. SHADO HQ is informed but nothing is definite. Ayesha goes on about "the interplay of G-forces and other assorted techno-babble. The UFO does not have enough power to escape the lunar G-force. Ed tells Alec that Foster's chances of survival have improved to a million-to-one. The UFO is expected to land forty kilometres from Moonbase. Lt. Ellis decides to go to the target area. All SHADO personnel tensely wait for the UFO to make a crash landing. Paul is thrown clear, Ellis rescues him and takes him back to Moonbase. |
| Dr. Jackson informs Freeman and Straker that Foster has been breathing liquid for some time now. It will be risky getting him to breath normally again especially on Moonbase
without specialist equipment. Ed assures Alec that Paul will pull through. Lt. Ellis is roped into helping with the removal of the alien helmet. Dr. Jackson, Straker and Freeman watch the proceedings on the videolink. Ellis removes the helmet very gingerly but once its off Foster starts to violently struggle and spew up green liquid. The scene instanly changes to the sauna. It has all been a bad dream. Foster is sweating and heavily panting. Dr. Fraser advises Paul to "never take a sauna under the weather." |
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out of 10
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Sylvia Graham
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If you think Ordeal is the height of kink then read the original script. It goes off the scale of my Kink-o-meter! Originally, it was Peter Carlin (Peter Gordeno) going through the ordeal. The opening party scene was meant to be
even raunchier complete with limbo dancing (Mmm, I would have loved to have seen Mr. Gordeno do that!), plenty of flirting and a round of fisticuffs. During filming, Alec Freeman was supposed to be
at the party, too (Lord help us! Hide your whiskey bottles!), but his party scene was deleted. Not to worry, the final version of Ordeal is a gem and one of my favourite episodes. The plot-line tactic of it all being a dream was very popular at the time. Probably the last time scriptwriters could get away with it without the public thinking it was one great cop-out was in "Dallas" during the mid-1980s. |
| Nowadays films like "The Matrix" have to be surreal to the bitter end. Life was so much more innocent back in the late sixties...
or was it? In my write-up to The Dalotek Affair, I mentioned man had landed on the moon while the episode was in production. Despite Ordeal's delightfully wild and wacky story, unfortunately something very sinister happened in another part of the world while it was in production. On 9 August, 1969, someone was having the most frightening ordeal of her life: Sharon Tate was butchered by the Manson Clan. How I wish her ordeal could have only been a bad dream, too. |
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| This episode is simply groovy, baby! Lt. Ellis and Colonel Foster appear together in an episode for the first time. This is sure to please
both sexes (whatever their sexual persuasion!). We not only get to gaze at the beauty of the Lieutenants Ellis, Barry and Harrington but we also get to see Ellis from behind and isn't she pert and pretty? My only concern
is that she did not wear gloves while removing Paul's alien helmet. Who knows what that green stuff would have done to her pearly nail polish! Paul has a whole new look in Ordeal. Yes, he wears a wig and eye-liner! Obviously, Paul is very taken with his CO's personal beautification programme. Spare a thought for Mr. Billington as he had to wear the wig in that hot sauna (Oh, wait a minute, it wasn't really a sauna now, was it?) |
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Whether intentional or not, the theme of homo-eroticism occurs in full force. See Exposed for
my thoughts on this. There seems to be quite a lot of emotional attachment towards Colonel Foster. Alec states this as the reason why Lew Waterman could not bear to destroy the UFO. In reality, I do not think any
military organisation would accept that. In times of war, soldiers can feel quite a bond towards each other (watch "The Deerhunter" as an example) but, hey, this is UFO I am talking about: it has its own set of rules and logic. And since this is Foster's little mind trip, isn't it interesting how he thinks everyone at SHADO HQ, Moonbase and on Skydiver would be terribly worried about him? All the world revolves around Foster. What an inflated image he has of himself! Well, he looks so delicious that we can forgive him just this once. And, besides, this is a dream: he does not have any control over it. |
| Not even the "X-Files" ever managed to have an alien abduction occur in a sauna. Chalk up another one for the originality of UFO. I think the episode really starts to go
pear-shaped when Freeman mentions to Straker that Foster has checked into the glorified health farm that day. It just gets more bizarre after that. Ed Bishop excels at playing manic. First Straker is insistent that Foster be blown out of existence. After that one chance in a million of Foster's survival,
he adds to the surrealistic tone of the episode by being extremely confident that Foster will pull through. Ed Bishop is such a wonderful actor that I wish he had more worldwide recognition of his talent.
And then my friend, Dr. Jackson makes an appearance near the end full of Eastern European mystery. The last |
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time the talented doctor appeared was in Exposed winding-up Foster good and proper with his interrogation skills. Is there no end to this man's talents? Jackson
appears to be equally proficient as a doctor of medicine. It is interesting that Jackson appears at all in Foster's dream. Obviously he has made an impression in the young man's mind. I wonder what Jackson has done to have such an influence? Ordeal is a product of its time. For me, it is one of the more positive things to come out of the late sixties. At least it still entertains and titillates at the most. Music plays a big part: there's "Get Back" by the Beatles, the instrumental called "Trampoline" by the Spencer Davies Group and Paul Foster singing "Beautiful Dreamer" (Who was the genius who suggested that?) by Stephen Foster. There are girls and guys in hip clothes, plenty of booze and a big bowl of pickled onions. If you want to see something different and delightful then make sure you see Ordeal! |
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