Nuclear Nazis

[swordznsorcery]

Episode 1x05: "The Search"

There is a submarine, at a docks at night. A bloke shoots the watchman with a rifle, then gets together with a little gathering of frogmen and gasses the sub's inhabitants. We don't actually see what happens to them, and I don't recall it being mentioned later, but I assume that they're dumped overboard. Having taken possession of the sub, the frogmen are then revealed to be Nazis; and the even more bonkers than usual kind, as they don't believe that the war ever ended. Best cue some Champions, then.

It's a good one, this. It has a good plot, and a believable one for those days too. In the sixties the war was more than recent enough to make Nazis a frequent visitor to adventure shows of all kinds, and of course they would have been even more effective as bad guys back then. This lot is as despicable as you'd expect, with a plot to blow up London with a nuclear missile. I especially like how the Champions themselves, with all of their various super powers, don't find it in any way easy to win the day. For starters they don't have a clue where the submarine is, other than a rough estimate based on how far it could have gone since its disappearance. The only lead they have is that, in order to use the nuclear missiles on board, the Nazis will need to get themselves some sort of expert. So basically the good guys are not exactly on top of the situation. Craig takes a guess that the submarine will head for Heligoland, and trusts his super intuition enough to persuade Tremayne to let him go there. He wants to take Richard, but Tremayne won't let him, and makes him take Sharron instead. I can't quite decide if this is supposed to be insulting to Sharron or not. Richard isn't inactive for long, though, for a charmingly old-fashioned-looking physicist promptly disappears, and he's despatched to try to pick up the trail.


Yep, definitely a submarine. It's on a piece of stock footage, though, so it should be fairly safe from Nazi invasion.


Unless this is a magic rifle.


"Are you my mummy?"


The only thing worse than a Nazi is a smug Nazi.


Tremayne briefs Craig and Richard (and presumably Sharron) about their latest mission.


A quite wonderfully period scientist. If it wasn't for the fact that he's an actor, I'd swear that he featured in half of those spectacularly dated videos that we were always having to watch at school.

He smokes a pipe, you just know he does.


Happily, Brilliantly Dated Physicist is appearing on TV, so we also get a Brilliantly Dated Camera. Isn't it lovely?


Here's another one, this time back in Tremayne's office.


He and Craig are watching some home movies, presumably in case either of them is unaware of exactly what a submarine is.


A sketch of our man with the magic rifle back at the beginning. Craig is anxious to go to Heligoland to look for him, even though he can't quite explain why.


He does get very animated, however, which strikes me as a not a very good way to keep his job. Fortunately Tremayne doesn't seem to be the vindictive sort, and okays the mission. Though he doesn't allow Craig to go skipping off with Richard, because he's mean.

In Heligoland there's nothing to go on, and Craig is just about to go potty from the inactivity when the magic rifle man turns up. It's dark, though, and so they decide that following him will be too obvious. If only they had a radio mic! Happily Sharron, who thinks of everything, has brought one with her, cleverly secreted in a box of matches. Craig palms them off on the suspect, and off they go! Following him, even though they already decided that it was too obvious to go doing that at night, when there's nobody else around. Okay. After a while their man drops the box of matches and, thinking that the trail might have gone cold, Craig sends Sharron back to their hotel. Because things always go so well when you go off alone, Craig. This time is no exception, and he's promptly shot, making Richard run off in a panic to join Sharron.


Oh good Lord. He's not actually wearing that, is he? I'm just imagining it, right?


Don't hug him! He's wearing the worst clothing ever!

Actually, this is quite nice. There is absolutely no sexual chemistry here, and a lot of shows would have tried to shoehorn some in. Even Department S, the other similarly vintaged show that tried to have the female member of the team as an equal, wound up partnering her off with the star. Neither Craig nor Richard ever treat Sharron as anything other than a friend, though. You don't get that often nowadays even. I like it, and I'd like to see it more.


Sharron and Craig think that they have spotted their man. Happily, Craig has now changed out of the yellow polo-neck and bizarre furry thing combo, but unfortunately... well, you can see for yourselves.


Craig, no man wearing that jacket has any right to smirk.


Off they sneak into the night, to do a bit of blatantly obvious tailing, even though the radio mic was supposed to remove the need for that. But never mind. It's all nicely dramatic, so I'm not really going to complain.


Needless to say, though, Craig manages to get into trouble, and winds up being shot. He actually gets shot in Richard's eye, which I would have thought is fairly unique.


Richard (and his rather nice waistcoat) are immediately alert. Richard calls Tremayne to find out if there is any news on Craig and Sharron.


Tremayne apparently lives at his office. I don't know why, but this pleases me immensely. As does the fact that he appears to have marbles in his coloured pencils jar.


Craig wakes up on board the submarine. Well, he found it. Full points for that, at any rate.


That Nazi captain is still being smug. Seriously, he's in need of a good punching.


Meanwhile, Richard has disobeyed Tremayne, and dashes off to join Sharron. She's worried about Craig, because she doesn't seem to know what's happened to him. Sharron's a little odd in that respect. The boys are forever picking up on each other's various scrapes, and hers too, but she rarely seems to know what's going on with them.


Whilst they try to discuss their top secret business in a crowded bar, the missing physicist turns up with a secretary and a Nazi in tow. Richard hatches a plan.


Elsewhere, Craig has been brought a ham sandwich by a surprisingly nice Nazi, who is concerned that the prisoner "has had nothing since he came on board". Yes, but you're evil. You're not supposed to care about that. Actually, their values do seem to be a little odd. They have this guy on their sub. He's been shot twice in the arm, so they tie him up and lock him away in a storeroom. Then they worry about him needing ham sandwiches? Wouldn't a bandage be a better plan?

Mind you, when you consider that his hands are supposed to be tied behind his back, it could be that giving him sandwiches is actually a strange sort of torture. And both of those mugs appear to be empty anyway. Perhaps the strangely nice Nazi isn't so nice after all? Either way, he's soon bashed over the head by Craig, who has managed to snap his ropes. Craig then takes a sandwich off to explore the sub. Which is quite kind of him, really.


Richard, Sharron and a rather hideous piece of porcelain listen in on the not-missing-anymore physicist and his companions, using their super hearing.

That's Richard and Sharron with the super hearing. I don't know about the jug.


Richard then inadvertently tosses the Nazi out of a window, and informs the physicist that he'll be taking the man's place.

Back on the sub, Craig and his sandwich don't get far, which probably isn't surprising in a submarine packed full of enemies. He's locked up again, which does rather lead me to wonder why. Why are they keeping this random man around? To begin with they wanted to see who he was, back when he was unconscious. He's not unconscious anymore, though. Has it not occurred to anybody to ask him who he is? Or, given that he's taken to breaking out of his prison and prowling around, maybe just getting rid of him altogether? And has nobody noticed that he's been shot twice in the arm, and shouldn't even be mobile?! Still, I can't blame this show for odd moments of illogic, given that every show ever is guilty of that at some point. There's a nice bleak atmosphere of hopelessness being built up, and Craig's recapture helps to add to that.


Richard and Sharron, posing as a helpful Nazi and a secretary, accompany the nicely old-fashioned scientist onto the sub.


Craig is hugely and endearingly delighted when he senses the approach of Richard.


Not that it gets him anywhere, as Richard and Sharron are betrayed by the physicist as soon as they arrive onboard.


Well, it does get him a bandage. I don't know where it came from, though, unless Sharron happened to have brought one with her. I wouldn't be surprised.

The captain, otherwise known as Smug Git, has meanwhile persuaded the physicist to blow up London. Said physicist is Not Happy, as he was told that it was all just a ploy in order to obtain a ransom from the British government. Not so. The Nazis want to actually blow up London, just to make a point. That really does seem to be about as far as their plan goes. Steal sub, steal physicist, blow up London, gloat. It makes them into quite good bad guys, though, as they really don't stand to gain anything from their actions. They're just blowing up London because they feel like it. Nicely Dated Physicist is unwilling, but easily persuaded by a pistol and a powerful glare.


It's a big red button. I like a big red button. Smug Git launches the missile that will obliterate London.


And there it goes.


The gang have meanwhile broken out of their prison, using their combined super strength to make short work of the door. They storm the bridge and seize control, but with the missile already launched, it looks as though the bad guys have won.

I know that the Champions have special blood (revealed in a later episode), but what the hell?! What's in it that it manages to stand out so well against a dark shirt?! And more heroes should wear waistcoats. I might start a campaign.


He's being smug again.


Craig leaves Richard and Sharron to guard the Nazis, then drags the physicist off to the bomb room. He's certain that there must be a way to stop the missile from reaching its destination. The news is not encouraging, however. There simply isn't the time left for the computer to figure out a new course.


A submarine. Lest we forget where we are.


There's only one thing for it. Given the necessary information, Craig must outthink the computer, and figure out all of the mathematical equations in double quick time.


Craig does maths very quickly. Another Champions skill, clearly. I wonder if he already knew that he could do it, or if he was just hoping? I do sometimes wonder how they know about all of these abilities. I suppose they must get together on their days off, and experiment. Anyway, Craig's super maths skills enable him to divert the missile to the North Pole. Thereby balancing things out a bit, presumably, since he already blew up the South Pole a few episodes back.


Back home in Geneva, the gang wonder how they're going to explain this one to Tremayne. Not easily, I'm guessing.

I do wish Sharron wouldn't wear that coat. Can't pink be illegal? Please?