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Episode 1x12: "The Gilded Cage"
Mr Tremayne is asleep, in a little bedroom at Nemesis headquarters, when an alarm goes off on his bedside table. His office is being broken into, and somebody – actually two somebodies – are copying Richard's file. Although he calls security, Tremayne decides to go tackle the intruders himself, unarmed and in his jim-jams. Unsurprisingly, it doesn't go well. He gets clobbered, and the bad guys escape into the night.
Richard, however, seems to have not a care in the world. Relaxing in a train, he watches as an older man comes in with a newspaper, and sits down to do the cryptic crossword. Presumably because he couldn't be bothered to buy his own, or because he's bored, or possibly just because he's feeling really annoying today, Richard waits until the other man goes off for coffee, and then nicks his paper, completing the crossword in just a few minutes. I appreciate that this is probably supposed to show how smart and quick-thinking his Champions powers make him, but if he'd nicked my crossword (if I actually did crosswords), I'd probably want to belt him over the head with something, not marvel at his amazing powers of deduction. He sniggers to himself at the older man's outrage, and then hides behind his magazine for the rest of the journey like a rather immature schoolboy. Oh dear. I think I sense a comedy episode coming on - or probably, anyway. I can never quite work out what "The Gilded Cage" is supposed to be about. There is peril, there is some drama – and yet there's Richard, swanning around the whole time, playing everything for laughs, and wearing nowt but a pair of pyjamas. If it's supposed to be a serious episode, it has a funny way of showing it; and if it's supposed to be a funny episode, then it's not very funny. What it is, however, is really rather slashy. Maybe that's what it's supposed to be about.
Craig is called into Tremayne's office, and is told that Richard's file has been tampered with. Richard is waiting to be kidnapped, and Craig's job is to find him when he has been. It's another one of those vague 'might-work-might-be-a-bit-of-a-catastrophe' sort of plans, really. Craig phones Richard up, looking strangely delighted by the prospect of going round to his place for a chat and a drink. Richard's no sooner hung up, though, when there's a knock at his door, and a pair of 'carpet removers' turn up. Richard has ordered no such service, and politely turns his back in order to get clobbered. The way that he falls, neatly setting his drink down on the floor in the process, is another of the touches that leads me to suspect that I'm not supposed to be taking the episode particularly seriously. The carpet men then wrap Richard up in his carpet, and haul him off somewhere, just as Craig turns up. Why does Craig not know that Richard is inside the carpet? Maybe the dizziness he's just experienced when Richard was knocked out put him off his game, but I'm sure he should know when they're near each other. They usually do. Anyway, he goes off upstairs to find Richard gone, a note left for him by Richard telling him that he's gone, and a distinct absence of carpet. How did those men take the carpet up, and leave all of the furniture exactly in the same place as before? They must be the world's neatest and most thorough arrangers of kidnappings ever. It must have taken them hours. Craig clearly spends quite a lot of time there, anyway, as he immediately notices that the carpet's gone, and wanders around like a man who knows the place. He's annoyed with himself for not getting there soon enough, and therefore visits Sharron – in order to give the poor woman something to do in this episode – for a quick pep talk on figuring things out. Sharron turns out to be the team's memory expert, on top of medicine, bugs, languages, biological weaponry, and everything else that she's been an expert in so far. I wish I knew where she does these courses. She helps Craig to remember what was written on the side of the van that he saw as he arrived at Richard's apartment, putting him back on the trail. She doesn't offer to help out, though! Apparently she's not all that bothered about where Richard is.
Tremayne sleeps in his room at Nemesis HQ.
Meanwhile, two men break into his office.
They copy Richard's file, then rather conveniently leave it lying on the desk, so that everybody knows it's been tampered with.
Tremayne very sportingly stands around and waited to get bashed over the head.
Whilst, on a train, Richard nicks somebody's crossword, because he's feeling like a ten year old today.
Then hides behind his magazine.
I really can't find it as funny as he does, though.
Mr Tremayne, meanwhile, is not finding anything funny this morning. He's got a headache, somebody is after one of his agents, Sharron is inexplicably missing, and Craig is not very good at avoiding head injury jokes. Clearly it's going to be one of those days.
Richard, sitting around waiting to be kidnapped, is very happy to hear from Craig, however, and invites him round for a drink, and a free ticket to the kidnapping party.
Craig thinks that this sounds like fun. Or possibly like a date. Tremayne has still got a headache, though, and is just grouchy.
A record! I haven't seen one of them in ages. Sadly, poor Richard gets kidnapped before he really gets the chance to listen to it.
See.
His bash over the head is bad news for poor Craig who, yet again, is driving when the bad things happen. Happily this time he doesn't go all diagonal, even though they both get injected with some sleepy juice right after.
Craig seems to be driving the world's biggest Mercedes.
When the kidnappers politely rang the doorbell, Richard took the time to leave a note for Craig. Here, Craig finds it.
And skips off for some memory coaching from the strangely absent (and bikini-clad) Sharron. If one of my best friends had just been kidnapped, I'm not sure that I'd spend the afternoon sunbathing. Maybe she's figured out that it's a comedy episode, and has decided that she won't bother getting involved.
Elsewhere, Richard wakes up in a huge bed. Somebody has put him into a pair of pyjamas, and left him with a girl for company. The pyjamas seem to be for her benefit rather than his, as somebody wants her to think that he's more or less an ordinary guest – or, possibly, wants him to think that she thinks that. It's all intended to get him attached to her, anyway, but quite what her role in it all is, it's hard to say. She's very nice to him, anyway. He enjoys his bed and his fancy room – and the company – so much that he tries to send Nemesis off on a wild goose chase, so that he won't get rescued too quickly. Half of the world's security agents therefore get sent off to Dublin for no good reason, whilst Craig alone is on the right trail. Richard is meanwhile told of the reason for his kidnap. His cipher skills are required to translate some sort of something that has come into the possession of someone. Or something like that. If he doesn't do as he's told, the girl who may or may not be, but probably isn't, innocent will be killed. Richard believes the threat, and sets to work trying to decipher something blue.
Richard wakes up in his fancy prison cell, with a glass of champagne and a woman for company. You know, that's really not bad going for a kidnap novice.
It's movie!Barbara, from the version of Doctor Who And The Daleks that had Peter Cushing in it.
That's not Peter Cushing, though. Although it does look like he might have met him once.
Richard puts a message on a random pigeon, with instructions that whoever finds it should contact the police, and send Nemesis and whoever else is on the trail over to Dublin.
Whilst movie!Barbara changes into a quite horrific dress.
Despite the dress, Richard likes movie!Barbara.
And as the kissing triggers the telepathy link...
... it transpires that Craig quite likes her too. Or possibly just the kissing. And this is where things really do get weird. They share kisses. One of them kisses somebody, and the other feels it. What the hell happens if one of them does more than kissing?! I can only hope that, when that does happen, that's one occasion when Craig isn't driving.
Possibly Richard phones him up first to make sure.
Craig has meanwhile switched his giant Merc for a grey Jag MkII, since there are still a lot of them positioned around London for the invasion. He's off following movie!Barbara.
Who has, for some reason, decided that a good move would be to dress as a giant fruit chew.
Elsewhere, in an attempt to save her life, Richard battles to translate some blue things of uncertain origin.
His jailer attempts to help, and seems to have quite a lot of ideas on the subject, which leads me to wonder why he didn't just translate the bloody things himself.
Back in the fancy prison cell, Richard finishes his translation, then memorises and burns it. His jailer is none too pleased about this, and threatens movie!Barbara all over again. When she turns up once more, he sets his heavies on her, and Richard has no choice but to hand over a copy of the translation. At this point, however, some other heavies turn up, apparently working for movie!Barbara. They'd also quite like the translation, thank you. So did the jailer guy just happen to pick a girl who was already after the mysterious blue things? I have no idea what's happening in this bit of plot. It was probably explained, but I may have been distracted. Anyway, happily Craig has followed everybody to the house, and nips in in the nick of time to save Richard and capture half a dozen crooks of varying crookedness, who may or may not be working together, but I don't really know.
And then they go home.
What the hell...?!
I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition.
Neither did Craig.
Richard finishes his translation. He is happy. The polar bear rather less so.
Outside the building, Craig figures out that Richard is inside it either through Championsy togetherness telepathy, or by listening to music. He does actually tell Tremayne that he's found Richard because he heard one of Richard's favourite pieces of music. There being nobody else in the world who has ever listened to it, presumably. Anyway, Richard snogs the girl again, as a far more interesting way of making contact with Craig than just saying hello.
They really enjoy that kissing connection thing, don't they. So, is Richard kissing both the girl and Craig, or are Richard and Craig both kissing the girl? Or are they all kissing each other? And what happens if two Champions actually do kiss each other? Do they feel everything twice? Or potentially four times, if they also feel each other feeling each other.
It may be best to stop thinking about this now.
The jailer's heavies nab movie!Barbara in an effort to persuade Richard to hand over his translation of the blue things.
Which he then does.
I have no idea at all who this second set of heavies are. They have very big guns, and appear to be working with movie!Barbara. Since most people don't have their own matching set of heavies, I'm assuming that this makes her more of a bad guy than we – and apparently the jailer – have been led to believe.
Happily, however, Craig is on hand. Craig is very impressive with a gun, clearly, because when he turns up in the doorway, four large men all with guns of their own all immediately surrender to him. You'd think that the two big fellers with the really big guns would just laugh at him, but no.
Instead they all stand very still, and wait to be arrested.
Richard and his jammies join Craig for a bit of escaping. And possibly some clothes.
And then it's back to headquarters to explain it all to Tremayne. Apparently the blue things were all about an encrypted formula for a fabulous new type of fuel that would put the petrol companies out of business. It would, however, be too costly to bother making, so Richard was kidnapped, the whole of Nemesis mobilised, and half of the world's security agents sent on a wild goose chase to Dublin, for absolutely no reason at all.
Is funny.
Is not funny.
Oh.
Ah well. Everyone's a critic.
Mr Tremayne is asleep, in a little bedroom at Nemesis headquarters, when an alarm goes off on his bedside table. His office is being broken into, and somebody – actually two somebodies – are copying Richard's file. Although he calls security, Tremayne decides to go tackle the intruders himself, unarmed and in his jim-jams. Unsurprisingly, it doesn't go well. He gets clobbered, and the bad guys escape into the night.
Richard, however, seems to have not a care in the world. Relaxing in a train, he watches as an older man comes in with a newspaper, and sits down to do the cryptic crossword. Presumably because he couldn't be bothered to buy his own, or because he's bored, or possibly just because he's feeling really annoying today, Richard waits until the other man goes off for coffee, and then nicks his paper, completing the crossword in just a few minutes. I appreciate that this is probably supposed to show how smart and quick-thinking his Champions powers make him, but if he'd nicked my crossword (if I actually did crosswords), I'd probably want to belt him over the head with something, not marvel at his amazing powers of deduction. He sniggers to himself at the older man's outrage, and then hides behind his magazine for the rest of the journey like a rather immature schoolboy. Oh dear. I think I sense a comedy episode coming on - or probably, anyway. I can never quite work out what "The Gilded Cage" is supposed to be about. There is peril, there is some drama – and yet there's Richard, swanning around the whole time, playing everything for laughs, and wearing nowt but a pair of pyjamas. If it's supposed to be a serious episode, it has a funny way of showing it; and if it's supposed to be a funny episode, then it's not very funny. What it is, however, is really rather slashy. Maybe that's what it's supposed to be about.
Craig is called into Tremayne's office, and is told that Richard's file has been tampered with. Richard is waiting to be kidnapped, and Craig's job is to find him when he has been. It's another one of those vague 'might-work-might-be-a-bit-of-a-catastrophe' sort of plans, really. Craig phones Richard up, looking strangely delighted by the prospect of going round to his place for a chat and a drink. Richard's no sooner hung up, though, when there's a knock at his door, and a pair of 'carpet removers' turn up. Richard has ordered no such service, and politely turns his back in order to get clobbered. The way that he falls, neatly setting his drink down on the floor in the process, is another of the touches that leads me to suspect that I'm not supposed to be taking the episode particularly seriously. The carpet men then wrap Richard up in his carpet, and haul him off somewhere, just as Craig turns up. Why does Craig not know that Richard is inside the carpet? Maybe the dizziness he's just experienced when Richard was knocked out put him off his game, but I'm sure he should know when they're near each other. They usually do. Anyway, he goes off upstairs to find Richard gone, a note left for him by Richard telling him that he's gone, and a distinct absence of carpet. How did those men take the carpet up, and leave all of the furniture exactly in the same place as before? They must be the world's neatest and most thorough arrangers of kidnappings ever. It must have taken them hours. Craig clearly spends quite a lot of time there, anyway, as he immediately notices that the carpet's gone, and wanders around like a man who knows the place. He's annoyed with himself for not getting there soon enough, and therefore visits Sharron – in order to give the poor woman something to do in this episode – for a quick pep talk on figuring things out. Sharron turns out to be the team's memory expert, on top of medicine, bugs, languages, biological weaponry, and everything else that she's been an expert in so far. I wish I knew where she does these courses. She helps Craig to remember what was written on the side of the van that he saw as he arrived at Richard's apartment, putting him back on the trail. She doesn't offer to help out, though! Apparently she's not all that bothered about where Richard is.
Tremayne sleeps in his room at Nemesis HQ.
Meanwhile, two men break into his office.
They copy Richard's file, then rather conveniently leave it lying on the desk, so that everybody knows it's been tampered with.
Tremayne very sportingly stands around and waited to get bashed over the head.
Whilst, on a train, Richard nicks somebody's crossword, because he's feeling like a ten year old today.
Then hides behind his magazine.
I really can't find it as funny as he does, though.
Mr Tremayne, meanwhile, is not finding anything funny this morning. He's got a headache, somebody is after one of his agents, Sharron is inexplicably missing, and Craig is not very good at avoiding head injury jokes. Clearly it's going to be one of those days.
Richard, sitting around waiting to be kidnapped, is very happy to hear from Craig, however, and invites him round for a drink, and a free ticket to the kidnapping party.
Craig thinks that this sounds like fun. Or possibly like a date. Tremayne has still got a headache, though, and is just grouchy.
A record! I haven't seen one of them in ages. Sadly, poor Richard gets kidnapped before he really gets the chance to listen to it.
See.
His bash over the head is bad news for poor Craig who, yet again, is driving when the bad things happen. Happily this time he doesn't go all diagonal, even though they both get injected with some sleepy juice right after.
Craig seems to be driving the world's biggest Mercedes.
When the kidnappers politely rang the doorbell, Richard took the time to leave a note for Craig. Here, Craig finds it.
And skips off for some memory coaching from the strangely absent (and bikini-clad) Sharron. If one of my best friends had just been kidnapped, I'm not sure that I'd spend the afternoon sunbathing. Maybe she's figured out that it's a comedy episode, and has decided that she won't bother getting involved.
Elsewhere, Richard wakes up in a huge bed. Somebody has put him into a pair of pyjamas, and left him with a girl for company. The pyjamas seem to be for her benefit rather than his, as somebody wants her to think that he's more or less an ordinary guest – or, possibly, wants him to think that she thinks that. It's all intended to get him attached to her, anyway, but quite what her role in it all is, it's hard to say. She's very nice to him, anyway. He enjoys his bed and his fancy room – and the company – so much that he tries to send Nemesis off on a wild goose chase, so that he won't get rescued too quickly. Half of the world's security agents therefore get sent off to Dublin for no good reason, whilst Craig alone is on the right trail. Richard is meanwhile told of the reason for his kidnap. His cipher skills are required to translate some sort of something that has come into the possession of someone. Or something like that. If he doesn't do as he's told, the girl who may or may not be, but probably isn't, innocent will be killed. Richard believes the threat, and sets to work trying to decipher something blue.
Richard wakes up in his fancy prison cell, with a glass of champagne and a woman for company. You know, that's really not bad going for a kidnap novice.
It's movie!Barbara, from the version of Doctor Who And The Daleks that had Peter Cushing in it.
That's not Peter Cushing, though. Although it does look like he might have met him once.
Richard puts a message on a random pigeon, with instructions that whoever finds it should contact the police, and send Nemesis and whoever else is on the trail over to Dublin.
Whilst movie!Barbara changes into a quite horrific dress.
Despite the dress, Richard likes movie!Barbara.
And as the kissing triggers the telepathy link...
... it transpires that Craig quite likes her too. Or possibly just the kissing. And this is where things really do get weird. They share kisses. One of them kisses somebody, and the other feels it. What the hell happens if one of them does more than kissing?! I can only hope that, when that does happen, that's one occasion when Craig isn't driving.
Possibly Richard phones him up first to make sure.
Craig has meanwhile switched his giant Merc for a grey Jag MkII, since there are still a lot of them positioned around London for the invasion. He's off following movie!Barbara.
Who has, for some reason, decided that a good move would be to dress as a giant fruit chew.
Elsewhere, in an attempt to save her life, Richard battles to translate some blue things of uncertain origin.
His jailer attempts to help, and seems to have quite a lot of ideas on the subject, which leads me to wonder why he didn't just translate the bloody things himself.
Back in the fancy prison cell, Richard finishes his translation, then memorises and burns it. His jailer is none too pleased about this, and threatens movie!Barbara all over again. When she turns up once more, he sets his heavies on her, and Richard has no choice but to hand over a copy of the translation. At this point, however, some other heavies turn up, apparently working for movie!Barbara. They'd also quite like the translation, thank you. So did the jailer guy just happen to pick a girl who was already after the mysterious blue things? I have no idea what's happening in this bit of plot. It was probably explained, but I may have been distracted. Anyway, happily Craig has followed everybody to the house, and nips in in the nick of time to save Richard and capture half a dozen crooks of varying crookedness, who may or may not be working together, but I don't really know.
And then they go home.
What the hell...?!
I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition.
Neither did Craig.
Richard finishes his translation. He is happy. The polar bear rather less so.
Outside the building, Craig figures out that Richard is inside it either through Championsy togetherness telepathy, or by listening to music. He does actually tell Tremayne that he's found Richard because he heard one of Richard's favourite pieces of music. There being nobody else in the world who has ever listened to it, presumably. Anyway, Richard snogs the girl again, as a far more interesting way of making contact with Craig than just saying hello.
They really enjoy that kissing connection thing, don't they. So, is Richard kissing both the girl and Craig, or are Richard and Craig both kissing the girl? Or are they all kissing each other? And what happens if two Champions actually do kiss each other? Do they feel everything twice? Or potentially four times, if they also feel each other feeling each other.
It may be best to stop thinking about this now.
The jailer's heavies nab movie!Barbara in an effort to persuade Richard to hand over his translation of the blue things.
Which he then does.
I have no idea at all who this second set of heavies are. They have very big guns, and appear to be working with movie!Barbara. Since most people don't have their own matching set of heavies, I'm assuming that this makes her more of a bad guy than we – and apparently the jailer – have been led to believe.
Happily, however, Craig is on hand. Craig is very impressive with a gun, clearly, because when he turns up in the doorway, four large men all with guns of their own all immediately surrender to him. You'd think that the two big fellers with the really big guns would just laugh at him, but no.
Instead they all stand very still, and wait to be arrested.
Richard and his jammies join Craig for a bit of escaping. And possibly some clothes.
And then it's back to headquarters to explain it all to Tremayne. Apparently the blue things were all about an encrypted formula for a fabulous new type of fuel that would put the petrol companies out of business. It would, however, be too costly to bother making, so Richard was kidnapped, the whole of Nemesis mobilised, and half of the world's security agents sent on a wild goose chase to Dublin, for absolutely no reason at all.
Is funny.
Is not funny.
Oh.
Ah well. Everyone's a critic.
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'JLJTWEAN' etc.
Richard, you're an arsehole.
(Whoever made that prop really didn't ever imagine today's technology, eh?)
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