The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert

[swordznsorcery]

Episode 1x29: "Desert Journey"

A man prepares for a meeting. He's murdered pretty swiftly, and one of his murderers takes his place. There are various Arab-type leaders present, and ohmigosh it's Roger Delgado! Then our murderous imposter leaves a briefcase with a bomb on it on the table, and runs away. He leaves it right next to Roger Delgado, who survives when half of the room is wiped out; but then he's the Master, so that comes as no real surprise. The meeting is in ruins, however. Peace in the region is destabilised. Quickly, call in the Champions!

Back in Geneva, Tremayne explains the situation to Craig and Richard. A fictional North African country is in dire straits, and the only way peace can be restored is if the old, deposed leader - the Bey - is brought back. The Bey is dead, however, leaving only his spoilt and awkward grown-up son to take control in his place. Craig and the oddly absent Sharron are tasked with flying to Rome, where Bey Jnr is living in exile, to persuade him to return. Richard, meanwhile, will go to the country itself, and spend the episode doing very little, because William Gaunt was probably filming scenes from another episode at the time. He does get to chat to Roger Delgado a lot, though, which is nice. Don't look into his eyes, Richard. I know you're immune to hypnotism, but he is the Master. And the proper one at that.

Whilst Richard lurks in a fictional North African country, Sharron busies herself in Rome, trying to charm the Bey. At first she appears to be making headway, but it soon transpires that Murderous Imposter is paying him to stay where he is. Consequently, never one to stand around wasting time, Sharron bashes him over the head, and hauls him off to meet with Craig. They then set about trying to get him home, preferably without any of them getting killed along the way. Easier said than done, with half of North Africa trying to stop them.


*snicker*


It's Roger Delgado!


Craig and Richard watch film of unrest on the streets of a country that very clearly isn't the one that this episode is based in.


Sharron turns up. She's been instructed to catch the Bey's eye, although I'd have thought that it would have made more sense to change when she gets to Rome, instead of doing it now.


Tremayne doesn't mind, though.


Apparently the future stability of the region relies upon Sherlock Holmes.


Sharron tries to charm him, but he's more interested in not getting shot by his countrymen.


Elsewhere, Richard finds a bug in Roger Delgado's office. He fuses it using the local electricity supply.


Which somehow causes this to happen to the eavesdroppers' equipment. How?!


A remote outpost. It is, rather obviously, Joe's Place from "Happening", which as it turns out is faintly ironic. When it was Joe's Place it was in Australia, but was strangely devoid of Australians. This time it's in North Africa, and it's actually managed to have a real Australian in it.

Just the one, admittedly, but that's still one more than the whole of Australia had two weeks ago.


A real Australian. Couldn't they have cast him two weeks back instead?!


Craig and Sharron fly overhead, with Sherlock Holmes.


They put down for refuelling, but since it's not an official flight or filling station, the request is met by scepticism. Craig being Craig, he mostly deals with this by flirting.


What the hell is going on with Sharron's hair?!

The Bey is recognised, so whilst the staff are off refuelling the plane, Craig sabotages the radio (he actually unplugs it, which is less sabotagey than is usual with radios). They then steal the truck that's parked outside, and make off into the night.


Sharron has a very weird look going on for most of this episode.


Back in the fictional North African country, Richard is still very wisely avoiding looking into Roger Delgado's eyes. Here he's filling him in on the progress so far in Operation: Abduct Sherlock Holmes.

Sharron and Craig drive on across the desert in their stolen truck, watched all the time by the enemy. Eventually, sensing that they're surrounded, they stop, and the Bey bolts, promptly getting shot. Usually this would be bad, but the assassins completely fail to follow through, and instead allow Sharron and Craig to run over, talk to him for a while, and then carry him back to the truck. Which is nice of them, if somewhat inefficient. Soon the little band are back on their way once again, and eventually arrive at a nomad camp. I like the nomad camp. Clearly somebody decided that the locals should speak a foreign language, but apparently nobody was available to translate into Arabic, so either the episode's writer - that old, cult favourite, Ian Stuart Black - or, more likely, the cast, made one up. They're quite obviously speaking complete gibberish, and it's rather endearing. Soon, having utilised their amazing super powers, Craig and Sharron can understand some of the gobbledegook, and realise they're in deadly danger from their hosts; but in order to escape, Craig must first extract himself from an orgy. Well, a party. He does have a scantily-clad woman in his lap. During the course of the escape, he manages to be spectacularly un-super, and knocks over a pot. Given the weight imbued upon this by the director and the guest cast, it must be the most important pot in the history of the world. It has more and longer close ups than most of the humans.


Sharron's hair is getting scarier.


Sherlock Holmes helpfully gets himself shot.


Sharron, I really think you need to see somebody about that hair. Possibly an exorcist.


A motley collection of Arabs, not at all discouraged by the fact that they're living their nomadic, desert existence in a studio just north of London.


Camels!


Obligatory belly dancer.


The bad guys prepare to swoop upon the Champions and Holmes.


A strangely significant Broken Pot Of Great Portentousness.

Having escaped certain death, Sharron, Craig and Sherlock Holmes are now staggering about the desert. I have to say, I'd have thought they'd have come up with a better escape plan than "Run out into the desert with no water or suitable clothing", but then I suppose it is Richard who tends to be in charge of the forethought. And he's currently on holiday helping Roger Delgado. So they stagger about with Sherlock Holmes at death's door, until they find a bit of shelter beside a rock. Craig contacts Richard telepathically, and asks for some help, telling him where they are by drawing a map in the sand. He then gathers everybody together and promptly leaves, so why he bothered sending Richard the map, I don't know. Arriving at the town they've been heading for, they hide in an empty building while they wait for Richard to find them. Or wait for Richard to follow their directions to the place where they were before, then try to follow their trail to the place where they are now. Happily this doesn't annoy him as much as it would me.

Reunited, off they all go to help the Bey get settled in his new palace. For some reason he's suddenly very willing to take over as leader, despite having been against it all along. I don't know what's changed his mind, but given that his new advisor is a dangerous alien with powerful hypnotic abilities, I have my suspicions. Something tells me that life in that little country will be very interesting. For starters it's bound to get invaded by aliens every week. But that doesn't concern us now. Back in the present, Holmes prepares to lead his country, but his enemies make one last attempt to stop him. As the others talk, Craig senses a presence outside the door, grabs a rifle from a nearby guard, and proceeds to annihilate the door with a stream of lead. What's left swings open to reveal... a perforated tea lady. No, not really. A strikingly under-perforated assassin. Despite having ripped the door apart with bullets, Craig appears to have only managed to shoot the assassin once. If you can't get away with having somebody cut to pieces by machine gun fire, then don't fire a machine gun at them to begin with. It looks silly. I'm sorry, but it does.


Craig calls Richard for assistance.


He draws a map in the sand to show Richard where they are. I'm not convinced that it will be of much use, but Richard is clearly better at map-reading than I am.


He receives the message, has a quick look at a map on a wall nearby, then races off in a jeep.


Richard just walked past that in "Happening". In Australia. Just where are Craig and Sharron right now exactly?!


Back in the desert, Craig, Sharron and Holmes arrive at a town. They then set about looking for somewhere to hide until Richard can come to pick them up.


Send me your armies of heavily-armed warriors! For see, I have a small knife, and will fight them all! Richard soon arrives to whisk everybody away, and the Bey is delivered safe and sound to his new home. If you can call preparing for a life with the Master safe and sound.


Holmes certainly doesn't seem too sure. It'll be all right, Holmes. Just don't look into his eyes.


You looked into his eyes!


The gang set off for home, apparently not realising that the Bey has just been hypnotised by an evil Time Lord. Presumably they'll soon be called back again, to correct the mistake.

All in all, it's rather a frustrating episode, this. On the one hand, it's a good, fun adventure, with a nice foreign setting and a quality guest cast. Jeremy Brett is jolly good as the spoilt, annoying Bey coming to accept his new role, and also there's Roger Delgado. On the other hand, though, Richard is only in a couple of scenes. It's so much less fun when we don't get the three Champions together. Following on from "Happening" and "The Interrogation", the continued lack of togetherness in this one as well is more than a little frustrating.

Still, that's all about to change. Up next is most people's favourite episode (and the final one in the series). There's thrills, angst and some serious whomping to come in "Autokill".