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Explosion On The Sun
Synopsis:
The Moon Observatory observes increased activity on the sun which appears to be causing heatwaves on Venus and Earth. The person responsible is Doctor Duncan, based on Ganymede, who has been crashing freighters of beryllium into the sun and is blackmailing the inner planets. Duncan has hi-jacked more beryllium and threatens to use it. Galasphere 347 is despatched to negotiate but the real mission is to try and find a way of stopping him...
Cast
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Captain Larry Dart
Husky
Slim
Colonel Raeburn
Marla
Professor Haggarty
Cassie
The Venusian President
Doctor Duncan
General Smith
Duncan's Assistant
Moon Observatory Scientist
Jackson
Dara
Duty Officer
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Dick Vosburgh
Ronnie Stevens
Ronnie Stevens
Murray Kash
Libby Morris
Ronnie Stevens
Libby Morris
Dick Vosburgh
Ronnie Stevens
Dick Vosburgh
Dick Vosburgh
Ronnie Stevens
Dick Vosburgh
Ronnie Stevens
Dick Vosburgh
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And The Moral Is:
• If You Can’t Stand The Heat... Stop Using The Beryllium!
Today I Will Be Mostly Learning... :
• Beryllium is a metal.
Huskyisms:
• “This heat is fantasticacious!”
Raeburnt:
• About Dart, thinking Raeburn has given in to Duncan “That means he’s angry at me, for saving his life.”
“Don’t Call Me Pop!”:
• What exactly does Haggarty have about travelling at faster than two million miles per hour ?
A Venusian Has...:
• No desire to catch some rays on her home planet at the present time.
Riding Along In My Monobile... ‘:
• Raeburn returns to Space Headquarters from Haggarty’s laboratory
Continuity:
• The director of Ganymede was a Venusian before Duncan replaced him.
• Haggarty knows Duncan, who used to work for him but was fired for trying to steal an invention.
• No mention is made of the flight time to Ganymede.
• The Zergon ray is used to revive the crew when they are twenty days from Earth.
Plot Device:
• Haggarty has fortunately invented a device that explodes at two million miles per hour. The question we ask is... why ?
2100 ?:
• Duncan’s assistant refers to ‘the wireless room’.
• It seems a little odd that the automatic pilot of the freighters has to be reset manually by the crew of a Galasphere, instead of by a signal of some sort.
Harmony For Strings:
• Slim trips Jackson up as he enters the Galasphere control room.
Haven’t I Seen... ?:
• The scientist at the Moon Observatory is Doctor Brown with a beard and wearing an Underwater Sea Farm wetsuit.
• Duncan’s assistant is Berridge with a beard.
• The ‘table’ with a rotating device in Doctor Duncan’s headquarters is the landing platform from atop of Space Headquarters
Take A Break:
• Galasphere 347 has landed on Ganymede. Dart outlines his plans to get Slim to snoop around, "Slim's small and might not be noticed."
"If you don't send us what we want,
it'll get a great deal hotter"
Doctor Duncan
Astro Viewer Working:
• Haggarty tells Raeburn Duncan had tried to steal one of his inventions. We wonder if it was the rotating dumbell device, as it appears in both Haggarty's lab and Duncan's headquarters.
Hoorah!:
• The animation of the freighters exploding before reaching the sun is brief but effective.
• Some shots of the puppets show them to be damp with sweat.
Boo!:
• The rockets would surely have taken some time to reach Ganymede, as well as Galasphere 347, so wouldn’t the Earth and Venus have cooled in the intervening time?
• Couldn’t the freighters being sent into the sun have been intercepted rather than be destroyed?
• The hoverjet used by Jackson has ‘Space Patrol’ on it.
Computer Central:
• First screened: October 17th 1963 (Westward/Channel)
• Running time: 24 minutes 19 seconds
• Believed to be the last of the second production block of thirteen episodes, this features the first appearance of the Dr Duncan puppet, who would make several further appearances in Series Two. This implies there may have been overlaps in the production blocks, also suggested by The Planet Of Thought having shorter end credits (as with the Series One episodes).
• BFCC Classified - 24th September 1998
• VHS - Volume 6
• DVD - Complete Series Box Set, Disk 4
Listings
• London, January 30th 1964:
Colonel Raeburn is faced with a dangerous situation when a would-be dictator sets himself up on the satellite Ganymede and begins to interfere with the sun.
• Wales, March 6th 1964:
Doctor Duncan causes an explosion by despatching freighters containing beryllium into the sun. He threatens to cause further chaos in his efforts to become dictator of the galaxy.
Brahms & List
• Explosion Of The Sun: The Listener In TV, Melbourne, Australia.
Ready To Lift ?:
An above average episode in terms of plot and drama, but seemingly forgetting the long time involved in getting from Jupiter to the Sun. Nevertheless, a satisfying conclusion to the first series.
 
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