Ordeal (UFO)

"Ordeal" is the nineteenth episode aired of the first series of UFO, a 1970 British television science fiction series about an alien invasion of Earth. The screenplay was written by Tony Barwick and the director was Ken Turner. The episode was filmed from 8 August to 20 August 1969, and aired on ATV Midlands on 14 April 1971. Though shown as the nineteenth episode, it was actually the ninth to have been filmed.[1][2]

"Ordeal"
UFO episode
Episode no.Season 1
Episode 19
Directed byKen Turner
Written byTony Barwick
Production code8 August to 20 August 1969
Original air date14 April 1971 (ATV Midlands)

The series was created by Gerry Anderson and Sylvia Anderson with Reg Hill, and produced by the Andersons and Lew Grade's Century 21 Productions for Grade's ITC Entertainment company.[3]

Story

Col. Foster gets drunk at a party the night before a scheduled fitness check at a SHADO-run health farm (featured in this sequence on the soundtrack is The Beatles' single "Get Back"). He passes out in a sauna at the farm, and awakens just as aliens are kidnapping him. The aliens put Foster in a UFO and take off. A close friend of the Colonel, Captain Waterman, is ordered to destroy the UFO carrying Foster. However, Waterman, flying Sky One, cannot bring himself to destroy the UFO. Instead, he uses Sky One to disable it, forcing a crash-landing on the Moon, where Foster is rescued by Moonbase operatives.

Inside Moonbase, they find Foster has been put in a spacesuit and made to breathe the liquid that the aliens have to breathe in order to survive the journey from their home planet. When his helmet is removed, he struggles to re-adapt to breathing air. He then awakens properly back inside the sauna, realising that he was simply imagining the abduction, while all along he was safely on Earth.[4]

Cast

Starring

Other cast

Production notes

Locations used for the filming included Neptune House, BBC Elstree Studios, Borehamwood.

The music used for the opening party scene is The Beatles' "Get Back". The instrumental playing during the subsequent party flashback scene is "Trampoline" by The Spencer Davis Group. The song "Beautiful Dreamer" sung by Foster while in the sauna at the end is by Stephen Foster written in the early 1860s.

References
  1. "UFO Episode Guide - Ordeal". Fanderson. Archived from the original on 8 October 2017. Retrieved 31 October 2017.
  2. "UFO Characters - Ordeal". SHADO Library. Retrieved 31 October 2017.
  3. "Underappreciated TV: UFO". Den of Geek. Retrieved 31 October 2017.
  4. Bentley, Chris (10 January 2003). The Complete Book of Gerry Anderson's UFO. p. 51. ISBN 978-1903111659.
Last produced:
"A Question of Priorities"		 UFO episodes Next produced:
"The Responsibility Seat"
Last transmitted:
"Timelash"		 Next transmitted:
"Court Martial"
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