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Earth's runaway moon experiences a weird pull from God-knows-where, and
at the same time, Moonbase Alpha receives the visit from an earth
spaceship that is manned only by a robot, Brian (voiced by Michael
Sharvell-Martin), who at first seems to be a nice fellow with a good sense
of humour ... but then he takes the moonbase's commander Koenig (Martin
Landau) and its physician Dr Russell (Barbara Bain) hostage, takes them to
the planet where his mothership has crashed, and renders the
Alpha-computer inoperational so nobody can follow him. Maya (Catherine
Schell), Alpha's resident shapeshifter, however has a mind like a computer
and so safely guides an Alpha shuttle to the planet even before Brian is
able to land there. On the planet, Koenig is forced to fetch the
fueltank from Brian's (damaged) mothership, and he makes a gruesome
discovery: Brian has taken over the mothership's computer and altered its
output so the crewmembers did not know the atmosphere on the planet was
toxic and walked out into their deaths, and Captain Michael (Bernard
Cribbins), Brian's creator, was left behind to die because ... well,
apparently he was unable to feed himself without his crew. But Koenig also
makes a welcome discovery on the mothership, Maya, who now agrees to
return to Brian's ship with Koenig, to assume the appearance of Captain
Michael, and break Brian, emotionally. In the end, Brian the robot weeps
... Oh boy, what a silly episode: I mean, the story as a whole
is on the weak side, and the weeping robot in the end destroys everything.
Oh, and the robot - one of the silliest-looking I've seen in a long time,
this one looks like something kids draw in groundschool, and all of his
mannerisms are getting on one's nerved pretty soon. Well, at least the
miniature effects are great as always, and the exteriors of the planet are
suitably creepy if a tad underused, but in all the whole thing is ...
well, campy fun actually, just nothing to be taken even half as seriously
as it was meant.
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