Episode #01 - Escape From Tomorrow

Air Date: 09/13/74    written by Art Wallace    Directed by Don Weis

The first episode set it up: a spaceship from Earth's past lands in year 3085, in the middle of a forest. The crash landing is witnessed by an old man (Royal Dano) and an ape boy (Bobby Porter).  Inside the ship are 3 astronauts; one is dead, while the other two are unconscious.  The old man carries the two live humans to a hidden bomb shelter. Meanwhile, the boy chimp has gone and told his father, the local prefect (Woodrow Parfrey); soon enough, a squad of gorilla soldiers converge on the downed ship.  The two astronauts (Ron Harper and James Naughton) awaken, thinking they're on some other planet, but the old man soon produces an old  book which displays a picture of New York City from year 2503.  The old man also imparts some info about humans being useless and dominant apes. The astronauts think he's addled but they're soon chased for the first time by gorillas on horseback.  After the old man sacrifices himself, the two newcomers are captured and put through a swift hearing of a sort. As it happens, a young, open-minded chimp named Galen (Roddy McDowall) had just been assigned as an observer to these proceedings by the head honcho orangutan Zaius (Booth Colman). Galen may be the only chance these new humans have  to escape.

Some of the plot in this first episode is a rough copy of the first film - the brief hearing, for example, is a shorter version of the famous trial of Taylor in the '68 film.  Also, Galen - a version of the film's Cornelius character - hotly denies the assertions of the astronauts about the planet's real history, that apes did not always rule, but quickly finds out the truth via that old book, a stunning revelation in conjunction with his realization of how the truth is suppressed by Zaius. This  is all a compressed version of the revelations in the final act of the film. Suppression of the truth is the main theme and it galvanizes Galen's action here and in all subsequent episodes, justifying his sudden status as a fugitive. Galen's first scene revolved around the exposition of his many acquaintances and relatives, and the suggestion that he was very establishment in ape culture. His reversion to ape-on-the-run rebel in the final act serves as a stark contrast to his earlier scenes. There's also unexpected conflict between Zaius, who wants the new humans alive for now for questioning, and gorilla general Urko (Mark Lenard), who wants to kill them immediately. In the end, Virdon, the older astronaut who has/had a wife and kids, manages to remove a recording disk from the ship just before the spacecraft is destroyed. Virdon thinks this disk might offer a way to return home. BoG's Score: 6 out of 10
Trivia of the Apes: this episode has brief stock footage of Ape City from the first film. The appearance of a dog (as a chimp's pet) in an early scene contradicts events explained in the 4th Apes film, which mentioned the death of all cats & dogs. Bobby Porter also played a boy chimp in Battle For the Planet of the Apes (1973).  Star Trek TOS actor alert: besides Lenard, who played Sarek in TOS Journey to Babel and a Romulan in Balance of Terror, Biff Elliot has a small role as one of the meek humans; he played Schmitter in the episode The Devil in the Dark.