episode #19 - Straight on 'Til Morning

episode #6 of 2nd season / Air Date: 11/8/74    written by D.C. Fontana    Directed by Lawrence Doheny

This episode moves everything into a bigger sci-fi universe as it makes it clear that there actually is extraterrestrial life out there, more advanced than ours. In some ways, an episode like this should come as no surprise, as the writer, Fontana, is best known for her work on the Star Trek franchise. Here, she applies the concept of alien civilizations to a 'stranded-on-Earth' plot: a quartet of exploring aliens crashland in our ocean; Austin happens to be one of those who saw the U.F.O.  The alien ship is lost (this is a convenient dismissal; I guess the ship disintegrates like the aliens do when they die).
Fontana builds a detailed sketch of the alien team's structure: it's a family, composed of two elderly parents, a daughter (Meg Foster) and a son. Each has a special ability or power: the daughter is a telepath; the son is the defender, capable of telekinesis, like directing rocks at people; the father can project illusions; I'm not sure what the mother can do. Fontana's theme, however, has to do with incompatibility between two species of two worlds. Whatever the best intentions are, the biochemistry side of it is lethal: a human touching an alien results in severe radiation burns for the human and slow (about a day) death for the alien. The alien expedition is doomed; Austin, of course, can hold hands with the female alien, as long as he uses his bionic hand.
This was a fairly interesting episode, ideal for sci-fi fans. It was a precursor to the later Bigfoot episodes, where-in more aliens from outer space were depicted. It's rather simple, with most of the story involving the aliens fleeing the local sheriff's dept., but it also suggests the possibilities of what is 'out there' and that Austin, being an astronaut, can relate to the aliens better (he also observed a U.F.O. 3 years earlier when in orbit). Perhaps the most interesting scene is between Austin & Oscar Goldman in the final act, when they are again in serious conflict (see the previous couple of episodes); Goldman initially plans to capture and learn from the female alien, but Austin's plea registers with him somehow.  BoG's Score: 6.5 out of 10