Episode Guide: Year One
Title: "Voyager's Return"
Within this page: Overview | Backplot | Plot Synopsis | Unanswered Questions | Analyses/Observations | Comments | Memorable Lines
Overview
An exploratory space probe from Earth's past crosses the wayward Moon's path -- bringing death and destruction in it's wake.
Production Number: 012 (Season One)
- filmed Wednesday, August 7 - Monday, August 26, 1974
Original U.K. airing week: 9 October 1975 (ATV Midlands)
Original U.S. airing week: 21 November 1975 (syndication)
Written by Johnny Byrne
Directed by Bob Kellett
Backplot
- In the year 1999, lunar nuclear waste storage dumps have exploded, due to magnetic radiation, sending Earth's moon into interstellar space. The inhabitants of Moonbase Alpha, unable to escape, are seeking a new home.
- In 1985, Earth launched the Voyager One exploratory space probe with advanced propulsion units for interplanetary travel. Unfortunately, the next probe (Voyager Two) wreaked untold havoc when the powerful nuclear engine accidentally kicked in early and destroyed a scientific outpost on the Moon.
- Scientist Ernst Queller, who created the propulsion system, was forced into hiding due to the devastation caused by his work. He underwent a name change to "Dr. Ernst Linden" and was assigned to Moonbase Alpha. No one on Alpha knows his true identity, including his assistant Jim Haines, whose parents were killed by the Voyager Two probe's engine accident.
- Voyager One has unleashed destruction upon other worlds in its interstellar journeys.
- The moon is back in interstellar space, following the atmospheric transformation at the hands of the beings of planet Ariel in the episode, "The Last Sunset."
Plot Synopsis
(From the original ITC Press Release.)
Grim danger emerges from the past. Moonbase is threatened with destruction from an unmanned spacecraft sent up from Earth many years earlier, with tragedy in its wake. Even worse lies ahead from outer space victims seeking revenge.
The clock rolls back for Commander John Koenig (MARTIN LANDAU) and Moonbase Alpha personnel when a spaceship is seen approaching, a voice from its computer signalling that this is Voyager One, with greetings from the people of Planet Earth.
Voyager One was launched back in 1985, long before the explosion which sent the Moon out of orbit. It has been polluting space ever since because of a tragic miscalculation in its Queller Drive engine, causing a lethal pollution producing fast neutrons which annihilate matter. Realization of this came when Voyager Two was launched and the Queller Drive activated too soon, causing the deaths of an entire scientific colony on the moon.
The danger Moonbase is now in is made clear when two Eagles on reconnaissance are caught in violent vibrations. Voyager One must either be destroyed or its Queller Drive de-activated. Professor Bergman (BARRY MORSE) protests that to destroy it would mean loss of all the valuable information it had gathered during its years in space. If possible, it must be saved and the one man who might be able to do so is scientist Dr. Ernst Linden (JEREMY KEMP), of the experimental Laboratory, who is asked if there are any means of overriding the Voyager One computer's security codes and get access to the command circuit, enabling instructions to be given to shut down the drive.
Although it is not realized at the time, Dr. Linden is most certainly the only man capable of doing this. He is, in fact, Ernst Queller. He changed his name after the disaster caused by Voyager Two. But can even he achieve this new assignment? He is facing a desperate race against time, and the situation takes a grim turn when his assistant, Jim Haines (BARRY STOKES), whose parents were lost in the early disaster, discovers his real identity and, losing his temper, strikes Dr. Linden with such force that he is incapacitated. Dr. Helena Russell (BARBARA BAIN) struggles to revive the injured man, struggling against the clock. Only minutes remain before Koenig must decide to give the destruct order.
Voyager One is saved at the last moment and is brought to a safe landing on the Moon, but there is even greater drama ahead with the materialisation of a humanoid alien, and the appearance of three alien spaceships. The strange newcomer introduces himself as Aachon (ALEX SCOTT), "Chief Justifier of the Worlds of Sidon", seeking vengeance for the millions whose lives were extinguished when the Queller Drive decimated two of those worlds...
SCREENPLAY BY JOHNNY BYRNE
DIRECTED BY BOB KELLETT
Guest Star
JEREMY KEMP
Guest Artist
BARRY STOKES
with
PRENTIS HANCOCK as PAUL MORROW
CLIFTON JONES as DAVID KANO
ZIENIA MERTON as SANDRA BENES
ANTON PHILLIPS as DR. MATHIAS
NICK TATE as ALAN CARTER
JOHN HAMILL as DOMINIX
EVA RUEBER-STAIER as JANE
Script
View the script for "Voyager's Return."
Unanswered Questions
- What became of Voyager Two? (See Space1999.org's forthcoming Space: 1999 comic book story roadmap/overview for one possibility.)
- What information was downloaded from Voyager's computers to Moonbase Alpha, after the ship landed on Alpha? Was any of it helpful to the Alphans' future encounters?
Analyses/Observations
- The Voyager probe contained a command module section. The probe's life support system was also operational when the spacecraft was boarded by Queller, Koenig, Russell and others. Given the design, it is assumed that Voyager One was the first of many future, manned space probes.
Comments
- Jeremy Kemp played Captain Jean-Luc Picard's brother, Robert, in the Star Trek: The Next Generation season four episode, "Family."
- A special effects gaff: While viewing the close-up of Voyager's engine, you can see droplets of water dripping downwards!
Memorable Lines
"This is the voice of Voyager One. Greetings from the people of the planet Earth." - Voyager One spacecraft's automated recording
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