Episode Guide: Year Two
Title: "One Moment of Humanity"
Within this page: Overview | Backplot | Plot Synopsis | Unanswered Questions | Analyses/Observations | Comments | Memorable Lines
Overview
Tony Verdeschi and Dr. Helena Russell are kidnapped by robots to the planet Vega, where their imperfect humanity may spark a revolution.
Production Number: 003 (Season Two)
Original U.K. airing week: 25 September 1976 (ATV Midlands)
Original U.S. airing week: 25 September 1976 (syndication)
Written by Tony Barwick
Directed by Charles Crichton
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.
Plot Synopsis
(From the original ITC Press Release.)
A planet of human robots... but their complete mastery over those who have created them needs one further sense. They need the emotion that will enable them to kill. Can they learn from the Alphans?
The rulers of the planet Vega are uniformly handsome. Those working for them might almost be robots, their skin a white rubbery mixture, their identities submerged simply by their being numbered.
The Alphans' first contact with them is when the moon is stricken by a mysterious loss of power and the striking figure of an alien woman materializes.
She is Zamara (BILLIE WHITELAW), who tells them they are held in an electric force field and demands that two of them shall return to Vega with her. In the mistaken belief that they are lovers, she selects Helena Russell (BARBARA BAIN) and Tony Verdeschi (TONY ANHOLT). Travel to the planet is by positronic transfer - the power of their own concentration. The first person they meet there is Zarl (LEIGH LAWSON).
Warned by one of the robot-like figures, No. 8 (GEOFFREY BALYDON), "Whatever happens, do not react as they expect of you - if you show aggression, they will kill you," they find themselves having to control their tempers when Zamara and Zarl goad them with every type of insult, the situation all the more acute in the knowledge that the Vegans have it in their power to bring the moon's life support system to an end unless they achieve their objective.
The reason for their abduction becomes clear when they once again succeed in talking to No. 8. He peels off his rubbery white mask, revealing the face of a middle-aged man, and tells them: "We are the humans - they are the Androids." Long ago, his people built the first robots, linked to a powerful computer which designed more advanced robots who in turn built more sophisticated computers, the cycle continuing until the robots had evolved to perfect humanoid form, obtaining their mechanical perfection from themselves, learning their emotions from their creators who covered their faces for self-protection because, No. 8 explains, "They want to kill us, but they can't... because they have never seen violence, they don't possess the emotions of anger or aggression. That is what they want from you... to learn how to show anger... how to kill."
The Vegans continue, without success, to stir these emotions in Helena and Tony, trying one ruse after another until, in desperation, Zamara again materializes on Alpha. In the library, a chance glimpse of "Othello" provides her with the realization that it is jelousy that makes humans violent and lovers feel so strongly. But before she can return to Vega, John Koenig (MARTIN LANDAU) warns that her efforts to stir these feelings in Helena and Tony won't work. They are not in love. He is the one who loves Helena; Tony is in love with Maya (CATHERINE SCHELL).
Zamara seizes her opportunity. Both Koenig and Maya are taken to Vega. Helena is quick to realize that the Vegans are planning to use the new weapon of jealousy. An attempt is made by Maya, turning herself into a dove, to reach the master computer which could destroy the robots, but she is unsuccessful, and Koenig finds himself having to try desperately to control himself as he is forced to watch Zarl making violent love to Helena. An involuntary cry from her proves too much for him. He lunges at Zarl. To Zamara's delight, they have been taught their first lesson in aggression...
Appalled, Tony, Maya and Helena watch. Now, there is only one chance. The Vegans are links in a chain. If one link could be broken...
Helena seizes that one chance. Zarl must be forced to experience one new emotion: love. If she can make him do this, and experience just one second of humanity, he will have attained his dream of complete humanity for a fleeting moment before the link is broken and the machines are no longer the masters...
"SPACE 1999" - SERIES II
CAST LIST
EPISODE NO. 4 - "ONE MOMENT OF HUMANITY"
DIRECTOR: CHARLES CRICHTON
KOENIG - MARTIN LANDAU
HELENA - BARBARA BAIN
TONY VERDESCHI - TONY ANHOLT
MAYA - CATHERINE SCHELL
ALAN CARTER - NICK TATE
SAHN - ZIENIA MERTON
DR. MATHIAS - ANTON PHILLIPS
1ST OPERATIVE - SARAH BULLEN
ZAMARA - BILLIE WHITELAW
ZARL - LEIGH LAWSON
NUMBER EIGHT - GEOFFREY BAYLDON
CHOREOGRAPHER - LIONEL BLAIR
VEGAN/ASSISTANT CHOREOGRAPHER - HILARY DING
VEGAN - MAGGIE HENDERSON
VEGAN - LARAINE HUMPHRYS
VEGAN - ZENA CLIFTON
VEGAN - JASON MITCHELL
VEGAN - PAUL HASTINGS
VEGAN - BARRY RHODE
VEGAN - JURGEN ANDERSON
Unanswered Questions
Analyses/Observations
- Shakespearean references to "Julius Caesar" and "Othello" are prominent within the episode.
Comments
- "One Moment of Humanity" began, in some fan opinions, the downward spiral of poor Year Two scripting endeavors. (For example, Maya's discovery that "the computer has a failsafe device. If the energy source is disturbed the whole planet explodes.")
Memorable Lines
"You will travel to Vega by positronic transfer. All you have to do is to freely wish it. If you value the lives of your friends on Alpha, you will do it." - Zamara
"Yes, you are free to do as you wish. Eat the food, throw it in my face, whatever you like. Call yourself a man? Act the part." - Zarl
"Because they can't employ violence, never having experienced or seen it. They want to kill us, but they can't. They don't possess the emotions of anger and aggression. That is what they want from you. To teach them how to kill." - Number 8
"Why do you try these stupid games? Zarl, myself, all the Vegans, we are part of the completeness. An indestructible chain, you cannot touch us." - Zamara
"Emotion is a weakness. We can use it, but we must never become ensnared." - Zamara
"Won't work? According to your Shakespeare jealousy is the best of passions." - Zamara
"I don't know how much longer I can take this." - John Koenig
"No, don't be sorry. It was worth... one moment... of humanity." - Zarl
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