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ACTION
TV ONLINE EPISODE GUIDE
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Script : Jim Eldridge Director : Emma Bodger Behind The Scenes: Series creator Jim Eldridge is probably best known for writing and creating the long-running radio series King Street Junior. On television his work on children's series has mainly been in the fantasy area. 1990 saw the transmission of the first of his four Uncle Jack series, while 1991 brought with it the poorly-received ITV time travel series Time Riders. The first of two seasons of Monster TV started transmission in December 1999. More recently he has written scripts for all three seasons of The Ghost Hunter. Other series he has contributed to include the highly popular children's series Spatz and the Jim Davidson sitcom Up The Elephant And Round The Castle. Cast : Dominic Rickhards (Mr Edgar), Guy Scantlebury (Mr Harris), Michelle Lee (Mrs Harris). Synopsis : The Powers Project is asked to look into the strange events taking place at a country hotel. A teenage girl named Song Li Harris is claiming that a ghost has been damaging her room, while her parents and the manager are rather more sceptical. Notes : New Kid in Town takes its cue from The Tomorrow People by having Song Li's new powers emerge in the opening episode. She's actually responsible for the poltergeist activity herself - many documented cases of such activity are connected with teenage girls of a similar age. Mary was Professor Powers first subject - her powers disappeared as she got older. CGI effects! On a BBC budget! In a children's drama!
Script : Jim Eldridge Director : Emma Bodger Behind The Scenes: Gareth Hunt is probably best known for appearing as ex-army man Mike Gambit in The New Avengers, as well as starring in a long-running series of coffee commercials. He also appeared in the very final story of the Jon Pertwee era of Doctor Who (Planet of the Spiders) and The Wall Came Tumbling Down, an episode of the abysmal Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense. More recently he has appeared as Charlie Doyle in the ITV soap Night & Day. Cast : Gareth Hunt (Tom Watkins), Phillip Wright (David Watkins), Heather Bleasdale (Janey Watkins), Dominic Barklem (Brian Watkins), Flip Webster (Sgt Webster). Synopsis : Twenty-five years after his father was seriously injured in a quarrying accident, David Watkins drives into a quarry and disappears. His son, Brian, contacts the Powers Project via the police after reading about their work online. After Mark's attempt to use his psychic dowsing skills on David's favourite pen fail, he suggests that Song Li may have more success. Her powers finally lead them to the quarry where she finds the detonating box that David had fallen on twenty-five years earlier. She has a vision of the accident and sees that David's father was actually pushed out of the way of the explosion by another man, and from her description it seems to be David himself… Notes : The first standout episode. You can't beat a good time travel story (Eldridge's earlier Time Riders definitely wasn't…) and having David save his father from two separate explosions (the second in effect saving himself from the time bubble) is clever. And who'd have thought that anyone like Gareth Hunt would be appearing in the series?!
Script : Jim Eldridge Director : Emma Bodger Behind The Scenes: Among Emma Bodger's other directing credits are episodes of Hollyoaks, Brookside, Where the Heart Is and episodes of the Sky One football drama Dream Team. Cast : Ed Browning (Evan Foster), Jon Croft (Harry Ford), Victoria Willing (Mrs Foster), James Lailey (Mr Stannard), Alan Barnes (Detective). Synopsis
: Evan Foster has been helping Harry Ford to lay pipes at his
farm, and as they work they stumble across a silver chalice. Unknown
to Harry, Evan also finds an inscribed amulet. The Powers Project
are called in when Evan starts visiting the local museum at every
available opportunity after the chalice goes on display. From viewing
CCTV footage taken one night, Evan can clearly be seen standing outside
the museum along with the shadow of someone else. According to the
curator of the museum, Mr Stannard, the chalice is almost certainly
a 10th century Anglo Saxon burial chalice, although no remains were
found with it. When Harry disappears the team finally realise that
someone, or something, is trying to bring the objects back together.
But as Song Li points out, there weren't any bones found…
Script : Jim Eldridge Director : Brian Farnham Behind The Scenes: Jessica Fox had previously played Anthea in the BBC's 1997 adaptation of E Nesbit's The Phoenix and the Carpet, and played Enid Nightshade in the CITV children's dramas The Worst Witch and Weirdsister College: The Further Adventures of the Worst Witch. Powers
isn't David Mallinson's first brush with the world of children's sci-fi
drama. In 2000 he played Goodman in Life Force on ITV. In 1999 he
played the part of Vincent Crone in the two-part Channel 5 science
thriller The Alchemists. Synopsis
: The Powers team are called in to try and communicate with a
girl who has been caught outside a secret research establishment.
The other people with her at the time managed to get away. Neither
Mark or Song Li manage to get anything from the girl, but Mark does
pick up from Dr Felton that there is a possibility she may be an alien.
Strange signals were picked up on the night she was captured and they
can't be identified. Mark and Song Li try to communicate with her
again with no one else in the room and finally find out that her name
is Lex. She was on a research trip with her father and a small crew
when their ship developed a fault. They landed to re-fuel it with
water. Felton, meanwhile, is listening to their conversation via a
bug planted in her cell. Unknown to him, Mark and Song Li are intending
to break Lex out…
Script : Stephen Hallett Director : Emma Bodger Behind The Scenes: Stephen Hallett had previously written for the medical drama Doctors Cast : Zoe Thorne (Erin), Janine Wood (Nina), Peter Geddis (William), Peggy Shields (Angie). Synopsis
: The Powers project investigate the causes of Erin's recurring
dream in which she repeatedly sees an old couple named William and
Angie. Song Li uses her powers to share Erin's dream and with the
information Mark and Professor Powers are able to locate the house
where William and Angie live.
Script : Christopher Wicking Director : Emma Bodger Behind The Scenes: Things That Go Bump is the only episode to be written by Christopher Wicking who is best known for writing horror films such as Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (1971) and To the Devil a Daughter (1976). In the late 1970s and early 1980s he also scripted three episodes of the action series The Professionals (The Madness of Mickey Hamilton / The Gun / Discovered in a Graveyard). Cast : Lucy Robinson (Cora Hamilton), Blair Plant (Dr Frank Munro), Mary Roscoe (Aunt Kate), Rachel Crowther (Kelly Driscoll), Billie North, Ryan North, Louis Dunford, Lauren Hartley, Shaneeqa Duprey (Children). Synopsis
: The Powers team are asked to look into what initially appears
to be a simple case of vandalism at the Hawthorne House children's
home. When Mark and Professor Powers visit the home things initially
seem normal until the balls from the pool table start flying around
the room. Powers suspects it may just be Mark's reaction to missing
his parents. While the Professor tries to track down the aunt of a
former resident of the home called Kelly Driscoll, who it is thought
may be behind the incidents, Mary and Song Li go along to the home
where they are intending to spend the night. Soon after their arrival
they witness a number of saucepan lids flying off saucepans. Later
that night the home comes under attack once more…
Script : Stephen Hallett Director : Brain Farnham Behind The Scenes: Brian Farnham's fantasy credits date back to the early 1970s when he was responsible for directing an episode of the BBC horror anthology Dead Of Night (Death Cancels All Debts). More recently he has directed no less than nine of the first twenty episodes of BUGS - including the first episode, Out of the Hive, and four episodes of Crime Traveller. Other recent work has also been for Carnival Films and has included episodes of the detective series Rosemary & Thyme and feature-length episodes of Agatha Christie's Poirot. In 1992 he produced and directed the TV version of Fay Weldon's Growing Rich which starred Gary and Martin Kemp. Cast : Katie Sheridan (Sam Ryan), Alison Lomas (Julia Ryan), Bruce McGregor (Ned Thomson), Philip Brook (Mr Cargill), Eluned Jones (Mrs Cargill), Ben Robinson (Tim Cargill), Kieron Forsyth (Frank Morris). Synopsis
: The Powers team investigate the strange disappearance of Ned
Thomson who has been captured on video apparently being abducted by
aliens.
Script : Carolyn Sally Jones Director : Brain Farnham Behind The Scenes: I'll Be Watching You is the first of three episodes by Carolyn Sally Jones. Other shows she has written for include Casualty, Heartbeat, the detective drama Wycliffe and The Bill. In 1999 her BBC adaptation of Pig Heart Boy won a Children's BAFTA for Best Drama and she is the writer behind the current Look and Read serial Shadow Play. Fiona
Gillies other credits include Casualty, The Jury, and the spooky 1993
Taggart story Gingerbread. In 1995 she appeared in Pulse, the last
episode of BUGS first season and played Becky Johnson, Mark's ex-wife,
in both seasons of the incredibly underrated sitcom Joking Apart. Synopsis
: Mark is taken along by Professor Powers to talk to a boy called
Ian, who his aunt believes may be being bullied. Ian suffers from
vertigo and is dared by Dean to walk along a wall. Initially he stumbles,
but a light appears at the end of the wall and he calmly walks along
it. Later, Mark picks up a stray thought from Ian: he believes someone
is looking after him. He also picks up a strange photo that Ian has
dropped. Back at the lab Mary identifies the photo as being an aura
photo. When Song Li takes the photo she gets an image of Mel and Ian
being involved in a car accident and also senses another presence
was there with them. Talking to Mel they find out that that they had
been to the local fair where Ian had had the photo taken. On the way
home a lorry pulled out from a junction, but before Mel had even seen
the lorry she heard a voice telling her to pull over. Ian believes
he has a guardian angel and when Mary does some looking into the subject
she finds that the phenomenon usually vanishes after about three days.
It's now three days since the accident and Dean has dared Ian to walk
along the scaffolding in an old church…
Script : Carolyn Sally Jones Director : Emma Bodger Behind The Scenes: Rupert Holliday Evans is a familiar face on television having appeared in series as varied as Between the Lines, A Touch of Frost and Second Sight. Comedy fans may remember him as one of the Double-Take Brothers in The Harry Enfield Show. Mandana
Jones is probably known for her role as prisoner Nikki Wade in the
first three seasons of the ITV prison drama Bad Girls. Guest roles
have included parts in Holby City, The Afternoon Play and a recent
episode of Born and Bred (A Small Flourish). Synopsis
: Mary gets a call from the husband of one of her friends who
died the previous year. His son, Ben, has been looking for their dog
which has run away, and he is now telling stories about returning
home and finding his father missing and an unknown woman and girl
living in their house. After Mark and Song Li become involved, Professor
Powers comes up with the theory that they may be dealing with a parallel
universe linked to ours via a wormhole. The only problem being that
the other universe is becoming unstable and may be starting to affect
our own…
Script : Jim Eldridge Director : Emma Bodger Behind The Scenes: The producer of Powers was Chris Le Grys who had previously been in charge of the bizarre ITV soap Night & Day. Other people on Powers who had previously worked on Night & Day include the two directors, Brian Farnham and Emma Bodger, writer John Jackson, and actors Dominic Rickhards and Gareth Hunt who appear in the first two episodes. Cast : Florence Bell (Toni), Stephen Rashbrook (Dr Nolan), Annie Fitzmaurice (Nancy). Synopsis
: A car crashes and a teenage girl climbs out of the back completely
injured and walks away leaving a man and woman unconscious in the
car. She walks down the local high street and into an electrical shop.
As she looks at the televisions the pictures all change to show the
crashed car. Later, at the local police station, she manages to turn
the alarm on and off and open a locked police car which has the keys
inside. The police contact the Powers Project to see if they can help.
Meanwhile, the woman who was in the crashed car is being interviewed
by Dr Nolan who needs to know if Toni caused the crash - they don't
know what she might be capable of. Back at the Powers Project and
the professor is seeing how Toni does on a reaction test where the
user has to use their powers to predict which areas in a computer
game will become active. Rather surprisingly she blows it out of the
water and has a 100% record. Song Li is unable to pick up any emotion
from her at all. Meanwhile, Dr Nolan has received a report that Toni
was with the police. She's unstable and could be dangerous if any
more pressure is put on her…
Script : Carolyn Sally Jones Director : Brain Farnham Cast : Amber Noble (Becky Goodson), Robert Perkins (Neil Goodson), Maggie Hayes (Moira Goodson), Peter Barich (Air Traffic Controller). Synopsis
: Mark and Dr Holland go to investigate an area where aircraft
have reported instrumentation problems. Initially suspecting it to
be caused by ley lines, they soon find themselves with a strange sense
of déjà vu… Alright, so it's a cheap joke, but you get the point. If you're going to have part of the story repeating, you need a bit of action to hold the interest. Having a JCB turning over a large stone doesn't really cut the mustard… A bigger
problem for this story is that the concept is far from original in
TV sci-fi. Meglos, a 1980 Tom Baker Doctor Who story, had the Doctor
and Romana trapped in a chronic hysteresis (time loop to you and me)
from which they could only escape by repeating the sequence of events
in the brief time before loop starts again. The Star Trek: The Next
Generation episode Cause and Effect had the Enterprise repeatedly
colliding with the USS Bozeman which had disappeared eighty years
earlier. More recently The X Files used a time loop in the season
six episode Monday, in which a woman repeatedly tries to stop Mulder
and Scully from being killed in an explosion when a bank robbery goes
wrong.
Script : Jim Eldridge Director : Brian Farnham Behind The Scenes: This episode was followed by a webchat with Adam Jessop and Amy Yamazaki. Cast : Sean Baker (Professor Dixon), William Tapley (Adult Mark), Naoko Mori (Adult Song Li). Synopsis : Professor Dixon brings along a device called a Future Box which should enable the user to get a glimpse of his or her future. Mark is eager to find out if he will be rich and famous and is the first to try the machine. Ignoring Dixon's warning, he interacts with his future self who is quite definitely rich, but whose means of acquiring his wealth are somewhat less than ethical… Notes: Excellent stuff! Possible futures for both Mark and Song Li - neither of which impress the current day versions, a genuine sense of threat in some scenes and an exciting finale. Definitely the best episode of the season.
Script : John Jackson Director : Brian Farnham Behind The Scenes: David Dakar has appeared in literally dozens of other programmes including a number of telefantasy shows. In Doctor Who he played Irongron and Captain Rigg in The Time Warrior and Nightmare of Eden respectively, and appeared as Josiah Freston in the superb adaptation of Susan Hill's The Woman in Black. Other memorable roles include the thuggish Jarvis in the very final episode of Porridge and Captain Spiker in the popular teatime adventure series Dick Turpin. Cast : Michael Obiora (Tyrone Lewis), David Dakar (Mike Knowles), Arthur Whybrow (Morris), Natasha Williams (Mrs Lewis). Synopsis
: As a birthday surprise Mark is taken to see the FA Cup, which
is currently on display at Stanford Rovers FC. While there he takes
a penalty on the pitch, which is saved by a young player called Tyrone
Lewis who simply turned around and caught the ball as if he knew where
it was going be. It soon emerges that Tyrone didn't just see where
the ball was going to be. He's also had a vision of the FA Cup being
stolen from its display case while Mark and Song Li are present… |
 Created by Jim Eldridge, Powers made it's BBC One debut in January 2004 as part of the new season of programmes.  Promoted as a children's version of The X Files, the series is based around a paranormal research group know as the Powers Project. In charge is Professor Henry Powers whose main subject is fourteen year Mark Roberts who is staying with Dr Mary Holland (who also used to have special powers) for six weeks while his parents are in Africa.  Mark's powers include telepathy and telekinesis. The fourth and final member of the team is Song Li Harris whose powers only come to light in the opening episode. Unlike Mark, her telekinetic powers aren't very strong but she is able to detect emotions and is able to see images of past events while handling objects. While superficially it would appear to be little different from earlier series such as The Tomorrow People or The Delta Wave, Powers managed to steer clear of the super-villains and alien invasions that caused so many problems for the heroes of the earlier shows. Where they often had threats of a global nature, Powers stuck to rather smaller problems that, in general, occurred to individuals. Subjects covered in the thirteen episodes include ghosts, time bubbles, ancient curses, alien visitations, guardian angels, parallel universes and precognition. While Jim Eldridge wrote six of the episodes himself , the remaining seven were split between Stephen Hallett, Carolyn Sally Jones, Christopher Wicking and John Jackson. Unfortunately, the series suffered a slight but noticeable dip in quality halfway through the season and its significant that this coincides with the first four episodes not written by Eldridge. Of the thirteen episodes, the undisputed highlight was the penultimate episode Future Box which showed possible futures for both Mark and Song Li. Other episodes of note were the alien visitation episode We Are Not Alone, the parallel universe episode The Uninvited and Face Value. One thing that is noticeable about the stand out episodes is that they all contain a certain element of threat, something which is too often lacking in children's drama these days. The series has since been repeated several times on the digital CBBC channel. Unfortunately, the powers that be have decided that a second season doesn't fit in with their plans. The series is not commercially available at present. Text © Kieran Seymour, 2004.
The series was created by Jim Eldridge. Episodes were transmitted on BBC 1 on Wednesdays between 4:25pm and 5:00pm. |