Blackout

DVD, BUGS S2 (Blackout)

Was this the series' answer to 'Die Hard' and all those subsequent spinoffs and copycats? It's probably the closest thing, and when you think that film was only a few years before this, it seems likely it was some kind of influence. The difference being that I actually like this and it doesn't rely on lots of swearing and violence to make an exciting story, something that was always a strong point about the series. Saying that, it is a little bit bloody: we linger unnecessarily long on the post-smash bodies of terrorist Pascal (played by Samantha Beckinsale, who I think is the sister of Kate), and the mystery man Martin Kolveck, not to mention that the poor tour guide showing the group round NRGen is shot by Pascal for no reason other than she seems to dislike fat men! Add to that a high number of deaths on screen (Lacombe, her partner at the Currency Exchange House in the Financial District, murders three security guards in cold blood!), and the fact that Ros was directly responsible for three of them and the body count is pretty high! Perhaps this reflected the stakes in this takeover of the split isotope fusion reactor plant, that its destruction would result in a five mile-wide crater, causing the deaths of who knows how many people, so our team didn't have time for finesse when dealing with such people. And what people they were, these terrorists purporting to be from the Pro Earth People's Front, though in reality the Front part was an actual front for criminal activity: no less than clearing out the vaults at the Currency Exchange.

It seemed like a lot of work to go to for a van load of notes, but I suppose, like Alec Guinness' character in 'The Lavender Hill Mob' Lacombe was on the inside and saw how it could be done (though he wasn't coming up for retirement so decided to make his own). It was certainly audacious to create such a massive diversion by taking over a power plant in the name of nature and provided us with a sizeable sense of scale in what was being attempted, and in reflection, what our team were trying to prevent. It was so big that it's one of those cases when you wonder why Kanin, the representative of NRGen (how did he know about the Gizmos team, was a mate of Alex?), didn't have a direct line to the army or government forces - say, armed police, anti-terrorist organisations who train for such eventualities. But then this was in the years before planes were flown into the Trade Centre in New York, and while there had certainly been terrorist actions and the threat of others, it shows that the attitude was perhaps not as concerned about such things being likely. Or perhaps I'm reading too much into it and the simple fact is that in reality the authorities would always be first on the scene in such a situation, but then our team wouldn't be so special. We can always say that, much as Kanin didn't even have time to spare on ringing the doorbell at Gizmo's, he came right to the heart of the matter, presumably knowing who Ros was, and the expertise of the team she represented, and so felt the best and swiftest course was to involve her friends and colleagues.

Kanin's explosive entrance (even if it was only one of those air explosions, which always seems like a bit of a cop-out, and was in fact the second of the episode despite coming so close to the beginning - the door to the control room at the plant gets similar treatment from Pascal's people), reminds of the last time Gizmo's was subjected to forced entry: in Season 1 when Jean-Daniel paid a visit with Mr. Bazooka. This is a different Gizmo's of course, but he's another bald man and after we'd just suffered infiltration from JD's cousin Bixon in the previous episode, you'd be forgiven for being suspicious. But there was no time to ask for ID, Ros' life was in danger! I don't know whether the lack of JD scenes was due to them wanting a bit of variety, allow him to sink back into the shadows so we forget what's going on behind the scenes, or if it was simply a case of time constraints and they liked the episode enough they didn't want to cut anything out to make room for yet another prison scene. I'd love to know the history of such things, whether they discussed having JD there or it was never even considered, perhaps a break was wanted? The episode is large scale enough on its own without needing any grander schemes, but the addition of Kolveck, this representative of a third party interested in taking advantage of the plant being under outside control, could suggest a JD link: was he working for JD, or was it completely unrelated? Maybe the people he represented worked for JD?

These things neither detract nor really add much to what is a pretty rip-roaring adventure, but it's the kind of thing that's fun to speculate on after the fact. The important thing this time is that this is a Ros episode, she gets to do most of the action and saves the day at the end! Ed and Beckett seem very much her subordinates through distance - Beckett at least is never close by, he's the outside liaison, mainly working with Kanin or visiting the Exchange, while Ed manages to break in through the 'end of the world' tunnel, which was great, and mainly does what Ros asks of him. Ros gets to be the one crawling around in the air ducting for a change (don't know how she kept her smart suit so clean!), slipping about in this large complex with its various levels and locations. That's something I've always liked: the sensation of going deep underground where some deep danger lurks. In this case it's the reactor itself, but also the patrolling terrorists - although we see them use tasers again, it's only to blast the satellite dishes and security equipment (including Philips monitors that I used to run my Amiga on!), when it comes to people they aren't shy of firing real bullets, which ups the threat level as no one's going to be 'Star Trek'-stunned in this!

Ros' action credentials get a rigorous checking, and with some help from Ed she gets the job done, even if it includes knocking patrol leader Eckberg down a ladder shaft to his death. He fell straight down so he must have landed on his head, but that was better than landing on Ed, gazing up and grinning to distract him. Ed showed great faith in Ros at that moment because he never flinched even as Eckberg pointed the gun at him, and waited coolly for Ros to make her gambit. It's somewhat lost in the humour of the moment, but it shows how much trust there is between the main characters (as does the touching moment when Ed tells Beckett to keep driving if they can't stop the meltdown). There seems to be some trust between Ros and her friend that works at the plant, the first Alex we have on the series before the more famous one arrives next season. He's such a good friend that the episode ends with Ros going out with him, though we never hear of him again. Another name that would later become infamous crops up, but only in a literal blink and you'll miss it moment: Christa! Yes, now we know what Beckett's neighbour in Season 4 was doing before we met her, she was part of some protest or terrorist group of some kind… And it's telling that Beckett is the one to be doing the profile search… Okay, the picture doesn't look like the same person, and this woman is called Christa Van Marka, and it's a common enough first name, just not on this series and adding another black mark to Christa's name is fun to do.

It's not only character names that appear elsewhere than in this episode, some of the sets look strikingly familiar: I always used to notice the primary core, this location deep under the plant, looked suspiciously like the water refinement site in 'Manna From Heaven,' the place from where 'Mad' Sally was going to poison the nation's water supply, but various areas of the NRGen plant, both outside and in looked very much like The Hive building, so it's possible this was a regular location they were allowed to film at: there are those familiar circular stairways, the tiny square windows and the hefty metal doors. It could be that it was just another building designed by the same architect I suppose, but knowing how they'd used The Hive building before, and would do again, it's likely this was the same place, but it's cunningly disguised so you wouldn't notice unless you were studying the episodes carefully or watched them multiple times, both of which I've done. One other 'BUGS' location shows up, though this time only on a monitor: Jean-Daniel's mainframe room from Computer Recall is used to represent a similar sort of thing for NRGen - JD may not appear, but his presence is still felt.

The colour palette of the episode is achieved very well, mainly through the environment this time rather than the characters' clothing. While Beckett wears a mustard coloured shirt as the brightest example of clothing in the episode, and with the red backdrop of Gizmo's his main location, Ros and Ed are much more muted, she in trouser suit of blue jacket and grey trousers, he also in grey trousers with what appeared to be a purple jumper, though you never see it clearly as he doesn't take off the leather jacket that was the character's trademark. They're both seen in a lot of gloomy shots with little lights around, but it's things like the garish yellow backdrop of electrical hazard cabinets, or faces cast in blue light that adds colour this time, while the terrorists' colour of choice is a full red, Pascal's lips the same colour as if to mark her out as the leader. She's a cold, calculating person with no compassion or mercy in her, first shooting the guide without cause, other than to show her intentions to the other hostages, double-crossing Travis, her man on the inside, when she no longer needs him, and setting up her own private deal with Kolveck: ten million for the core isotope triggers which she never tells her boyfriend Lacombe about. He too, has a very sinister way about him that makes you wonder if they can even trust each other - the way he calls her 'lover' in that tone of voice recalled Brian Brody and his wife Juliet from 'Down Among The Dead Men,' and it would be easy to imagine one of the pair ending up the same way if they hadn't both died.

Lacombe is chased by Beckett in his big action moment of the episode, driving too fast and overturning his van full of money when Ed activates a bridge to stop him getting over it. That's not strictly Beckett's fault, Lacombe was in control. When it comes to Eckberg, Pascal and Kolveck, however, Ros was responsible for them, pushing Eckberg down the ladder, shutting the 'flood door' before the other two could drive through, and she doesn't seem to be too concerned about it. I'm sure Kanin and NRGen advocated all she'd done if the authorities ever had shown an interest in prosecution, because obviously we can't have vigilantes going around killing people, even if they do deserve it! About the only bad guy that didn't die was Max, the security guard at the Exchange who was in on Lacombe's plan. I was expecting him to get gunned down by Lacombe once he was no longer needed, but he instead gets shut in the vault thanks to Beckett's intervention, which may well have saved his life, unless he ran out of oxygen before anyone remembered he was in there…

There aren't a whole lot of gadgets in this one, it's more about using computers and laptops to avert catastrophe, but one thing that does stand out are the coin transmitters, a pair of coins that act like walkie-talkies. The only problem is that the little electronic lights that demonstrate to us this isn't just an ordinary coin the production is trying to get us to believe has communication abilities, would give away that it's not a real coin, and I assumed the whole point of it was to disguise a communications device! Still, it was fun, shame it never appeared again, just one more of Ros' genius devices on her ever flowing production line, presumably. At least we get Ed riding his bike again, as he should - in fact we learn he has multiple motorbikes, not just from the fact he uses a 'dirt bike' stunt type (so Ros can do a jump), instead of a more traditional road bike, but he says at the end that's the last time he lets Ros borrow one of his bikes. She certainly cut a groove, or whatever they call it, speeding down the escape tunnel, performing jumps in her posh suit, tripping the exit, then racing back to lock in the triggers before everything went up - in the best tradition of the series everything came together brilliantly at the end as each of the team's lives were at risk, with derring-do, quick reactions and bold, split-second choices rushing out of the screen.

Perhaps the buildup getting to that end sequence was a little slower than we think of in the series, but there was some added interest from Kolveck adding a new player in the game, a third party to up the ante. Did he really have Pascal's money waiting at the other end of the tunnel, or associates waiting to shoot her? We'll never know. It's odd to see Ed and Ros switch roles, with Ed in control of the computer system while Ros rides his bike, but it's something that's often worked. Beckett being on the outside emphasises their solitariness, though it was good he was able to get to the other end of the connection at the Exchange. Their security doesn't seem all that good from the fact Beckett is able to walk straight back into the building claiming he lost his pager (same as Lacombe being able to smuggle in an automatic weapon to use on the guard's birthday party!), you'd think they'd have someone with him rather than let him wander the halls unaccompanied, unless he charmed whatever receptionist was there. I enjoyed his spiel about his boss making him wear it, as Beckett doesn't have a boss at this stage, but he would do the following year! The actors' traits were coming out a little more by this time, so when Ed's on his bike again, it feels right, but something else mentioned is after Alex breaks his handcuffs with a fire axe he says another inch to the right and he'd have never played guitar again, something we'd never seen Ed do, but which Craig McLachlan certainly did.

Ed also finds himself climbing horizontally along pipes again (like the escape in 'Hot Metal'), after being handcuffed to a pipe (like Beckett in 'Down Among The Dead Men'). There was one moment which looked like a genuine mistake: when Ed rides into the tunnel he skids and then there's a line which could very well have been added after the fact, where he says this place is a deathtrap. If it was added in in response to the skid then I like that attention to detail and the fact they kept that moment in instead of doing another take. It's possible it was all planned, but it's not really important to the story, other than, I suppose, as setup for Ros chasing the villains at the end. I loved Ed's line about keeping the lid on the kettle, a nice analogy for this boiling reactor that's getting too hot without the triggers. Usually computer voices remain entirely calm and emotionless, so it made a change to hear one that was getting more and more agitated, almost panicking. I think a calm voice in a life or death situation can be more chilling since a computer has no actual concern about what's happening, it's just following its warning programming, but it fits with this series that instead it gets more and more agitated: you're all about to die, get out before it's too late! The only thing is, as great as Ed and Alex' solution to giving Ros more time by letting out the coolant so it sinks down to the reactor, it made the stuff look less dangerous than earlier when Ros pulled Ed out of harm's way - here he's getting a face full of the stuff and is fine!

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