Back in
the day, the very late 70s or perhaps the early 80s, there was a time
when children were actually catered to in the daytime schedules on
BBC1.
At
Christmas, Easter, and most excitingly in the long summer holiday,
children's TV was shown in the early morning AS WELL AS in the
afternoon by the Beeb. It was superior stuff too, because instead of
the childish Play School, and to me the earnest, boring and tedious
Jackanory and Blue Peter, you got action!
By
action, I mean staples like Champion the Wonder Horse (“like a
something something arrow from a bow”) - in which use of the dog
Rebel was the most interesting thing to me – and Eastern European
seeming stories like “Down on the Danube Delta”, “Silas”,
ummm, the one with the cities at war; where all the children were
dubbed into posh prep school, and all adults were as gruff as Tommy
Vance after a Fisherman's Friend. Heidi was also doing the rounds at
this time, but I dismissed that as far too girly and cissy.
The
big treat however, for a young boy who thanks to an eccentric sea
captain from Scotland was already a massive space fan, was a showing
of Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars. I think I was possibly staying with
my grandparents near Sellafield (true!) when the 15 or so 20 minute
episodes from the 30s were shown in morning matinee fashion, with the
voiceovered cliffhanger at the end.
I
don't really remember the storyline of this at all, but the penile
rocket ships with the drone of a World War 1 aircraft and a sparkler
for an engine were present and correct. So was Ming, Dale, Aura,
Barin, and I think the Hawkmen too. There might have been sort of
“clay men” living in underground caves too. The presiding Flash
was Olympic swimming gold medalist Buster Crabbe with his
immaculately stylish hair.
For
a children's show, there was something quite horrendous thrown in.
1930s torture porn in a sci fi sense. This was seen in the shape of
the terrifying “Evaporation Chamber” where Flash, Barin and Co
found themselves thrown in more than once for Ming's pleasure.
What
was evaporating about it, I'm still not clear about. It resembled a
sort of electrical playroom which General Pinochet's secret police
would have had massive wet dreams over. Huge Tesla coils crackled and
spat bolts of electricity between their arcs, and these conical
devices shot showers of sparks over our writhing heroes.
Whatever
the evaporation was, it was clearly very painful and I certainly
didn't want it happening to me. I had nightmares about it a few
times, and I was always afraid that I'd go into a big shop and find
those big Tesla Coils waiting for me.
These
big shops were already scary enough to a child. They had those slowly
moving cameras that looked like Death Star Imperial pain droids.
Brrrrrrrrr....
Copyright
Bloody Mulberry 27.12.13
No comments:
Post a Comment