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“End of
Eternity” |
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The Alphans open
Pandora’s Box when they free an imprisoned man trapped within a passing
asteroid, unleashing a vicious, sadistic — and immortal — killer into their
midst. Writer: Johnny
Byrne Director: Ray
Austin Guest Cast Peter Bowles as Balor Jim Smilie as Pete Baxter |
Meet Balor.
The people of his world have achieved immortality, which you might think is a good thing, but living forever has its one downside: it’s boring. When Balor
got bored, he chose to pass the time torturing and killing people. It wasn’t that big a deal, of course, because they always reverted back to being alive and unscathed afterwards, but still, you can imagine it would
get terribly annoying after a while. So they sealed the nasty bloke up in an
asteroid and hurled it out into space. It eventually encounters the runaway
moon and the Alphans who live on it, and of course, they let him out. Bad
mistake. Like “Death’s Other Dominion” and “The
Infernal Machine” this episode examines the true implications of
immortality, especially when it falls into the wrong hands. Balor is just
plain creepy, from the evil in his eyes to his black suit that would be the
envy of any S&M enthusiast. And he’s deliciously evil and delightfully psychotic.
And to make him even harder to defeat, he’s immortal! The deal is simple, if
the Alphans will let Balor thrash them to death on a daily basis, he’ll bring
them back to life afterwards. That’s not a hard decision for Koenig to make.
(“Hmm, let’s see... how about... ‘no’.”) But Balor doesn’t like taking no for
an answer, and so he turns into a really mean person. Peter Bowles is
perfectly menacing in the role, with those piercing eyes and that almost
sadistically sarcastic demeanor. To Space: 1999 fans, he is an icon
representing the deepest, darkest things in the heart of man. After all, isn’t
there maybe just a little bit of Balor in all of us…? |
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RELATED PAGES: [Ken Scott] [Martin Willey] |
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Alpha
Chronicle Online ©2001 by Matt Butts. Space: 1999 ©1975 Carlton
International Media, |
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