Review STAR COPS: LITTLE GREEN MEN AND OTHER MARTIANS - Episode 09

[Doctor Omega]

Your thoughts on this, the final episode.....

Rumours swell of alien artefacts discovered on Mars. An attempt is made to kill Nathan Spring as he investigates drug smuggling and the deaths of two pilots.

Back to the start, with the very first episode....

YOUR JOURNEY INTO STAR COPS STARTS HERE:
AN INSTINCT FOR MURDER

https://www.imdforums.com/threads/your-journey-into-star-cops-starts-here.581/


Back to the previous episode....

DEATH ON THE MOON

https://www.imdforums.com/threads/death-on-the-moon-episode-cancelled.3545/

 

[michaellevenson]

First thing to say is that the political byplay between Larwood andKenzy was meant to be Larwood and Theroux, but Erik Ray Evans non-appearance due to illness meant a change to the script.
This is a clever and quite complex story that I didn't fully get first time round. The duplicity of Krevenko shows he is a Russian patriot at heart.
Dr Philpott must have been a bit of a psycho already to commit mass murder to cover up his attempted swindle of the Hoaldy Museum. The idea of fake Martian artifacts being really Mayan art smuggled onto Mars for a con is so clever.
Nice to know Kenzy did do creative spitting as part of her art degree.
Great final episode to the series . It is a real shame that there was no more. I'd love Big Finish to take it up.
What did happen between Nathan and Pal Kenzy? I've got to find out!!

 

[Doctor Omega]

One of my favourite episodes. I find a bit of a parallel with this episode and the Moonbase 3 episode where the alien creature killing people on the moon turns out to be something much more mundane. Again, this episode suggests something extra terrestrial is going on at first - and then the truth is gradually revealed. The Larwood character has some nice exchanges, particularly with Pal Kenzie.

So a good, solid episode to end on, much like Moonbase 3.

And then it was all over.

In retrospect, it was perhaps miraculous that this series got commissioned at all in the first place in a BBC that, at the time, where the suits in charge hated science fiction. But we got nine episodes out of it and a small, but faithful following to this day - after quite a few years of being almost forgotten, perhaps?

So yes, I like to think that the story for the original STAR COPS isn't quite over - and if the story picks up with a reboot that has nothing to do with the original STAR COPS, then I don't think I will be overly interested. Too many classics of old get royally screwed by a modern makeover, of course.

Here's to STAR COPS! You were fun while you lasted.

 

[ant-mac]

Well, well, in case you've been wondering about it, it seems episode 6 is still stuck at the top and ever since I've been stripped of my Contributor superpowers, there's nothing I can do about it.

Well, you could act like any other standard member would, by sending a request to a staff member, indicating what you would like done.

Michael manages superbly without any extra "superpowers". What's stopping you?

 

[ant-mac]

I did. I sent you a message last week with no response. I figured there would be greater chances you'd notice a more enticing one like this, and I was right, apparently.

I don't know... But I'm going out on a limb here. Perhaps because you answer *his* messages? That might work.
Now that you honor me with a reply? Nothing, sir! Now the sky is the limit!

And what message was this? Was it a public message? A private message? E-mail? Snail mail? I received nothing.

By the way, as you are aware, I am not the only staff member. There are three others, two of whom are present either frequently or at least regularly. What stopped you from contacting one of them when you received no reply from me?

For the record, if at first I don't succeed, I try again.

 

[ant-mac]

By the way, you just replied to give me a spirited answer? Because episode 6 is still up, and #9 isn't.

So, do you wish to have episode 6 removed and episode 9 pinned up?

What about episodes 7 and 8?

 

[ant-mac]

Well, I think only the current week's episode should be pinned, so I'd go with episode 9 only, please.

Done.

 

[ant-mac]

It was a telepathic message. (Kidding!) It was a conversation under the title "Contributor", which we used for communication other times and I added another entry to it. Is there a preferred way of contacting you when necessary?

I periodically clean out my inventory of PM conversations and remove ones that have been inactive for some time.

CONTRIBUTOR is one such example. I deleted it from my inventory some months ago.

If you wish to make a request to a staff member, simply send them a new PM.

Oh, but you are my favorite one. And by that I mean, the only one I ever talked to and I'm not even sure who the others are. But I suppose I can find that out somewhere on this site.

It's not difficult for you to find out.

Click on the MEMBERS tab at the top of the page. Then click on the STAFF MEMBERS tab and a partial list of staff members is provided.

It's not difficult, it simply takes a little effort.

Alternatively, as I previously pointed out to you in a PM, administrators are red and moderators are green. So simply remain vigilant for a post by one of them.

Well, I just posted the comment to our conversation and didn't give another thought to it, at least until I checked the board again. But, sure I could've insisted. Anyway, that's not that a big deal.

Yes, all it would have taken was a little bit of initiative and effort.

It seems to me that pinning was a nice feature if you could just add it to the post when you wrote it, would pin it and see how it looked and perhaps would undo it and try something different. But if changing something that simple becomes bureaucratic, I don't think it's really worth the hassle. In other forums we didn't have that and things worked fine. I guess this would be a vital feature in message boards that have many, many comments posted constantly, and the entry about the latest episode could disappear under an avalanche of posts on older episodes. But that has never been the case with single-season shows for us, with just a handful of comments.

Well, if you think it's an important feature that everyone should have access to, make a post about it in FEEDBACK & SUGGESTIONS forum.

Or, alternatively, send Alex a PM.

Thanks for taking care of that anyway.

You're welcome.

 

[Brimfin]

Well, it’s hard to believe we’ve reached the end of this series already. What a difference between this experience and TWIN PEAKS. There was no sense of finality as they had still intended to do one more episode but it didn’t pan out. The good news is that the series ends on a good episode. The main complaint about it was that it had too many ingredients. There was so much going on, it was hard to keep up with it all. There was even a line in the script about keeping up with all the goings-on.

This one teases us with a mission to Mars that ends with the astronaut finding something buried in the soil but not telling us what. Rumors about that it might be an actual Martian or some other Earth-shattering (or maybe Mars-shattering) item. Meanwhile, an inspection of a spaceship reveals an old statute hidden on the ship – not drugs or radioactive materials or anything else they were expecting. It’s a little while later that Kenzy sees it and realizes it’s actually a valuable piece of pre-Colombian art. But who was smuggling it, and why?

There’s also the deaths of two pilots – one a female who dies in a crash while flying low over the Moon, the other a male who dies just before meeting a reporter and telling him “I…Dee…Two” or something, which he doesn’t tell Nathan about until much later. Yes, we also have that reporter rummaging around who apparently gave the subject of his pieces a bad reputation so he isn’t very popular. He’s even a former teacher of Kenzy, who is disillusioned by him now. He has a flask which he carries around and drinks in front of people. Pal finds out it just contains water, though she also finds out he has a stash of real booze in his luggage. Apparently, he likes to catch people off guard by pretending to be drunk.

Theroux isn’t around this week – he’s on Earth rest. (In reality, he had chicken pox and so he was absent and some of his lines ended up delegated to others.) Meanwhile, Nathan is headed on a long trip to Mars. I never could catch exactly why he was going there. He no sooner heads out toward Mars leaving a message behind before the entire ship explodes and he is apparently killed. Lucky for him, he changed his mind at the last minute and thus lived to see another day. It was a good chance to see how his team reacted to his death and his subsequent survival. Kenzy was genuinely sad to see him go and then delighted to find him still alive. She’s truly grown fond of the man who started out as her adversary.

The crux of the story – the connecting element between the deaths, the smuggling and the reporter (who was tipped off about the possibility) was that it was an elaborate ruse to plan a piece of Mayan sculpture on Mars to be found by the explorer back in the teaser. That would make it appear that the Mayans or their mentors really were space explorers (as some have genuinely speculated) and that they had visited Mars as well. This would make the sculpture rare and valuable and the museum would get possession of it and have a priceless exhibit for life. When the plan began to unravel, they started to kill everyone and destroy everything to cover it up. This leads to an exciting climax where the museum curator tries to set off an explosion that will kill everyone (himself included) in order to destroy the one piece of holographic photography to prove that the sculpture was from Earth and planted on the moon. While Nathan struggles to keep the man from pushing the button, Kenzy frantically tries to disarm the charge, which she does with about half a second to spare. Whew! Those dying words the reporter heard were actually ID2, referring to the dead female pilot’s second ID badge which had the photo hidden behind it.

I know I haven’t gotten all the elements in there, and probably have a few wrong, as I have done before. This is one script I’d love to have a copy of so that I could catch all the dialogue, as I know I missed a lot of good lines and couldn’t write down the ones I caught fast enough. The ones that I caught below were written quickly, and in some cases, I wasn't sure who said them.

(paraphrasing)
(talking about a disparaging article Daniel Harwood wrote about cops:
Nathan: I’m not passing judgment.
Daniel: A lot of your colleagues were willing to be judges. They volunteered to be jury and executioner, too. I took to carrying a gun around.
Nathan: Some people get carried away.
Daniel: Yes…in body bags. That’s what I was worried about. But you’ll protect me here.
Nathan: Yes, I’ll protect you… and everyone else who obeys the laws here.

“Colin Devis is not as stupid as he pretends to be.”
“Who could be?”

Devis?: So you’re not looking for any particular story?
Daniel: No, I’m not that particular any more.
Kenzy: Were you ever?

Nathan: I just don’t want to see things fall apart here while I’m on my way to Mars.
Kenzy: That’s not a problem. There’s no video link between here and Mars.

“Is it even possible to expect a surprise?”

(After being told someone died too young)
“Who’s ever old enough to die?”

Besides the fun dialogue, there are some good models and special effects. The Mars rover is a different design than the Moon rover. There’s a crash from the pilot’s point of view, primarily to save money on the effects but clever nonetheless. And there’s a spectacular explosion of the Mars shuttle ship that Nathan was supposed to be on. Overall, I’ll give the episode 9 harried female workers, who have to deal with all that extra space traffic when Mars is much closer to Earth than usual.

And the final line of dialogue is “Anyone for Mars?” Okay, not a great line to end on. It hardly compares to “Land sakes, I’m on fire.” from The Time Tunnel. But overall STAR COPS was an enjoyable series and I’m glad the Sages stayed around to get to it. The cast was great and the show was surprisingly timely for having been made 30 years ago. I did love the theme, especially the way the STAR COPS logo appears when they sing, “Reach across the stars…” I can understand why some viewers thought the theme music inappropriate for a sci-fi drama, but the song was just so good, I couldn’t help but love it – especially at the end when it played full length. One line I got a kick out of was after, “Send out the word” “I’ll remem-ber you.” At first it sounded like “Are we men?” before I’d hear the "ber you" and realize what was actually said. And that always reminded me of that song by Devo where they say, “Are we not men? We are Devo.” Okay, just wanted to share that.

Well, I’m hoping the Sages can stay together and head on to another series. We’ll soon know. I'll try to get to my By the Numbers ASAP, but I'm just running way behind now in just about everything I am doing.

 

[michaellevenson]

Yes a great way to end, and I agree with all of Brimfin's assessment, I'll add that Krivenko's deception to secure Russia's the first to exhibit the Martian added to his character
9/10
Unusual for a show with so few episodes to have a devoted fan base after 30 years, but that says a lot about its quality. A new 8 episode series for audio will be released this year, with Calder , Linda Newton and Trevor Cooper reprising their roles.
The show failed not because of the acting or writing or anything about the show itself ,but because basically the BBC sabotaged it! Seriously.
They had been recently humiliated when attempts to cancel Dr Who led to actors and pop stars releasing a record about saving the Doctor, and they had to back down. The hierarchy just didn't like Sci Fi, and made no attempt to push Star Cops or give it a decent transmission time. At the time in Britain we had four tv stations and that's all, Star Cops was on BBC 2 -8.30-9.30 pm, the other three stations ran programs 8-9 followed by 9-10, meaning to watch Star Cops you'd have to leave an 8 O'clock show halfway and join a 9 O'clock one midpoint after Star Cops finished. Or take two hours out of your evening viewing to watch an hour show. It never stood a chance. Okay rant over ,sorry.

 

[michaellevenson]

Ha! It’s ironic how this show started so “grounded” and realistic, with a space shuttle not much different from the last ones used and a modest space station orbiting the earth pretty much like the ISS, and then the writers got carried away and all of a sudden we had large moon bases, luxury passenger spaceships going back and forth from earth, to the moon and back to earth. And now we learn man has reached Mars and astronauts are doing routine exploration missions there.

However before I move on with the episode, let’s talk about the movie “The Flight of the Phoenix” instead. In it, a group of airplane passengers are stranded in the middle of a desert and the only way for them to survive is to build another airplane from the remains of the airplane that got them there. There’s a dramatic scene in which one of the survivors gets the propeller to move in order to get the engine starter and it fails. They only have a handful of spark plugs I think that will give the initial spark necessary for the engine to work and each attempt consumes one of the available devices. If they run out of sparkers, the airplane can no longer take off.

The reason I’m telling you this is that I find this scene offers an interesting analogy to Star Cops. Let’s say the story can be divided into four parts: introduction, preparation, momentum and climax. The “momentum” phase would be crucial, because that’s when the story goes running seemingly by itself because of how good and exciting it is.

And that’s the issue I have with Star Cops. Like in those failed attempts in “the Flight of the Phoenix,” the propeller starts, the engine sputters and goes “puk, puk, puk” but it never gains momentum and eventually dies down. The elements are there, the introduction was appropriate, the preparation was competent, but the airplane simply won’t take off. And then we have the climax, with a logical and well thought-out, though somewhat dry, explanation for everything.

I could be thinking that this is because English fiction on television until the end of last century was still deeply influenced by England’s tradition in the theater and in radio, so a natural way of presenting a dramatic situation would be having two people talking in a room having a calm and long conversation about it, a problem which I also observed in the few episodes of Blake’s 7 I saw. But then I think of UFO, for example, which suffered from none of such problems and, much to the contrary, had dynamic editing and story telling, or the Prisoner, or even Space: 1999. Those shows simply inhabit another universe Star Cops and Blake’s 7 would never conceive to exist.

The fact is, I can see now that British audiences must've been more lenient with low production values and a more morose story pacing, but what the producers of Star Cops failed to realize is that in 1987 it was getting much harder to get a way with such problems, which might have been overlooked in 1967 or even 1977. So, I honestly doubt a show with this general quality would've made into the 1990s with the competition of more professionally made shows.

Anyway, the premise was of this episode was good, and even though I expected the whole Martian incident to be a hoax, it would be nice if they at least suggested there could be some truth to it. And no, I never suspected Spring would have died.

I’d say the silver lining in this episode was the growth of Kenzy as a character. She was annoying in the beginning and her original hairstyle was flattering to her looks at all. To my surprise she became interesting, likable and even pretty, and her interaction with Nathan gave the human touch that elevated this episode a little over the rest, more mundane and bureaucratic writing.

Our final episode gets 6 underground cities anyone will be able to discover once they step on Mars just by digging a small whole on the ground.

Sorry you hated this show, I suppose it's a cultural thing. If you're used to fast paced American shows and grown up on them then this is a different world. But I don't think it makes Star Cops less worthy, just different. Brimfin an American enjoyed it as are most others here, so it's all a matter of taste I suppose.
Lumping Blakes7 in this category is unfair though, you said yourself you've only given that a few episodes, it was a leisurely almost, slow opening, but since all the seven are now behind Blake and his cause and the antagonists are truly involved, the psychotic Travis and cold bitch Servalan, there's plenty of action. What's surprised me is that you gave up so quickly on that show, equally surprising is Brimfin is leading the way having just done episode 9 a couple of days after episode 8, so I had better get moving and put episode 10's cast list on the appropriate thread.
In fact why don't you watch episode 9, see what you think, it'll be interesting to compare what you think of it with Brimfin's review. You needn't have watched the immediately preceding episodes to watch this, since you last watched B7 , Cally, an auburn haired telepath has joined the crew, and Space Commander Travis, a black leather clad , one eyed and with an artificial arm, has been appointed to capture Blake. In episode 9 Blake has to rescue a resistance fighter from a icebound planet but Travis is there already with a plan to not only get Blake but also capture The Liberator.

 

[Gavin]

This one was a bit of a mixed bag. Interesting concept with the expansion of the star cops to Mars and the idea of a smuggling ring. But there was a lot going on and it was hard to keep up with all the different things going on.

I’d say the silver lining in this episode was the growth of Kenzy as a character.

I liked that too - I wasn't keen on her character at first but she's grown on me and I think, if the show had continued, she'd have developed into a good third in command (and based on what they'd done with David Theroux's character so far - probably a better second in command than him).

I'm with @Mad-Pac on this though - I can see why the show didn't last. The pacing wasn't right for the stories (I'm not suggesting it needed to be non-stop action) but you could have cut at least 10 minutes from each episode without losing any story. The special effects were pretty ordinary for their time too (although the model work was excellent), which I suspect was a BBC budgeting issue (as far as I'm aware all shows got basically the same budget, regardless of their requirements). Shows like Doctor Who and Blake's 7 got away with it but by the late 80's audiences expected better from shows. That's one of the reasons Doctor Who ended up cancelled too.

I'll give this episode a 6 out of 10.

 

[Cloister56]

I always feel quite down when I reach the last episode of a tv series. The last time you hear the intro song, what will happen to the characters, what potential for future episodes has now been lost.

Unusual for a show with so few episodes to have a devoted fan base after 30 years, but that says a lot about its quality. A new 8 episode series for audio will be released this year, with Calder , Linda Newton and Trevor Cooper reprising their roles.

This has been a great thing for many shows including Doctor Who. When I listen to them I imagine Colin Baker as he was back then, the old structure (episodes with cliffhangers) can be kept. It allows a show to live on and evolve slowly as it might if it had continue on screen.

Anyway will I want to enlist with the Star Cops for their future adventures? Will the final episode convince me?

Have a built up my review enough? I think so.

So Humans have got their ass to Mars. The opening scenes with the buggy are very nice, I think the model work has generally been a great strength of the series. The red filter is quite nice, the CSO (I assume) sky not so much so until the sun explodes over the horizon, that was impressive.

An object found on Mars confirming life. It looks very Mayan, but then things get interesting when another identical object is found trying to be smuggled to Mars.

Larwood the journalist looks likes a wino when he arrives in his mac (although it is clean). Initially it seems like it's part of his act but was it to try and smuggle in his bottle of booze? I would have thought anything travelling up to space would be scanned and inspected within an inch of it's life.
He seems to be having no luck at first with both his contacts meeting sticky ends very soon after contact with him. The first was a freighter hopper pilot in what was a very grizzly death sequence. Then a mysterious man in a cargo hold with "merchandise".
Very intriguing.

The two were both pilots and were sharing the same quarters. I thought at first they had found another statue and wondered why Devis didn't mention the one he found but it seems it's the same one.

The death of Nathan was surprising. The reaction from everyone was well played. Usually I would have been expecting his return but the fact this is the last episode did make me consider the possibility but I think the series might have struggled without him if it had continued.
The show doesn't string (heh) it out too long and Kenzy's reaction to his survival is brilliant.

The final fight to prevent the curator detonating the bomb is very exciting with Kenzy desperately defusing the bomb while the curator reaches out.

I am still a little confused. They smuggle the Mayan statue onto Mars to be found. So what was the second statue being smuggled to Mars that Devis found. Were they hoping to generate more artifacts?

I've been very impressed with Kenzy during this series. She can be serious, bitchy, funny and is very capable.
Apart from Calder she is probably the stand out of the Star Cops.
She gets a great line this week.

Nathan: I just don’t want to see things fall apart here while I’m on my way to Mars.
Kenzy: That’s not a problem. There’s no video link between here and Mars.

I would hope she is the next in line to be the deputy.

And I agree with Gavin's thoughts:

I liked that too - I wasn't keen on her character at first but she's grown on me and I think, if the show had continued, she'd have developed into a good third in command (and based on what they'd done with David Theroux's character so far - probably a better second in command than him).

Theroux is absent from this episode and I'm sad to say I don't really miss him. He is my least favourite and his character hasn't seemed to grow over the series. He never seems to trust Nathan's instinct despite multiple episodes and he never seems that pleasant to the others having a short fuse.
Shoun could have been interesting, maybe with another series but what we saw past her intro episode didn't really impress.
Devis is great, his stories of previous wives, he does seem to have great respect for Nathan and is a great addition to the team.
Of course Nathan is excellent. A great lead to build the show around, flawed but with great investigatory ability and generally is quite likeable.
He handles Miss Caxton the reporter very well. Though the whole thing could have been avoided with a lock on the Star Cops office. His quips about he is the man to ask for directions and if you need the time, too a while to sink in but were amusing.
Looking at that my 3 favourites are all coming back for the Big Finish stuff, a tick in that column then.

And the final line of dialogue is “Anyone for Mars?”

I thought it was a great way to end. Extending the Star Cops reach, it does seem to be a little quick and I'm not sure what different stories they could set on Mars but it's a nice way to end.

Overall a really enjoyed this last episode and I will miss this show. I came to enjoy the theme tune despite feeling it was very out of place at the beginning.

9 ripples sending a message to the shore, out of 10.

 

[Gavin]

Theroux is absent from this episode and I'm sad to say I don't really miss him. He is my least favourite and his character hasn't seemed to grow over the series.

I thought the character had a lot of potential, but he was very inconsistently written even within individual episodes. There were signs of growth, only to have him revert a few scenes later.

 

[Cloister56]

I thought the character had a lot of potential, but he was very inconsistently written even within individual episodes. There were signs of growth, only to have him revert a few scenes later.

Yes that's exactly it. I kept thinking "ah now he see's where Nathan is coming from" only for him to push against him in the next episode or scene. I know someones character wouldn't change completely but he seemed to be making the same assumptions and mistakes again and again.

 

[Brimfin]

Star Cops - By the Numbers


I'm glad I waited a little longer before posting this. I not only got Clositer56's rating for the last episode, but Gavin also completed his rankings on the remainder of the episodes. So now, without further ado:

Fellow Sages of the Single Season here are the rankings for Star Cops:

Overall ranking for show (by averaging all episode rankings)
MichaelLevenson – 8.778
Ant-mac* - 8.000
Brimfin – 7.944
Simian Jack** – 7.833
Cloister56 – 7.556
Gavin – 6.778
Mad-pac – 6.556
(* Stopped reviewing after episode 5.)
(**Stopped reviewing after episode 4.)

Highest–ranked episodes by individuals
MichaelLevenson Conversations with the Dead, In Warm Blood (10)
Brimfin – In Warm Blood (10)
Cloister56 – Trivial Games and Paranoid Pursuits (9)
Mad-pac – In Warm Blood (9)
Simian Jack – Conversations with the Dead (9)
Gavin – A Double Life (9)

Highest-ranked episodes by overall ranking
In Warm Blood (8.60)
A Double Life (8.00)
Conversations with the Dead (7.86)

Lowest-ranked episodes by individuals
Mad-pac – Other People’s Secrets (4)
Gavin – This Case to be Opened in a Million Years (4)
Cloister56 – A Double Life, Other People’s Secrets (6)
Brimfin – Trivial Games and Paranoid Pursuits (6)
Simian Jack – An Instinct for Murder (6.5)
MichaelLevenson – Other People’s Secrets (7)

Lowest-ranked episodes by overall ratings
Other People’s Secrets (6.40)
This Case to be Opened in a Million Years (6.83)
An Instinct for Murder (7.43)

Most consistently-ranked episodes
Intelligent Listening for Beginners (9,8,8.8,8,7,6)
Trivial Games and Paranoid Pursuits (9,8,8,8,7,6)

Least consistently-ranked episodes
This Case to be Opened in a Million Years (9,8,8,7,5,4)
Other People’s Secrets (8,7,7,6,4)
Little Green Men and Other Martians (9,9,9,6,6)

Average episode ranking overall: 7.585, The highest ranked show since I’ve been doing these calculations.

1. Star Cops 7.585​
2. Total Recall 2070 7.281​
3. Brimstone 7.280​
4. Caprica 7.238​
5. The Middleman 6.992​
6. UFO 6.812​
7. The Prisoner (1967) 6.800​
8. The Prisoner (2005) 6.771​
9. Twin Peaks 6.638​
10. Kolchak: The Night Stalker 6.597​
11. Planet of the Apes 6.546​
12. Invasion: Earth 6.375​
13. Earth 2 6.256​

 

[Cloister56]

So Star Cops is definitively the greatest show ever made, very interesting.

 

[Gavin]

I imagine different people have different rating systems so some shows could be more generously rated than others. And some may rate quite harshly.

 

[michaellevenson]

Also of course The Sages aren't a stable group. New members come , others go from show to show. All we can say is that the particular Sages at this particular time for this particular show had a higher satisfaction rate than any previous Sages for a previous show.
I like Star Cops , but I wouldn't rate it above The Prisoner or UFO.

 

[michaellevenson]

Well, I'd say that this particular Sage, and by that I mean you, had a very high satisfaction with Star Cops, so the grades soared to the skies like Apollo 11.


Is that so? Sorry, but I couldn't let this one pass. I got curious so I checked. Here are your grades as far as I could retrieve them:

The Prisoner (eps 10 to 17)
3, 7, 10, 1, 10, 6, 9, 9 - Average: 6.875

UFO (eps 2 + 4 through 7 + 10 through 26)
9, 7, 9, 5, 9, 9, 5, 10, 9, 8, 9, 6.5, 10, 9, 4 - Average: 7.9

Star Cops (eps 1 through 9)
9, 10, 9, 8, 9, 10, 8, 7, 9 - Average: 8.77

So, yes, if you give a nine-episode show two tens and four nines, a show goes all the way up. And that convinces me Star Cops not only rewrote the rules of television as a means of communication, but also redefined British culture itself.

Well three of my favourite Prisoner episodes are in the first 6 eps, so that would shoot up the average.
But if I had a choice , that being I could only ever see two of the three shows again, it would be goodbye Star Cops, two totally inventive and unique shows like The Prisoner and UFO I couldn't never watch again. Also the greater number of episodes in UFO means more good marks, poor marks and average ones, so 4x9 marks in SC has a greater impact than the 7x9 I can see I gave for UFO.
Anyway flattered my old ratings fascinate you.