THE SKY IS FALLING
WRITER-BARNEY SLATER AND HERMAN GROVES
DIR-SOBEY MARTIN
STORY-HERMAN GROVES
NARRATION: Last week as you recall, the incorrigible Dr. Smith had once again slipped away from his assigned chores at the campsite. At this moment, however, neither he nor the other members of our space family were aware that they were shortly to encounter an incredible, mechanical creature from a far distant, alien world.
TEASER-fully recapped however the opening scene is one shot of Smith sleeping--a different take than the one they started with last week--this shot here seems to be taken just after Judy left Smith and we also see a very different shot of the Robot---with his arms out of his body.
Smith sleeps, his head against the back of the rock. The Robot is standing nearby, with his arms outside himself. Holding a bucket of vegetables, Judy comes and tells the doctor that Don wants his help at the drill site. Smith asks her to sit. She does and they look up into the sky. Smith says when there is something up there--he'll be the first to see it and alert the camp. Judy says, "Oh, Dr. Smith, you're incredible, absolutely incredible." Smith smiles, "Indeed, don't you ever want to leave this ghastly planet?" Judy says, "Of course I do, but its living in a dream world, Dr. Smith, to ever think a rescue mission from Earth can ever find us here." Smith says, "Perhaps not from Earth, but I'd welcome any form of intelligent life that might conceivably help us--a hands across outer space so to speak." Judy sarcastically but gently says, "I think I better let you get back to your work." She leaves. Near Smith, bushes move as Smith goes back to sleep, the back of his head against the rock. Taking his arms out now, the Robot says, "Approach of alien object." Smith tells him to be quiet--"One more word and I'll remove your power pack." From the bush, a metal crab creature comes out with a central claw and two spiked balls on the end of two long arms on either side. It whirs as it moves at him. He sees it and is unable to move. It has lower tusks and a large light on its nose, two metal silvery eyes. "Keep away from me!" (CLIFFHANGER ENDED HERE WITH A CLOSE UP OF THE CRAB). The claw comes right up to his face but stops after he screams loudly. It moves back. Smith crawls off and gets up and runs. It follows him. Smith runs back through camp, dragging Penny, who was preparing something in a bowl on the table outside camp. He takes her into the spaceship and closes the door, yelling for someone to help. John, Don, Judy, and Will come running into the Control Room. Smith warns them about a horde of mechanical monsters, telling John there must be hundreds, thousands. When John stares, Smith asks, "You doubt my word?" He tells them he has an ESP about danger. Will looks out the porthole and sees it. Will is joined by Penny and John. Penny calls it a little thing, harmless. Smith asks John if he is going to take a mere child's word over his "mine." John just turns and looks at him as if to say, "Yes." He looks back. Penny asks her dad what it is. He tells her they can take a closer look on the monitor. The crab comes up the ramp and stops at the door. Don looks, "It's dematerializing." John asks, "What?" "It's dematerializing!" Don repeats. It slowly vanishes and then reappears slowly on the other side of the door in the airlock which is open. It comes in at them. John moves Will and Penny back. Smith holds Will in front of him; Don and Judy hold onto Penny. John shields them all.
ACT ONE
Freeze frame on metal crab. DERELICT and HUNGRY SEA music. It moves in some more. Will moves toward it and it stops when his foot accidentally hits it. John picks it up and takes it to the lab below. Don asks Smith where he is going--they will need Smith's help in the lab--need his overly intelligent observations. Smith wants to rest. We get a nice inside view of the viewport roof and interior area. Lab--Will and John change the antenna. John figures the central control unit has a selective computer that runs it--allowing free choice. It can matter transfer--a wild theory that says molecular structure can be broken down and reassembled at another point. John also figures intelligent life made this thing. Smith advises to destroy it. Will asks, "Why? It isn't doing us any harm." Smith notes, "As always you speak with the trusting innocence of youth." John figures it is a harmless data computer--taking rock samples and atmospheric samples. Don says, "Someone or something is making tests to see if the planet is conducive to another form of life." Smith wants to destroy it; Don says that's his solution for everything, "You're a self centered, selfish individual whose primary concern is only one thing--for himself." John stops them from arguing as usual. Smith goes to the galley to feed his inner man. When they all walk off, the metal crab's light goes on and it turns slightly. Smith tells Will to sit beside him. Maureen has sent the girls to the garden to get some vegetables for dinner, a task she assigned to Dr. Smith. Maureen says the crab resembles a large BUG. Don asks Smith where the Robot is and Will covers for Smith--he will go get it. Maureen goes to cut the cake and it vanishes. Will puts his head on his hands, "Oh no." Smith calls it a cruel adversary they are facing, John disputes this--they just wanted the cake as a specimen. Smith storms out, "What happens when they decide they need a human being for a specimen!" John and Don search a rocky area near a rock wall. Will is rock hunting when he sees a ray. A beam of light brings down some type of large ball amid a platform disk around it. An alien man appears wearing a pendant and headband. Will says, "Hello there, I'm William Robinson from the planet Earth."
ACT TWO
The alien cannot talk. Will runs to John and Don, telling them he saw it. John tells him, "Before you jump into anything, I want you to stop, think, and consult me." They go to the device, the man is gone, and John figures the device is a regenerator to reassemble matter. He wonders whether they are friend or enemy. When they leave, the alien man comes out from behind a rock. The men return to the Jupiter II where the girls and Smith have set the crab on a table outside. Penny tells John that Dr. Smith has programmed the Robot to compute the crab. Smith says, "You underestimate my abilities, Doctor Robinson." Don says, "Never mind the backslapping, activate the Robot." Robot tells them the aliens are warm blooded mammalians, 1.8 meters in height, 80 kilograms." He cannot give any further data. John says, "We're to treat our visitors with friendliness and kindness. I particularly want to stress that point to you Dr. Smith." Two more beams come out of the sky and they see them. Smith says, "It's positively raining aliens." He brings the Robot and the crab to a spot, telling the Robot to wait there for him. He figures the aliens have superior intelligence and so does he. For a brief moment we hear music from THE RELUCTANT STOWAWAY when John was putting on his helmet before going into the airlock). Smith arrives and their are more devices, one with a large mirror like device on top and larger circle platform floor. He brings the crab back and sees the alien doesn't understand about shaking hands. There are smoking things in the background. Smith tries to use hands to demonstrate what he means and seems to think thousands of aliens are coming from their planet. Smith knows all the rocks and caves on the planet and tells the man he can help them control "the natives" meaning the Robinson party. Smith denies the alien man his gun and pulls it on him when the alien gets too close. The lady alien gets a larger hand rifle. She gives it to the man. Will is by the rocks and a smaller alien boy sees him. He wears some kind of ties around his legs and the clothing looks very alien. Will tells the boy they are friends. Will shakes the alien boy's hand. The alien boy hears an alarm and runs off. Will shakes his head. Later, he tells the others at dinner that night (outside the ramp of the Jupiter II of course), "He was just like us except he dressed differently." John thinks the aliens are here to do what they originally set out to do--colonization. Smith arrives and tells them he went to the alien camp and that thousands will soon arrive---they are a small handful against thousands. Will knows he and the boy liked each other. Smith tells him, "An alien race, Will. Their emotional responses could be the direct opposite of our own. A laugh could mean deep hatred while a frown could be the friendliest of expressions." John forbids Smith to go to the alien camp site again, "We can live in peace provided we don't act prematurely." When Smith goes on about how evil the aliens are, Don asks, "Smith, have you ever in your life had a good thought?" Smith claims to be a realistic man and goes on and on about tens of thousands of aliens and on the other hand, the seven of them--John looks at Maureen and they both smile at this---Smith feels the aliens will put them in cages and make them sideshow freaks, "Hurry, hurry, hurry, see the freaks for only a quarter, folks." Will smiles and laughs at Smith and then looks at Maureen. Maureen tells him to please sit and eat but he can't. Smith feeling like a condemned man cannot even eat a hearty meal. He goes inside the spaceship, leaving the others befuddled. John stares, Don throws his napkin.
ACT THREE
The alien boy brings a ball to Will in the same rocky area. He gives it to Will and motions for the other boy to throw it. Will does and the ball turns (amid sound effects that would later be used for the Spindrift spaceship in LAND OF THE GIANTS and the doors on THE PROMISED PLANET in LOST's third season). Will laughs, "You can play catch with yourself." Will sneezes and says, "excuse me." The boy won't take the ball back. He lets Will keep it. Suddenly, the boy drops and the ball falls as Will brings the hurt boy to a cave to rest. John comes out of Jupiter II with Judy, talking, "Oh, Dad, really..." She laughs as he says, "I'm telling you, that's the way it is." They both go out to see a worried Maureen, who says she is just being a mother. John says, "Darling, you want me to go look for him? I'll call Don and we'll leave right now." He goes, Judy and Maureen smile as he goes off. The alien mother is worried about the alien boy. It is getting dark over the land. Will watches over the boy. We see a long shot of the planet. Don and John have laser rifles--Don's looks very odd. The alien man finds the ball of his boy (son?). Outside, the Jupiter, Smith asks The Robot the time. Robot answers--19 hundred and 32 hours. Smith says, "I mean the real time, not the space jargon." Smith suspects foul play has befallen their young Will and he needs every tool at his disposal to convince the Robinsons of the aliens' evil intent. He tells the Robot to shut up when the Robot tells him there is no evidence that the aliens are evil minded. Smith tells him when there is emotion involved, there is no need for evidence--"the right word in the right ear at the right time." Smith tells the Robot, "Don't look at me like that." Robot says, "I do not look. I merely stand." "You're probably thinking what kind of man would use a parent's love for his own preservation...and you're exactly right--my kind of man." He goes in to find a cheerful Judy trying to cheer up Maureen. He says, "Well, two of the loveliest ladies on this planet or any other planet for that matter." He calls Maureen a pioneer spirit of old, a Spartan woman who remains calm and hopeful while her only male offspring could be suffering indescribable torture at the hands of the enemy." Judy yells at him to stop it but he goes on. Maureen tells him, "He's only a little boy." Smith says, "Who knows after all they are beings from an unknown world." Penny comes down the ladder, "Mom! Dad's back!" She rushes up, followed by Smith. Judy and Maureen go up on the elevator. John goes inside, moving past and ignoring Smith. Don talks to Smith and tells him to keep his opinions to himself, "Ever since those aliens landed, you've been telling us what great danger we're in--well maybe we are but until something happens shut up." When Smith responds, Don tells him, "Shove off of it!" He moves to hit Smith but Smith runs away. The alien parents cannot drink their smoking liquid or eat alien food. They worry. DERELICT music. Maureen moves outside to John at night--telling him his dinner is cold. John is not hungry and she tells him she isn't either. Night, after dinner, Penny solemnly helps Maureen clean up but Maureen stops her, "Is there something you want to tell me?" Penny says, "You always know when I have a problem." Maureen smiles, "It's an instinct all mothers have." Penny was talking to Dr. Smith about the aliens. Maureen says, "I already know what Dr. Smith thinks." Penny says, "Mom, I think he's right." Maureen says, "Well, maybe he is--I just don't know." Penny says she talked to Judy and she feels the same way. They should go to the alien camp. Maureen tells her to start cleaning up and she will be right back. She goes to her cabin and shuts the door behind her, waiting for a resting John to tell her he is not asleep. He was thinking about Will. Maureen sits close to him, "So is everybody else." John wants to go to the alien camp site--one minute it is yes, the other no. John goes on, "You see, if we, if we were on earth, I'd know exactly how to handle the situation but in this alien world with alien people and alien morality..." Maureen stops him and says, "I know..." John continues, "It'd be just two easy to make mistakes...and I don't want to do anything we'll all be sorry for later." Later, still dark but almost dawn, John finds Don fiddling with a plant branch or leaf. He tells Don that Maureen is handling it as well as could be expected. They try to figure out the aliens and why they haven't tried outright aggression before. Don says, "You know as much as I hate to admit it, Smith could be right." Will liked the boy but Don reminds him Will didn't meet the parents. John muses, "It seems youngsters from everywhere can get along...it's the...the adults who are always at each other's throats." HOLD ON HERE A MINUTE NOTE: This was true in 1965 and maybe even 1966 but today, today's children in 1997--the REAL 1997-not the 1997 of LOST IN SPACE---children cannot get along any better than their parents or any adults--in fact, children probably get along worse than adults--not having any respect for differences in each other--and, not to be so pessimistic--I've seen so called liberal kids of liberal parents--put down others more than anyone else. Okay. John tells Don, "Well, I hate to start a fight but I will." It will be dawn in a few hours and then they will go to the alien camp site--he tells Don he better get some sleep. Don leaves him alone to think about this.
ACT FOUR
Early dawn over the alien landscape: John and Don exit the Jupiter II with a just awakened Smith, Maureen, and Judy. John tells Maureen to keep the forcefield on and then tells Smith he is going with them against his will. Smith didn't want to take a rifle but does. Judy touches Don's arm, "Don, oh never mind." Don leaves. Will is resting in the cave. The boy wakes up and Will tries to take him home, helping out of the cave. John, Don, and Smith pass beyond rocks, Smith still protesting and trying to get to stay behind the rocks. John says, "You're coming with us, Dr. Smith." The alien man gets his hand rifle gun while the woman alien moves behind a rock with a rifle. Don pushes Smith ahead. John goes out to the man and tells the other two, "No shooting unless he starts." John puts his gun down and gives Will's height but the man corrects to his boy's smaller height. The woman peeks out and Smith thinks she is going to fire so he shoots at her. He hits a rock near her. John throws the alien man's gun down and runs, getting his own gun. The woman fires a slinky shaped ray at their rock hiding place. NOTE: If you look close the alien man takes the gun from her in a long shot, then in closer up--he takes it again! John tells Smith, "You just lost your nerve." Will lays the boy near a rock behind him and goes to John, Don, and Smith, telling them what happened. Smith scolds him, "None of this would have happened if it hadn't been for you." They each thought the other had each other's boy. Don says, "They'll think we had him all along." John tells him he is going to bring them their boy. Don protests, "Listen someone oughta be out there with you in case your ideas on universal brotherhood don't work out." John says, "Well, they better work out. Smith's right about one thing--before long there'll be thousands of them down here. This is our only chance to survive with them." John goes. Will says, "If there were only some way we could talk to them." John goes to the boy, "Don't be frightened." He is careful not to scare him and carries him back to his father and mother. NOTE: We can see the rocks around the alien base were cut out and down by the aliens to be straight on one side. The mother goes to the boy and then points to John, meaning for the husband to kill him with the gun.
TAG-unusual in that it is separate from the cliffhanger by an ad.
Don tells Smith, "John said not to shoot." Will jumps out in front of John; John pushes Will down, "Will, get out of here!" The man looks at Will. The boy moves to Will and shakes his hand and the adults see this. The alien boy looks at the man (some kind of communication?). The man throws his gun down. John gets it and returns it; John hugs Will's head as they return to the other two. The aliens beam up in the ray and their equipment all vanishes. When Will sneezed, he contaminated the air. Even though the anti-biotics cured him (did we see this?), the aliens had to leave. Will tells Smith to throw the ball but Smith turns around after he does--and the ball returns as Will tells Smith and the ball hits the doctor in the head. "Now he tells me." Don and John laugh. They leave; John reminds Will, "Get your ball, Will." Will says, "OK."
CLIFFHANGER-Smith yawns as he rests, goggles on, on a lounge chair near Will who is working on the Chariot with controls on a table in front of the vehicle. Smith tells Will, "You see, Will, even as a boy, I was determined to become a scientist--to work for the betterment of mankind." Will tells Don it is the centrifical repressor. After some verbal sparring, Don threatens Smith with a wrench if Smith doesn't help. Smith asks what are Don's orders and Don asks him to take the fuel cell to the back of the Chariot and leave it there for him to work on later. Smith jokes about Don being a capitan and Don warns him to be careful with the fuel cell--it can explode on contact with air. "Never fear, Smith is here," Smith says, and goes to the back. Don asks, "I don't know why we bother with him, Will." Will tells him, "Dr. Smith has some good qualities." Don has yet to see any. Instead of putting it on the ground, Smith drops it. It lands and a small light goes on. Smith tells Don he wants to go to his cabin--he's weary. Don says, "You're always tired and hungry, that's your natural state." When we next see the fuel cylinder, it is smoking (and NOTE: it is not in the same position Smith dropped it in--it is turned on another side!). Smith goes to the ramp. Will smells something. Don does too, now, and gets up and runs toward the back of the Chariot, "The fuel cell. Get back! It could explode at any second!" Smith turns at the door of the ship and watches, in horror. Don grabs it up and tosses it. There is a rip roaring blast that seems to engulf Don!
TO BE CONTINUED NEXT WEEK, SAME TIME, SAME CHANNEL
REVIEW: Will's line of "If there were only some way we cold talk to them," could almost be translated to the SPACE: 1999 episode SPACE BRAIN and in fact, Helena Russell says something similar at the end of that episode, "If only we could have communicated." THE SKY IF FALLING is very good LOST IN SPACE. Smith seems to have a few good points and the others note this but he is, after all, still the villain and still a prejudiced person. Some promo material and other books mention that the alien man is called Rethso, the woman Moela---these names are in the credits for the aliens. The boy doesn't seem to have a name. There is also some material that states these aliens are called Taurons. This may be in the script but is not stated in the episode at all. The boy's name is Lunon but this is not in the credits nor stated in the episode. In fact the actor who played the boy, supposedly Eddie Rosson, is not even credited in the end credits at all. This annoyance would cross over all Irwin Allen shows--the credits not listing the characters' correct names at times--if listed at all--or listing the wrong names which were from preliminary scripts or listing "The Alien" or "The captain". Sometimes, the aliens or monsters didn't have a name but at other times, names were given on screen which were not given on the credits--merely given as "the monster" or something like that. Other times, no credit is given at all.
This episode is one of the best. The language barrier was an interesting one and handled quite well--perhaps the first time it was distinctly handled in a prime time science fiction show. STAR TREK is always, wrongly, declared as the show of "universal brotherhood" but this is really not true--LOST IN SPACE is. While LOST IN SPACE may have had aliens in it from the second episode on, the true "bad" guy was Dr. Smith. Not the Derelict Blobs, the Taurons, or even the Invaders from the 5th Dimension--and these may have been from some kind of twisted Earth in an anti universe--not really aliens from another planet at all. The monsters that were just life forms and animals--the Cyclops, the electric tumbleweed, the man eating plants, etc---were also "bad guys" but not because they knew any better. If anything, it is STAR TREK with its Communists, Klingons, Romulans, Gorns, Tholians, and other hostile life forms that exhibit war like tendencies that marks THAT show as having aliens as Bad Guys. True, LOST IN SPACE turned that way in a way but not yet. Whole races of aliens were not evil minded yet. That would come with THE LOST CIVILIZATION, THE DEADLY GAMES OF GAMMA 6 and perhaps a few others--such as the Sobrams (THE FLAMING PLANET) and TARGET: EARTH's blobs.