Space Academy - Phantom Planet

Space Academy debuted the year of my birth. Born in August of 1977, this show was in September. I had never heard of it until my uncle mentioned it to me in 2010. I often talk about my uncle because he was such an influence. 2009 – 2011 was not an easy time for me, truthfully. I was spending time at my uncle’s to work on assignments as I returned to college after losing a job I had for twelve years. Tense time in my life, for sure. But 2010 was also quite special. My uncle would be dead by July 2011. But in 2010 we spent a great deal of time together and he introduced me to a few shows in the 70s I was unfamiliar. Space Academy, Ark II, and Jason of Star Command were all Saturday morning offerings for kids to enjoy. Short-lived as they might be, DVD releases for them were picked up by my uncle around 2007. He really wanted me to watch these shows with him and I did…every episode of all three in 2010. I can tell you that I’m grateful I did. The first of the shows was Space Academy, with fifteen episodes in one single season. In 2012 I was getting up in the morning and having a nice little Saturday sci-fi television slate for several weeks, opening with Space Academy. His loss was still quite fresh and in his memory I felt Space Academy was a nice show to start these Saturday morning slates of sci-fi television. I wish I could get back to that because it was rather fun setting up a sci-fi television binge with the likes of Babylon 5 and Star Trek: The Next Generation, Lost in Space and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea becoming active members of the line-up. Ark II soon found its way some in the line-up. I was kind of wanting to mix it up a bit tonight and decided on Phantom Planet as fun episode for the off-night of Thursday. No way I will be able to revisit Saturday right now, but perhaps as the summer concludes I might do it in September for a spell. I’m quite happy I inherited my uncle’s collection so I can rewatch the episodes in the box set and just remind myself of fond memories spent with a man I hold great regard for. I can’t really gauge if reviews for Space Academy will garner interest or not. It is such a rather obscure little show. Like I said, I didn’t really know about this until my until told me about it.

Phantom Planet is the eighth episode of the season. There’s nothing necessarily extraordinary about it so its choice as the first episode I review for the blog was essentially because I like the title and it has a ghost planet, an “alien spirit”, and an asteroid set for demolition. The asteroid is basically the same set used for the different worlds the characters of the show would often explore or investigate. On the asteroid is this alien ghost (basically an extra dressed in this costume made up with these tassels with eyes that look like light bulbs) “requesting” members of the “blue team” (in Space Academy, the titular “school of bright young minds and unique abilities” has different teams with colors applied to them) to follow it into a cave to “rescue” these gold egg-shaped “info collection devices”. The asteroid once was home to a mining colony and now all that is left is the gold eggs housing their wisdom and history.

Jonathan Harris of Lost in Space is Commander Isaac Gampu, nearly 300 years old! His time in space seems to have halted his aging at some point. Gampu is a serious character compared to Dr. Smith. He’s not a cartoon but a leader of considerable authority and paternal nature. He actually receives “communication” from the ghost telling him that his team needs to return to the asteroid for all of the gold devices but after explosive charges are set up, the instability is just too dangerous for a second trip. So brother and sister psychics, Chris and Laura (Ric Carrot and Pamelyn Ferdin) use astral projection to move their presence onto the asteroid to rescue the devices, but fail to return…this motivates Gampu to urge the alien ghost to return his young officers to him.

The show’s plots aim for the young. A ghost planet appears and disappears. This alien that weeps and wails appears and disappears on the asteroid. Gold eggs in a cave are to be transported if the history and significance of those who once lived on the asteroid are to be shared elsewhere. Loki, a little boy orphaned and alone in the first episode of the show, is found by the blue team and raised by Gampu pretty much as a son. Loki is best known by those who enjoy the show as spiritedly responding to astonishing discoveries with “camelopardus!” He does that at the end of this episode as well.

Space Academy asteroid and Seeker

This is one of my least favorite episodes of the series mainly because the alien is just so laughable to me (but probably was just fine to kids in the late 70s) with the story a bit too corny for my own adult tastes. I didn’t mind it and my son quite enjoyed it so the demographic was met for this kind of presentation and material. The Seeker gets in its five minutes, too. All the teenagers in the cast go on the trip to the asteroid, and the show always made it a mission to include the ensemble (although characters did get positioned stories giving them the focal attention, those involved in the show tried to give all the cast something to do) if possible, with Phantom Planet an example of this. There’s a rather half-hearted séance in the hopes of talking with the ghost and the astral projection scene is implied rather than shown (when Chris and Laura are gone, we remain with Gampu and his team, I’m guessing to save having to go back for additional scenes on the asteroid), so financially Filmation had to spend wisely it seems.