The Time Tunnel
Encyclopedia
The Time Tunnel is a 1966–1967 U.S.
color science fiction TV series. The show was created and produced by Irwin Allen
, his third science fiction
television series. The show's main theme was Time Travel
Adventure. The Time Tunnel was released by 20th Century Fox
and broadcast on ABC
. The show ran for one season of 30 episodes. Reruns currently air on AmericanLife TV Network
and on Hulu
. A pilot for a new series was produced in 2002, although it was not picked up.
known as "The Time Tunnel". The base for Project Tic-Toc was huge and located underground in the Arizona desert, with no visible entry. The only way in was a large secret panel; when it opened, a car could quickly go through the entrance. Once the panel closed, all anyone could see was ordinary desert. Tic-Toc base was a futuristic series of complexes 800 floors deep and employing over 36,000 people ("12 thousand people in each of those complexes"). It was under the command of Lt. General Heywood Kirk (Whit Bissell
). The center of the base was The Time Tunnel control room where the Tunnel was located. In charge of operating the Tunnel were Dr. Ann McGregor (Lee Meriwether
) and Dr. Raymond Swain (John Zaremba
). The date at which it was operating was stated as 1968, which was two years into the future for the initial TV audience.
When the costs of the project approach those of the entire U.S. space program, United States Senator Leroy Clark (Gary Merrill
) launches an investigation of the project. The Senator thinks that the Tunnel has cost too much money for too little reward. At his request the Senator is allowed to visit the project base and given a tour. Once he reaches the central control room the Senator explains his complaints to the project heads. The Senator then says that he wishes to close down the project as a waste of time and money that has not worked. None of the discussion mentions specifically why the project has not worked or any experiments sending inanimate objects through the Tunnel.
When no one else was around to observe, a key Time Tunnel scientist, young physicist Dr. Anthony Newman (James Darren
), turns the machine on and sends himself back in time in an attempt to prove that the Time Tunnel project funds were not wasted. In so doing, Newman becomes "lost in time". The Time Tunnel top personnel quickly return, to see through the Tunnel that Newman is aboard the soon-to-sink Titanic. They can also see that he cannot escape before the sinking, and they cannot retrieve him.
In an attempt to rescue his younger friend, another key Tic-Toc scientist, Dr. Douglas Phillips (Robert Colbert
) enters the Time Tunnel as well, carrying a newspaper describing the sinking to occur. Unconvinced, the captain of the Titanic throws the newspaper overboard.
However, the system was still being developed, and the Tunnel operations staff are never able to bring them home. As the series progresses, the two time travelers are swung from one period in history to another, allowing episodes to be set in the past and future. Each episode begins with the following narration (which Dick Tufeld
voiced):
By luck (or lack thereof) the travelers, Doug and Tony, frequently found themselves thrown onto the precipice of major historical events: on board the Titanic before it hits the iceberg, in Pearl Harbor
before the Japanese attack
, on Krakatoa
before it erupts
, and so forth. They would try to warn people about the event, or try to prevent it from happening, while the Time Tunnel crew (led by two scientists and a military general), who once gaining a "fix" can view through the Tunnel the action taking place in the different time, would try to rescue the travelers before the historical calamity befell them too. Sometimes, when rescue was impossible at the time, the Time Tunnel scientists would often try to help Doug and Tony in other ways or, in some cases, communicate with them whenever possible. The final episode provides no resolution, as the series was initially scheduled to continue into a second season.
The Novikov self-consistency principle
was anticipated by the tacit understanding of the Time Tunnel scientists that recorded history could not be altered although in episode four ("The Day The Sky Fell In") the time travelers make it their concern to see to it that young Tony Newman escapes being killed in the Pearl Harbor bombing in order to prevent the adult Tony from ceasing to exist. Especially the Bible
is held to be sacrosanct as recorded history (except, of course, poetic license on numerous details, for the proverbial, dramatic effects) in episode 20 ("The Walls of Jericho"): General Kirk reassures Drs. Swain and MacGregor that Doug and Tony will survive the mortal dangers of being in Jericho.
The Time Tunnel's time travel model operates with the assumption that the past, the present, and the future are all alike continuing to exist in a manner to permit the random placement of a time traveler into any point of time. When Senator Clark sees an image of the Titanic on the image screen in the course of episode one, he is told by Dr. Swain that he is seeing "the living past," and Althea Hall is told by Tony Newman that the past and the future are the same. The Time Tunnel itself is like a long corridor that stretches through the time continuum with portals that allow access to any moment in history past, present, or future.
Despite the tacit understanding that recorded history cannot be altered, sometimes Doug and Tony’s actions are essential in causing history to unfold as it did, and the lives of individual people could be influenced by the actions of the Time Tunnel time travelers and scientists. In episode twenty-six ("Attack of the Barbarians") Marco Polo tells Doug Phillips that Tony and the Princess Serit can fall in love with each other despite their being from different times because they can then and there see and touch each other. Dr. MacGregor points out to Gen. Kirk and Dr. Swain that history itself might allow for Tony and Serit to marry.
The Time Tunnel is a precursor to Back to the Future
and to later TV series such as Quantum Leap, Stargate SG-1
, and Sliders
in which most episodes feature the cast traveling to a unique place and/or time.
film company. Even black-and-white shots of the Titanic sinking were tinted to fit them into this color production. Only a few actors were costumed for a given episode, interspersed with cuts of great masses of people similarly dressed from the original features. The plots were not noted for historical accuracy, nor was continuity given much concern: in "Rendezvous With Yesterday" (episode 1) Tony states that he was born in 1938, but in "The Day The Sky Fell In" (episode 4), he states he was 7 years old when Pearl Harbor was bombed, and so would have been born in 1934.
Certain episodes featured aliens
who wore costumes and carried props originally created for other Irwin Allen television and movie productions. Prop sets were similarly re-used. Only in episodes 18, 24, 28, 29, and 30 did aliens appear; only the second and third of these were set in the far future.
The Titanic-based premiere episode, "Rendezvous with Yesterday" (a re-edit of the original series pilot), was well written, and featured good production values, but Captain Smith of the Titanic was called "Malcolm" rather than "Edward" or "EJ". The names of the secondary officers are also fictitious and do not reflect the actual officers of the Titanic, though Walter Lord's
best-selling book A Night to Remember had been available for nine years.
The prop computer looked realistic because it was actually an array of memory modules from the Air Force
's recently decommissioned SAGE
computer.
The theme for The Time Tunnel was composed by John Williams
(credited as "Johnny Williams"), who would go on to become one of film's most celebrated composers - Williams also scored the pilot episode. GNP Crescendo later released an album featuring Williams's work and the score composed by George Duning
for the episode "The Death Merchant."
The series won an Emmy Award
in 1967, for Individual Achievements in Cinematography
. The award went to L.B. "Bill" Abbott, for his photographic special effects.
published a 1964 Pyramid Books
novel titled Time Tunnel with cover art somewhat similar to the television series' Tunnel. The actual plots were quite different. The 1964 novel was set in France
, the tunnel (an odd natural phenomenon) was discovered by a professor
, and it only established a fixed connection between the present (1964 in the novel) and Napoleonic era
1804—based on large masses of iron, which formed the temporal connection (or tunnel) when they did not move in space over the ages. Once the tunnel was formed, it was found people could go both ways. So could things. For instance, brand-new "antiques" for the 20th century and marvels of modern industry for the Napoleonic era. But you had to be careful - because what would happen to "now" if you did something in 1804 that changed history..?
In any case, in 1967 Leinster wrote a loosely based novelization
of the television series, entitled The Time Tunnel and also published by Pyramid. The Time Tunnel was the most important - and most secret - weapon ever developed. Scientists Ton Newman and Doug Phillips knew that the destiny of the world depended on it. Now the Tunnel was threatened with destruction - and the only way Doug and Tony could save it was to take a blind leap into the whirling mists of time.
This was followed later in the year by Timeslip: Time Tunnel Adventure #2, the last novel based on the TV series. The front and back covers feature photos from the series.
In Time Bomb, the experimental nuclear missile was sent through the Time Tunnel - but something went wrong, and it wound up buried in the capital of a great nation, over a century ago. Now, excavation equipment was moving toward the site - any day a bulldozer blade might set it off, destroying a mighty city and plunging the world into war. Time travelers Tony Newman and Doug Phillips had only one chance to head off disaster - to go through the Time Tunnel and make the accident "unhappen." The trouble was, there was a war on in the past - and the bomb was in enemy territory.
that came out that were directly related to The Time Tunnel TV series. These were put out by Gold Key Comics
(Western Publishing Co.) in 1966-7:
ese book with record album. 33⅓ RPM record licensed and manufactured for exclusive release in Japan by Asahi Sonorama
company and was released during the show's original airing in 1967. The record is pressed in blue-vinyl and contains the time-travel drama "Adventure in the Lost World." The highlight of this package is the colorful 12-page booklet which showcases original storybook artwork of the record's episode with the intrepid time travellers being terrorized by rampaging dinosaurs and angry cavemen.
Pinball
games - Bally Manufacturing created a pinball called Time Tunnel in 1971 based loosely on the TV series, but production was stopped due to copyright infringement. The game was re-released with revised artwork as Space Time.
Despite the series having only been on the air for one year, the number of websites and fan reminiscences concerning it attest to the series having made an impression on its audience.
The series was re-shown on American television in the early-mid 1990s, and it was re-shown on British television after the success of the 1997 Titanic
movie due to the Titanic-related content of the first episode. It was also parodied by Alexei Sayle
as Drunk in Time on British television. In the U.S., it can now be seen on the Encore Action cable network at various times.
The first 15 episodes were released on DVD in North America on January 24, 2006. The second volume, containing the final fifteen episodes, was released June 6, 2006. It also includes the unaired 2002 pilot and the made-for-TV film The Time Travelers as special features.
The Time Tunnel is being shown on the AmericanLife TV Network
cable channel, as of September 2007.
The Time Tunnel was very similar to a later time-travel show, NBC's Voyagers!
(1982–83).
showed interest in remaking this series. A pilot was produced by Twentieth Century Fox Television, Fox Television Studios and Regency Television in association with Irwin Allen Properties. Executive Producers were Kevin Burns
and Jon Jashni. Sheila Allen
was credited as one of the producers. It was not picked by Fox, in order to make room in its schedule for Joss Whedon
's Firefly
.
The new series had a much much darker, serious tone. Doug Phillips (David Conrad) is the main character, and Tony Newman is now Toni Newman, a female minor character. The unaired pilot episode is available on DVD from Fox Home Entertainment on The Time Tunnel: Volume Two, Disc Four.
In this remake, the (21st century) Time Tunnel is a Department of Energy research project into "hot fusion", which produces nearly limitless energy. When they initiated the reactor (an event not shown in the episode), it caused an unintended "time storm". For four hours—240 minutes—the time storm was uncontrollably whipping around in the past and changing history. The DOE was able to anchor one end of the storm by using the Tunnel like a lightning rod.
On their way into the tunnel complex, Flynn tells Doug Phillips, a former friend, that Phillips has been recruited because he has a detailed knowledge of the Battle of Hürtgen Forest
. The head of the Time Tunnel likens their team to FEMA
, in that they don't send a team back for a rain storm but they do for hurricanes. However, they can only go through time to where the other end of the storm is at the current moment, so they have a limited amount of time in which to fix what is wrong and to be retrieved by the Time Tunnel.
The team (Doug, Toni, Flynn, J.D. and Wix) must go back to WWII in 1944, to the Battle of Hürtgen Forest in Germany. They are to retrieve a person who was moved there by the time storm from 1546. During the mission, Doug Phillips meets his grandfather, a soldier who will be killed in this battle. Doug knows this, but cannot tell him and save his life because it would change history. Toni Newman tells him that she used to have three brothers and two sisters before the time storm accident, but is now an only child. They find out that the displaced person is a (very confused) medieval monk who is carrying bubonic plague
. When the team is almost captured, two of them have switched to German uniforms and pretend to be Colonel Klink and (Sergeant) Schultz, complete with fake documents. Everyone who came in contact with the monk is given an antibiotic injection and the time ripples stop. But Flynn has been fatally stabbed, so he reveals that Phillips was a bitter man before the "240", but he now has a family. Flynn told Phillips this information to give him incentive to keep the timeline the way that it is.
announced in 2005 that it was going to create a new pilot for its 2006/07 season. Allen's wife, Sheila, and two producers of the 2002 FOX remake (Kevin Burns
and Jon Jashni) began work on the new pilot. John Turman
(Hulk
) wrote the script. The series never materialized.
(1964), as well as the 1967 remake Journey to the Center of Time
, are both somewhat similar to this series. Both employ time travelers hopelessly lost in the infinite corridors of time, with no way to get back their own time period. Although the movie made in the early 1960s, The Time Machine
, might have inspired the series to be produced, the plot and characters are not similar enough to entertain similarities between the two. Ib Melchior
also has connections to these movies and Irwin Allen on other material, such as Lost in Space
, and it is debated in various publications and websites as to who created what first -Melchior or Allen. Tunnel Through Time
by Lester Del Rey
was also produced in 1966. The spirals on the cover art for the TV series bear similarity to the cover art on Del Rey's book as sold through Amazon.
is sometimes used in a long-running science fiction or fantasy universe to preserve continuity with the present by reconciling paranormal, anachronistic, or otherwise notable but unrecorded events with what actually happened in known history. Whatever Doug Phillips and Tony Newman did, they never could really change anything and sort of acted like Temporal Agents, who keep history as it really happened. Alternate History or Alternate Timelines never entered into this TV series story lines.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
color science fiction TV series. The show was created and produced by Irwin Allen
Irwin Allen
Irwin Allen was a television and film director and producer nicknamed "The Master of Disaster" for his work in the disaster film genre. He was also notable for creating a number of television series.- Biography :...
, his third science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
television series. The show's main theme was Time Travel
Time travel
Time travel is the concept of moving between different points in time in a manner analogous to moving between different points in space. Time travel could hypothetically involve moving backward in time to a moment earlier than the starting point, or forward to the future of that point without the...
Adventure. The Time Tunnel was released by 20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...
and broadcast on ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
. The show ran for one season of 30 episodes. Reruns currently air on AmericanLife TV Network
AmericanLife TV Network
Youtoo TV, formerly known as American Life TV Network , GoodLife TV Network, and Nostalgia Television, is an American cable-television channel launched on May 1, 1985. It now claims over 15 million subscribers throughout the U.S...
and on Hulu
Hulu
Hulu is a website and over-the-top subscription service offering ad-supported on-demand streaming video of TV shows, movies, webisodes and other new media, trailers, clips, and behind-the-scenes footage from NBC, Fox, ABC, and Obstacle on October 20th 2011 Nickelodeon and CBS and many other...
. A pilot for a new series was produced in 2002, although it was not picked up.
Summary
Project Tic-Toc is a top secret U.S. government effort to build an experimental time machineTime travel
Time travel is the concept of moving between different points in time in a manner analogous to moving between different points in space. Time travel could hypothetically involve moving backward in time to a moment earlier than the starting point, or forward to the future of that point without the...
known as "The Time Tunnel". The base for Project Tic-Toc was huge and located underground in the Arizona desert, with no visible entry. The only way in was a large secret panel; when it opened, a car could quickly go through the entrance. Once the panel closed, all anyone could see was ordinary desert. Tic-Toc base was a futuristic series of complexes 800 floors deep and employing over 36,000 people ("12 thousand people in each of those complexes"). It was under the command of Lt. General Heywood Kirk (Whit Bissell
Whit Bissell
Whitner Nutting Bissell , better known as Whit Bissell, was an American actor.-Early life:Born in New York City, Bissell was the son of prominent surgeon Dr. J. Dougal Bissell. He trained with the Carolina Playmakers, a theatrical organization associated with the University of North Carolina at...
). The center of the base was The Time Tunnel control room where the Tunnel was located. In charge of operating the Tunnel were Dr. Ann McGregor (Lee Meriwether
Lee Meriwether
Lee Ann Meriwether is an American actress, former model, and the winner of the 1955 Miss America pageant. She is perhaps best known for her role as Betty Jones, the crime-solving partner in the long-running 1970s crime drama, Barnaby Jones. The role earned her two Golden Globe Award nominations in...
) and Dr. Raymond Swain (John Zaremba
John Zaremba
John Zaremba was an American actor most noted for supporting roles on science fiction films and TV series....
). The date at which it was operating was stated as 1968, which was two years into the future for the initial TV audience.
When the costs of the project approach those of the entire U.S. space program, United States Senator Leroy Clark (Gary Merrill
Gary Merrill
Gary Fred Merrill was an American film and television character actor whose credits included more than fifty feature films, a half-dozen mostly short-lived TV series, and dozens of television guest appearances....
) launches an investigation of the project. The Senator thinks that the Tunnel has cost too much money for too little reward. At his request the Senator is allowed to visit the project base and given a tour. Once he reaches the central control room the Senator explains his complaints to the project heads. The Senator then says that he wishes to close down the project as a waste of time and money that has not worked. None of the discussion mentions specifically why the project has not worked or any experiments sending inanimate objects through the Tunnel.
When no one else was around to observe, a key Time Tunnel scientist, young physicist Dr. Anthony Newman (James Darren
James Darren
James William Ercolani , known by his stage name James Darren, is an American television and film actor, television director, and singer.-Career:...
), turns the machine on and sends himself back in time in an attempt to prove that the Time Tunnel project funds were not wasted. In so doing, Newman becomes "lost in time". The Time Tunnel top personnel quickly return, to see through the Tunnel that Newman is aboard the soon-to-sink Titanic. They can also see that he cannot escape before the sinking, and they cannot retrieve him.
In an attempt to rescue his younger friend, another key Tic-Toc scientist, Dr. Douglas Phillips (Robert Colbert
Robert Colbert
Robert Colbert is an American actor most noted for his leading role portraying Dr. Doug Phillips on the TV series The Time Tunnel and his two appearances as a third Maverick brother in Maverick....
) enters the Time Tunnel as well, carrying a newspaper describing the sinking to occur. Unconvinced, the captain of the Titanic throws the newspaper overboard.
However, the system was still being developed, and the Tunnel operations staff are never able to bring them home. As the series progresses, the two time travelers are swung from one period in history to another, allowing episodes to be set in the past and future. Each episode begins with the following narration (which Dick Tufeld
Dick Tufeld
Dick Tufeld is an American actor, announcer, narrator, and voice actor from the 1950s onward.He is perhaps best known as the voice of the Robot in the TV series Lost in Space, a role he reprised for the 1998 feature film...
voiced):
- "Two American scientists are lost in the swirling maze of past and future ages, during the first experiments on America's greatest and most secret project, the Time Tunnel. Tony Newman and Doug Phillips now tumble helplessly toward a new fantastic adventure, somewhere along the infinite corridors of time."
By luck (or lack thereof) the travelers, Doug and Tony, frequently found themselves thrown onto the precipice of major historical events: on board the Titanic before it hits the iceberg, in Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...
before the Japanese attack
Attack on Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike conducted by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of December 7, 1941...
, on Krakatoa
Krakatoa
Krakatoa is a volcanic island made of a'a lava in the Sunda Strait between the islands of Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. The name is used for the island group, the main island , and the volcano as a whole. The island exploded in 1883, killing approximately 40,000 people, although some estimates...
before it erupts
1883 eruption of Krakatoa
The 1883 eruption of Krakatoa began in May 1883 and culminated with the destruction of Krakatoa on 27 August 1883. Minor seismic activity continued to be reported until February 1884, though reports after October 1883 were later dismissed by Rogier Verbeek's investigation.-Early phase:In the years...
, and so forth. They would try to warn people about the event, or try to prevent it from happening, while the Time Tunnel crew (led by two scientists and a military general), who once gaining a "fix" can view through the Tunnel the action taking place in the different time, would try to rescue the travelers before the historical calamity befell them too. Sometimes, when rescue was impossible at the time, the Time Tunnel scientists would often try to help Doug and Tony in other ways or, in some cases, communicate with them whenever possible. The final episode provides no resolution, as the series was initially scheduled to continue into a second season.
The Novikov self-consistency principle
Novikov self-consistency principle
The Novikov self-consistency principle, also known as the Novikov self-consistency conjecture, is a principle developed by Russian physicist Igor Dmitriyevich Novikov in the mid-1980s to solve the problem of paradoxes in time travel, which is theoretically permitted in certain solutions of general...
was anticipated by the tacit understanding of the Time Tunnel scientists that recorded history could not be altered although in episode four ("The Day The Sky Fell In") the time travelers make it their concern to see to it that young Tony Newman escapes being killed in the Pearl Harbor bombing in order to prevent the adult Tony from ceasing to exist. Especially the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
is held to be sacrosanct as recorded history (except, of course, poetic license on numerous details, for the proverbial, dramatic effects) in episode 20 ("The Walls of Jericho"): General Kirk reassures Drs. Swain and MacGregor that Doug and Tony will survive the mortal dangers of being in Jericho.
The Time Tunnel's time travel model operates with the assumption that the past, the present, and the future are all alike continuing to exist in a manner to permit the random placement of a time traveler into any point of time. When Senator Clark sees an image of the Titanic on the image screen in the course of episode one, he is told by Dr. Swain that he is seeing "the living past," and Althea Hall is told by Tony Newman that the past and the future are the same. The Time Tunnel itself is like a long corridor that stretches through the time continuum with portals that allow access to any moment in history past, present, or future.
Despite the tacit understanding that recorded history cannot be altered, sometimes Doug and Tony’s actions are essential in causing history to unfold as it did, and the lives of individual people could be influenced by the actions of the Time Tunnel time travelers and scientists. In episode twenty-six ("Attack of the Barbarians") Marco Polo tells Doug Phillips that Tony and the Princess Serit can fall in love with each other despite their being from different times because they can then and there see and touch each other. Dr. MacGregor points out to Gen. Kirk and Dr. Swain that history itself might allow for Tony and Serit to marry.
The Time Tunnel is a precursor to Back to the Future
Back to the Future trilogy
The Back to the Future trilogy is a comedic science fiction adventure film series written by Bob Gale and Robert Zemeckis, directed by Zemeckis, produced by Amblin Entertainment and distributed by Universal Pictures. The main plot follows the adventures of a high school student Marty McFly and...
and to later TV series such as Quantum Leap, Stargate SG-1
Stargate SG-1
Stargate SG-1 is a Canadian-American adventure and military science fiction television series and part of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Stargate franchise. The show, created by Brad Wright and Jonathan Glassner, is based on the 1994 feature film Stargate by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich...
, and Sliders
Sliders
Sliders is an American science fiction television series. It was broadcast for five seasons, beginning in 1995 and ending in 2000. The series follows a group of travelers as they use a wormhole to "slide" between different parallel universes. The show was created by Robert K. Weiss and Tracy Tormé...
in which most episodes feature the cast traveling to a unique place and/or time.
Production
The production basis of the show was the large number of period dramas made by the 20th Century Fox20th Century Fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...
film company. Even black-and-white shots of the Titanic sinking were tinted to fit them into this color production. Only a few actors were costumed for a given episode, interspersed with cuts of great masses of people similarly dressed from the original features. The plots were not noted for historical accuracy, nor was continuity given much concern: in "Rendezvous With Yesterday" (episode 1) Tony states that he was born in 1938, but in "The Day The Sky Fell In" (episode 4), he states he was 7 years old when Pearl Harbor was bombed, and so would have been born in 1934.
Certain episodes featured aliens
Extraterrestrial life
Extraterrestrial life is defined as life that does not originate from Earth...
who wore costumes and carried props originally created for other Irwin Allen television and movie productions. Prop sets were similarly re-used. Only in episodes 18, 24, 28, 29, and 30 did aliens appear; only the second and third of these were set in the far future.
The Titanic-based premiere episode, "Rendezvous with Yesterday" (a re-edit of the original series pilot), was well written, and featured good production values, but Captain Smith of the Titanic was called "Malcolm" rather than "Edward" or "EJ". The names of the secondary officers are also fictitious and do not reflect the actual officers of the Titanic, though Walter Lord's
Walter Lord
John Walter Lord, Jr. , was an American author, best known for his documentary-style non-fiction account A Night to Remember, about the sinking of the RMS Titanic.-Early life:...
best-selling book A Night to Remember had been available for nine years.
The prop computer looked realistic because it was actually an array of memory modules from the Air Force
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...
's recently decommissioned SAGE
Semi Automatic Ground Environment
The Semi-Automatic Ground Environment was an automated control system for tracking and intercepting enemy bomber aircraft used by NORAD from the late 1950s into the 1980s...
computer.
The theme for The Time Tunnel was composed by John Williams
John Williams
John Towner Williams is an American composer, conductor, and pianist. In a career spanning almost six decades, he has composed some of the most recognizable film scores in the history of motion pictures, including the Star Wars saga, Jaws, Superman, the Indiana Jones films, E.T...
(credited as "Johnny Williams"), who would go on to become one of film's most celebrated composers - Williams also scored the pilot episode. GNP Crescendo later released an album featuring Williams's work and the score composed by George Duning
George Duning
George Duning was an American musician and film composer. He was born in Richmond, Indiana and educated in Cincinnati, Ohio at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, where his mentor was Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco....
for the episode "The Death Merchant."
The series won an Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
in 1967, for Individual Achievements in Cinematography
Cinematography
Cinematography is the making of lighting and camera choices when recording photographic images for cinema. It is closely related to the art of still photography...
. The award went to L.B. "Bill" Abbott, for his photographic special effects.
Recurring themes
Themes particularly characteristic of this show include:- The opening credits sequence is colorful and dynamic.
- A short "teaser" from next week's episode was shown at the end of each episode as Doug and Tony arrived at their next destination.
- The impressive introduction to the scale of the project (over 36,000 people and huge underground buildings) is never seen after the first episode except for two clips (used over and over) of the giant power generator flashing, and Tunnel Security running across a walkway. Some of these shots were homages to the Krell complex from the classic 1956 MGM film Forbidden PlanetForbidden PlanetForbidden Planet is a 1956 science fiction film directed by Fred M. Wilcox, with a screenplay by Cyril Hume. It stars Leslie Nielsen, Walter Pidgeon, and Anne Francis. The characters and its setting have been compared to those in William Shakespeare's The Tempest, and its plot contains certain...
but new matte paintings and models were created specifically for The Time Tunnel pilot episode. - At the end of every episode, Doug and Tony always somehow reverted to the same cleaned, pressed clothes: a green turtleneck sweater and a pair of gray slacks for Tony, and a conservative Norfolk suit for Doug. Doug never takes off his tie (although he loosens it occasionally). Doug's clothes were originally meant for the 1912 Titanic, but the suit somehow changes to being contemporary style in future episodes.
- Sometimes, when something is wrong with the Tunnel, Dr. Swain pushes Dr. MacGregor away from her control panel so he can do her job himself.
- Almost all of the non-regular characters, in particular all of the aliens, are hostile to Doug and Tony, and to Time Tunnel personnel, to one extent or another, even characters from sides that oppose each other.
- Hand-to-hand combat, sword fights, and force fields are frequent staples.
- Nearly all location shooting was filmed in and around southern California. This causes scenes set in different parts of the country (or the world) to have the same general hilly landscape with arid type trees and brush plants typical to the local region where filming occurred.
- The studio set uses forced perspectiveForced perspectiveForced perspective is a technique that employs optical illusion to make an object appear farther away, closer, larger or smaller than it actually is. It is used primarily in photography, filmmaking and architecture...
to make the Tunnel look infinite, even though side shots show that the Tunnel is indeed finite. - Doug and Tony almost always appeared somewhere in the past. They did travel to the future on four occasions: two in 1978, one in 8433, and part of one, in 1,000,000 AD, the latter two into an unrecognizable future.
- Aliens and people from the future all dressed identically, often in aluminum foil, as seen in other Irwin Allen TV series at the time.
- Elements of pure fantasy often appeared on the series, such as Nero's ghost and the magic powers of Merlin, without any scientific explanation given.
- When people are hit on the head they get amnesia, and it's always temporary.
- Everyone everywhere, in every time period, spoke 20th-century EnglishEnglish languageEnglish is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
. French and German characters have a stereotypical accent, while British, Greek and Afghan characters do not - yet Doug and Tony are still surprised when they find Native Americans who speak English in the Custer episode. - No explanation is given for the frequent computer glitches which spontaneously show scenes far from Doug and Tony but which are related to the storyline. The characters themselves even noticed this, wondering aloud if the computer is trying to show them something.
- Many episodes used stock footageStock footageStock footage, and similarly, archive footage, library pictures and file footage are film or video footage that may or may not be custom shot for use in a specific film or television program. Stock footage is of beneficial use to filmmakers as it is sometimes less expensive than shooting new...
from previous 20th Century-Fox and Irwin AllenIrwin AllenIrwin Allen was a television and film director and producer nicknamed "The Master of Disaster" for his work in the disaster film genre. He was also notable for creating a number of television series.- Biography :...
productions, in an effort to cut costs. These shots ran the gamut from episodes on General Custer, to the sinking of the Titanic, and many other historical events. - Tunnel personnel find necessary research information almost always in hard copy form, such books, charts, and maps, rather than from the computers, which other television series in the same years, such as Star Trek, employ.
- Often characters from the past are brought forward to the Time Tunnel and characters from the installation are sent back in time. However, for some strange reason, Time Tunnel personnel can't get both Doug and Tony back, without complications (like a time warp), even though every time transfer does succeed, somehow, in transporting both of them to the same time period and nearly, but not exactly, the same geographical location.
- Building up enough power to make a time transfer is almost always a time-consuming process.
- Even after a crisis passes and there is no other crisis apparently forthcoming, rather than Doug and Tony existing in that time period, until Tunnel personnel have perfected a means of getting them back, they get sent to another time period, to face a new crisis.
- In many episodes, especially the ones on an island, the entire surface area in which Doug and Tony move is easily a small fraction of an acre.
Anomalies
- "The Walls Of Jericho" episode reveals that the "two strangers" in The Bible are Doug and Tony, implying Doug and Tony are in The Bible. This episode has everyone—even Joshua—speaking English.
- In "Rendezvous With Yesterday", Tony states he was born in 1938. Yet in "The Day The Sky Fell In", he is portrayed as a seven-year-old at the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor. James Darren was actually born in 1936, coincidentally consistent with Tony being 30 at the start of the show.
- In "The Alamo", Colonel Travis states he has a twelve-year-old son. Travis' son Charles Edward was actually seven at the time of the battle. Travis, who was actually 26 at the time of his death, is portrayed in the episode as a man in his mid to late thirties, thus making the existence of a teenage child more plausible.
- In the opening scene of "Invasion", the commander of the Cherbourg Gestapo has a portrait of Rudolf HessRudolf HessRudolf Walter Richard Hess was a prominent Nazi politician who was Adolf Hitler's deputy in the Nazi Party during the 1930s and early 1940s...
hanging on his office's wall, a very unlikely occurrence for a Nazi officer in 1944. In later scenes the portrait is replaced by one of Heinrich HimmlerHeinrich HimmlerHeinrich Luitpold Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS, a military commander, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. As Chief of the German Police and the Minister of the Interior from 1943, Himmler oversaw all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo...
. - Wild historical mishmashes, such as Niccolò MachiavelliNiccolò MachiavelliNiccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli was an Italian historian, philosopher, humanist, and writer based in Florence during the Renaissance. He is one of the main founders of modern political science. He was a diplomat, political philosopher, playwright, and a civil servant of the Florentine Republic...
- explained, of course - getting involved in the Battle of Gettysburg, occur. And the explanation of why he can't be killed - he has already been dead for centuries - would make Doug and Tony similarly indestructible in the future episodes, yet they clearly fear death in those episodes.
Episodes
While the episodes were first shown in 1966, the show's setting begins in 1968, two years into the future.| Title | Original airdate | Arrival date | Arrival location | № | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rendezvous With Yesterday | September 9, 1966 | April 14, 1912 | RMS Titanic | 1 | ||
| The first episode. United States Senator Leroy Clark (Gary Merrill Gary Merrill Gary Fred Merrill was an American film and television character actor whose credits included more than fifty feature films, a half-dozen mostly short-lived TV series, and dozens of television guest appearances.... ), who was once a paratrooper under General Kirk, arrives from Washington, D.C. to observe the status of Project Tic-Toc in Arizona. Clark threatens to cut off funding unless the time travel technology can be successfully demonstrated before he leaves the following day. Late that night and against orders, Dr. Anthony Newman powers up the time tunnel, enters, and is successfully sent back in time. He arrives on board the RMS Titanic on the day before the ship collides with an iceberg and sinks. Realizing what is going to happen, he tries to convince the captain of the impending disaster but the captain orders that he be locked in a cabin. Dr. Doug Phillips convinces the commanding general that he needs to be sent back to rescue Dr. Newman. After breaking Dr. Newman out of the cabin, they send an SOS SOS SOS is the commonly used description for the international Morse code distress signal... message requesting immediate, emergency assistance, but they are both captured and locked back in the same cabin. After the iceberg is struck, Doug and Tony convince the captain to begin an evacuation. Project Tic-Toc shifts the travellers to another time to keep them from dying in the icy waters. Tony arrives outside of Tic-Toc headquarters in 1958, where no one knows him. He is shifted to save him from being shot by security. Senator Clark promises that no action regarding funding of the Time Tunnel will be taken until Newman and Phillips are either safely returned or beyond all possible help. Doug and Tony are shown reunited in a compartment of a manned rocket that is about to launch. |
||||||
| One Way To The Moon | September 16, 1966 | 1978 | Spacecraft Spacecraft A spacecraft or spaceship is a craft or machine designed for spaceflight. Spacecraft are used for a variety of purposes, including communications, earth observation, meteorology, navigation, planetary exploration and transportation of humans and cargo.... |
2 | ||
| The two time travellers arrive on a rocket ship. The craft, captained by a man named Kane (played by Larry Ward Larry Ward (actor) Larry Ward was an American actor who appeared in many films and television series. He was sometimes credited under the name Ward Gaynor.... ) and including astronauts Nazarro (Ben Cooper Ben Cooper Ben Cooper is a retired American actor of film and television, who won a Golden Boot award in 2005 for his work in westerns.-Early films:... ), Beard (James T. Callahan James T. Callahan James Thomas Callahan was an American film and television actor who appeared in more than 120 films and television shows between 1959 and 2007... ) and Harlow (Warren Stevens Warren Stevens Warren Stevens is an American stage, screen, and television actor.Born in Clarks Summit, Pennsylvania, Stevens began his acting career after serving in the U.S. Army Air Force as a pilot during World War II. He trained at The Actor's Studio in New York, received notice on Broadway, and thereafter... ) is to be the first manned mission to Mars Mars Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the Solar System. The planet is named after the Roman god of war, Mars. It is often described as the "Red Planet", as the iron oxide prevalent on its surface gives it a reddish appearance... . The added weight of Doug and Tony, a combined 335 pounds (about 152 kilograms) leaves the ship without enough fuel to make the trip. The ship is also unable to communicate with Earth, and it is discovered that the radio was sabotaged. The captain decides to pick up extra fuel at a depot on the moon built for this mission. On the moon, Beard kills Harlow in the depot and starts work on a time bomb in order to destroy the ship. Tony, and then Doug, suspect Beard of being the saboteur and confront him in the depot. Beard is knocked out, but the bomb is not found and Beard is killed when the depot explodes. The ship takes off without the time travellers, who are rescued by being shifted. Meanwhile, back at Project Tic-Toc, General Kirk receives a scientist named Dr. Brandon (Ross Elliott Ross Elliott Ross Elliott was an American television and film character actor. He began his acting career with Orson Welles in Mercury Theatre, where he performed in Welles' famed radio program The War of the Worlds.... ) and an admiral (Barry Kelley Barry Kelley Barry Kelley was an actor on Broadway in the 1930s and '40s and in movies during the 1940s, '50s, and '60s. The heavy-set actor created the role of Ike in Oklahoma! on Broadway.... ) from the Department of Space to help them. The admiral's aide, Ensign Beard, is shocked to find he is on board the craft in the future. Brandon is found to be a spy, and tries to hide in the complex. Beard, unaware of his own future, kills his accomplice Brandon to escape suspicion. |
||||||
| End Of The World | September 23, 1966 | May 21, 1910 | A mining community | 3 | ||
| During the 1910 pass of Halley's Comet, the travellers arrive in a small town where the local mine Mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock... experiences a cave-in Cave-in A cave-in is a collapse of a geologic formation, mine or structure which typically occurs during mining or tunneling. Geologic structures prone to cave-ins include alvar, tsingy and other limestone formations, but can also include lava tubes and a variety of other subsurface rock formations.In... , trapping a number of miners. Doug and Tony try to organize a rescue party, but all of the townspeople have left the town after a local professor named Ainsley (played by Gregory Morton) predicted the comet would destroy Earth that very day. Doug reviews Ainsley's calculations, but is unable to find a flaw with them. Doug then theorizes an invisible gravity field could be the reason why the comet would eventually go off course and miss the Earth. Using a radiometer Radiometer A radiometer is a device for measuring the radiant flux of electromagnetic radiation. Generally, the term radiometer denotes an infrared radiation detector, yet it also includes detectors operating on any electromagnetic wavelength.... and the university telescope Telescope A telescope is an instrument that aids in the observation of remote objects by collecting electromagnetic radiation . The first known practical telescopes were invented in the Netherlands at the beginning of the 1600s , using glass lenses... , Doug and Ainsley discover such a field. The professor then tells the townspeople–who are waiting for their doom on a hillside–the comet will not hit, and they go back to town to rescue the trapped miners. Meanwhile, back at Tic-Toc HQ, the Time Tunnel accidentally pulls the comet toward the complex. Ray shuts down the Tunnel to prevent the destruction of the Earth. The incident stops the heart of crew member Jerry (Sam Groom Sam Groom Sam Groom is an actor most noted for his numerous roles on television. He portrayed the title role in the Canadian television series Dr. Simon Locke . Prior to that, he had played Dr. Russ Matthews in the daytime soap Another World... ), but the staff revives him by shocking him with electrical cords. Ray then muses that the project should be shut down if it could lead to the end of the world, but Ann and Kirk disagree. The scene from episode one, in which Tony arrives outside of Tic-Toc headquarters in 1958, is then replayed in its entirety. Then he and Doug are shifted to another time. |
||||||
| The Day The Sky Fell In | September 30, 1966 | December 6, 1941 | Honolulu, Hawaii Hawaii Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of... |
4 | ||
| The time travellers arrive inside the Japan Japan Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south... ese consulate Consul (representative) The political title Consul is used for the official representatives of the government of one state in the territory of another, normally acting to assist and protect the citizens of the consul's own country, and to facilitate trade and friendship between the peoples of the two countries... in Honolulu the day before the attack on Pearl Harbor Attack on Pearl Harbor The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike conducted by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of December 7, 1941... . The young Anthony Newman was living in Honolulu at the time and had spent that night at his friend Billy Neal's house–which would be destroyed in the raid–but Dr. Newman has no memory of what happened. His father, a Lieutenant Commander Lieutenant commander (United States) Lieutenant commander is a mid-ranking officer rank in the United States Navy, the United States Coast Guard, the United States Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Commissioned Corps, with the pay grade of O-4 and NATO rank code OF-3... in the United States Navy United States Navy The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S... , was never seen again after the attack. When the travellers try to warn Tony's father of the impending attack, they are not believed. The attack goes on schedule the following morning, but the travellers are able to persuade Billy's mother, Louise Neal (played by Susan Flannery Susan Flannery Susan Flannery is an American soap opera actress. She is known for her role Stephanie Forrester on The Bold and the Beautiful and for her role as Dr. Laura Spencer Horton on Days of our Lives .... ), to take Billy and young Tony and flee to the mountains. Lt. Commander Newman is seriously injured at the communications center in a bomb blast while trying to warn the USS Enterprise USS Enterprise (CV-6) USS Enterprise , colloquially referred to as the "Big E," was the sixth aircraft carrier of the United States Navy and the seventh U.S. Navy ship to bear the name. Launched in 1936, she was a ship of the Yorktown class, and one of only three American carriers commissioned prior to World War II to... to stay away from Pearl Harbor. Tony arrives and helps his father transmit the warning to the ship. The elder Newman then dies in his son's arms. |
||||||
| The Last Patrol | October 7, 1966 | January 6, 1815 | near New Orleans, Louisiana | 5 | ||
| The time travelers arrive in Louisiana the day before the final battle of the War of 1812 War of 1812 The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain's ongoing war with France, impressment of American merchant... . They are taken prisoner by the British British North America British North America is a historical term. It consisted of the colonies and territories of the British Empire in continental North America after the end of the American Revolutionary War and the recognition of American independence in 1783.At the start of the Revolutionary War in 1775 the British... troops, court martialed as spies and sentenced to be shot at dawn. A British general, General Southall (Carroll O'Connor Carroll O'Connor John Carroll O'Connor best known as Carroll O'Connor, was an American actor, producer and director whose television career spanned four decades... ), is brought to the time tunnel so that the team can establish the location of their scientists. Recognizing his ancestor, Colonel Southall (also Carroll O'Connor), and confessing that he does not have long to live anyway, General Southall insists on going back to order Colonel Southall to release the two scientists and to find out why he led his troops into the strong point of the opposing army. General Southall fails to convince his ancestor, and both Southalls are killed in the battle. Note: This episode said that the battle Battle of New Orleans The Battle of New Orleans took place on January 8, 1815 and was the final major battle of the War of 1812. American forces, commanded by Major General Andrew Jackson, defeated an invading British Army intent on seizing New Orleans and the vast territory the United States had acquired with the... occurred on January 7; it actually occurred on January 8. |
||||||
| Crack Of Doom | October 14, 1966 | August 27, 1883 | Krakatoa Krakatoa Krakatoa is a volcanic island made of a'a lava in the Sunda Strait between the islands of Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. The name is used for the island group, the main island , and the volcano as a whole. The island exploded in 1883, killing approximately 40,000 people, although some estimates... in Maritime Southeast Asia Maritime Southeast Asia Maritime Southeast Asia refers to the maritime region of Southeast Asia as opposed to mainland Southeast Asia and includes the modern countries of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Brunei, East Timor and Singapore.... |
6 | ||
| The time travelers arrive in the vicinity of Indonesia Indonesia Indonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an... , on the island of Krakatoa Krakatoa Krakatoa is a volcanic island made of a'a lava in the Sunda Strait between the islands of Java and Sumatra in Indonesia. The name is used for the island group, the main island , and the volcano as a whole. The island exploded in 1883, killing approximately 40,000 people, although some estimates... the day of its eruption in August 1883 1883 eruption of Krakatoa The 1883 eruption of Krakatoa began in May 1883 and culminated with the destruction of Krakatoa on 27 August 1883. Minor seismic activity continued to be reported until February 1884, though reports after October 1883 were later dismissed by Rogier Verbeek's investigation.-Early phase:In the years... just in time to stop the sacrifice of a young Indonesian by his companions, who are there to serve as guides to Dr. Holland and his daughter. Dr. Holland is conducting a scientific investigation of the island following the loud vulcanic explosion a few months before. Karnutu, the chief guide, believes Doug and Tony are devils, who are causing the eruption, and he tries to sacrifice them to the fires to stop the eruption. Doug and Tony find that they have only a few hours to convince the scientists to leave the island before it is blown up with the biggest explosion in history. One problem they face is lack of information, Doug feels that they should go to Java Java Java is an island of Indonesia. With a population of 135 million , it is the world's most populous island, and one of the most densely populated regions in the world. It is home to 60% of Indonesia's population. The Indonesian capital city, Jakarta, is in west Java... for safety when they must go instead to Sumatra Sumatra Sumatra is an island in western Indonesia, westernmost of the Sunda Islands. It is the largest island entirely in Indonesia , and the sixth largest island in the world at 473,481 km2 with a population of 50,365,538... . Tony is retrieved just before Karnutu throws him into a lava pit, but when he gets to the Time Tunnel complex he finds all personnel frozen in a time warp. Tony finds the correct escape information written down by Dr. Swain. He takes it with him when he sends himself back to 1883. Karnutu is thwarted and falls into the lava pit. Doug and Tony finally persuade the scientists and their remaining guides to leave for Sumatra, but Doug and Tony must be left behind due to a lack of room in the canoe. Fortunately Tony left coordinates necessary to move the time travelers on a pad of paper in Dr. Swain's frozen hand when he was there during the time warp. They are shifted just in time to avoid the "big one." |
||||||
| Revenge Of The Gods | October 21, 1966 | April 23, 1184 BC | Near Troy Troy Troy was a city, both factual and legendary, located in northwest Anatolia in what is now Turkey, southeast of the Dardanelles and beside Mount Ida... in Anatolia Anatolia Anatolia is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia, comprising the majority of the Republic of Turkey... |
7 | ||
| The time travelers arrive near the city of Troy Troy Troy was a city, both factual and legendary, located in northwest Anatolia in what is now Turkey, southeast of the Dardanelles and beside Mount Ida... after the tenth year of the siege by the Achaeans (Mycenaean Greeks Greeks The Greeks, also known as the Hellenes , are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighboring regions. They also form a significant diaspora, with Greek communities established around the world.... ). Ulysses Odysseus Odysseus or Ulysses was a legendary Greek king of Ithaca and the hero of Homer's epic poem the Odyssey. Odysseus also plays a key role in Homer's Iliad and other works in the Epic Cycle.... the Greek commander takes Doug and Tony to be gods from Olympus Mount Olympus Mount Olympus is the highest mountain in Greece, located on the border between Thessaly and Macedonia, about 100 kilometres away from Thessaloniki, Greece's second largest city. Mount Olympus has 52 peaks. The highest peak Mytikas, meaning "nose", rises to 2,917 metres... to the disgust of Sardis, one of Ulysses's commanders. Sardis is defeated by Tony in a sword fight and defects to the Trojans, whose Prince Paris uses him for a raid on Ulysses's camp. Doug is captured and tortured in Troy. Tony distinguishes himself in a battle against the Trojans with the help of Jiggs, the Time Tunnel chief of security, who is sent back in time by accident with modern weapons and ammunition. Tony gets the privilege of joining the Greeks in the Trojan Horse Trojan Horse The Trojan Horse is a tale from the Trojan War about the stratagem that allowed the Greeks finally to enter the city of Troy and end the conflict. In the canonical version, after a fruitless 10-year siege, the Greeks constructed a huge wooden horse, and hid a select force of men inside... for the capture and sack of Troy. Both Sardis and Paris are killed, and Queen Helen and Doug are rescued. (See Trojan War Trojan War In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy took Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta. The war is among the most important events in Greek mythology and was narrated in many works of Greek literature, including the Iliad... .) |
||||||
| Massacre | October 28, 1966 | June 23, 1876 | Big Horn County, Montana Territory Big Horn County, Montana - National protected areas :* Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area * Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument- Economy :Coal Mining and Agriculture both play major roles in Big Horn County’s economy... |
8 | ||
| The time travelers arrive a few days before the Battle of the Little Bighorn Battle of the Little Bighorn The Battle of the Little Bighorn, also known as Custer's Last Stand and, by the Indians involved, as the Battle of the Greasy Grass, was an armed engagement between combined forces of Lakota, Northern Cheyenne and Arapaho people against the 7th Cavalry Regiment of the United States Army... . Dr. Newman is captured by the Indians and taken to their camp. Dr. Phillips is found by a young courier and goes with him to the camp of the 7th Cavalry. Dr. Phillips tries to convince Lt. Col. Lieutenant Colonel (United States) In the United States Army, United States Air Force, and United States Marine Corps, a lieutenant colonel is a field grade military officer rank just above the rank of major and just below the rank of colonel. It is equivalent to the naval rank of commander in the other uniformed services.The pay... George Armstrong Custer George Armstrong Custer George Armstrong Custer was a United States Army officer and cavalry commander in the American Civil War and the Indian Wars. Raised in Michigan and Ohio, Custer was admitted to West Point in 1858, where he graduated last in his class... to rescue Dr. Newman, which Custer will not do. Failing that, Dr. Phillips tries to convince Custer that his regiment will be totally wiped out so he should not go to battle. Custer has him arrested to prevent him from telling this to the rest of the troops. Meanwhile, the Indians threaten to execute Dr. Newman, but for his bravery in facing this, he is adopted by Sitting Bull Sitting Bull Sitting Bull Sitting Bull Sitting Bull (Lakota: Tȟatȟáŋka Íyotake (in Standard Lakota Orthography), also nicknamed Slon-he or "Slow"; (c. 1831 – December 15, 1890) was a Hunkpapa Lakota Sioux holy man who led his people as a tribal chief during years of resistance to United States government policies... . Dr. Newman convinces Sitting Bull to not attack the soldiers but to talk peace. Dr. Newman is sent to convey the message of peace to Custer. Custer has Dr. Newman arrested, but Dr. Phillips has already escaped. Sitting Bull remains in his tent for the duration of the battle, waiting for Custer to come talk peace. |
||||||
| Devil's Island | November 11, 1966 | March 14, 1895 | Devil's Island Devil's Island Devil's Island is the smallest and northernmost island of the three Îles du Salut located about 6 nautical miles off the coast of French Guiana . It has an area of 14 ha . It was a small part of the notorious French penal colony in French Guiana until 1952... in South America South America South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east... |
9 | ||
| The time travelers arrive on the French penal colony of Devil's Island just as new prisoners arrive. They are mistaken for two of the prisoners who have escaped and are imprisoned in their stead. The other prisoners are not interested in escape until Captain Alfred Dreyfus Alfred Dreyfus Alfred Dreyfus was a French artillery officer of Jewish background whose trial and conviction in 1894 on charges of treason became one of the most tense political dramas in modern French and European history... arrives on the island, but this is part of a scheme of the French government to eliminate Dreyfus by killing him if he tries to escape. (See the Dreyfus Affair Dreyfus Affair The Dreyfus affair was a political scandal that divided France in the 1890s and the early 1900s. It involved the conviction for treason in November 1894 of Captain Alfred Dreyfus, a young French artillery officer of Alsatian Jewish descent... .) |
||||||
| Reign Of Terror | November 18, 1966 | October 8, 1793 | Paris Paris Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region... , France France The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France... |
10 | ||
| The time travelers arrive in Paris Paris Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region... , France France The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France... in the middle of the French Revolution French Revolution The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years... during the Reign of Terror Reign of Terror The Reign of Terror , also known simply as The Terror , was a period of violence that occurred after the onset of the French Revolution, incited by conflict between rival political factions, the Girondins and the Jacobins, and marked by mass executions of "enemies of... . A shopkeeper offers to help them get out of the city if they will help him get to Marie Antoinette Marie Antoinette Marie Antoinette ; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was an Archduchess of Austria and the Queen of France and of Navarre. She was the fifteenth and penultimate child of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa and Holy Roman Emperor Francis I.... in an attempt to free her. Instead, they end up helping the Dauphin, Louis XVII Louis XVII of France Louis XVII , from birth to 1789 known as Louis-Charles, Duke of Normandy; then from 1789 to 1791 as Louis-Charles, Dauphin of France; and from 1791 to 1793 as Louis-Charles, Prince Royal of France, was the son of King Louis XVI of France and Queen Marie Antoinette... , to escape with the shopkeeper as his guide and protector. The time travelers are confronted by an ancestor of General Kirk, who is a dead ringer for him. Kirk has his heirloom ring sent back to possibly facilitate Doug and Tony's being recovered, but the ring had been a love token between Marie Antoinette and a foreign amour. The ancestor General Querque seeks to use the ring as evidence to incriminate Marie Antoinette, clearing the way for her execution. At the end of the episode Doug and Tony distract a young artillery lieutenant by the name of Napoléon Bonaparte so that the shopkeeper and the dauphin can go aboard a ship that will take them to freedom. The ring experiment ultimately fails: Doug and Tony get transferred to another era just before rifle shots reach their position, while the ring gets transferred, by inference, back to Kirk. Note: This episode said that Marie Antoinette was executed shortly after noon on October 15; the execution actually took place on October 16. |
||||||
| Secret Weapon | November 25, 1966 | June 16, 1956 | Southeastern Europe | 11 | ||
| A general in The Pentagon The Pentagon The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect... takes advantage of them arriving at the right time and location to send them on a spy mission. They are sent a message to meet a contact who will get them in to a secret Soviet Soviet Union The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991.... project, A-13. A-13 turns out to be a project very similar to Project Tic-Toc, but it is not quite functioning. Also, the chief scientist of that project is currently (in 1968) defecting to the United States. The two time travelers pose as scientists and return valuable information on the project and the defector. |
||||||
| The Death Trap | December 2, 1966 | February 21, 1861 | Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore... |
12 | ||
| The two time travelers arrive in a barn while a meeting is occurring of people conspiring to kill Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and... before he has even begun his Presidency. These followers of John Brown John Brown (abolitionist) John Brown was an American revolutionary abolitionist, who in the 1850s advocated and practiced armed insurrection as a means to abolish slavery in the United States. He led the Pottawatomie Massacre during which five men were killed, in 1856 in Bleeding Kansas, and made his name in the... are hoping to make it look like southern secession Secession Secession is the act of withdrawing from an organization, union, or especially a political entity. Threats of secession also can be a strategy for achieving more limited goals.-Secession theory:... ists had done it, thereby sparking a war with the South Southern United States The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States... and resulting in an end to slavery. |
||||||
| The Alamo | December 9, 1966 | March 6, 1836 | The Alamo Mission Alamo Mission in San Antonio The Alamo, originally known as Mission San Antonio de Valero, is a former Roman Catholic mission and fortress compound, site of the Battle of the Alamo in 1836, and now a museum, in San Antonio, Texas.... |
13 | ||
| The two time travelers arrive just outside of the Alamo on the final day of the siege. Knowing that the defenders are doomed they attempt to convince the commander, Col. William B. Travis William B. Travis William Barret Travis was a 19th-century American lawyer and soldier. At the age of 26, he was a lieutenant colonel in the Texas Army... , to have the men abandon the fort or at least evacuate the wounded. |
||||||
| The Night Of The Long Knives | December 16, 1966 | mid May, 1886 | Thar Desert Thar Desert The Thar Desert |Punjab]] province. The Cholistan Desert adjoins the Thar desert spreading into Pakistani Punjab province.-Location and description:... in India India India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world... |
14 | ||
| The two time travelers arrive in the Thar, where Dr. Phillips is immediately captured by Afghanistan rebels. Dr. Newman is shot and presumed dead, but is found by Rudyard Kipling Rudyard Kipling Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature... and taken to the local British fort. Rebellion against the British occupiers is rising, and the local commander has been ordered to not attack the rebels. But one of the scientists has escaped and must convince the British to attack the rebels, freeing Dr. Phillips and stopping the Night Of The Long Knives, the signal to begin the general uprising. Dayton Lummis Dayton Lummis Dayton Lummis. Sr. , was an American actor of film and television who specialized in the genre of anthology and western series, often playing authority figures. From 1959-1960, he appeared as Marshal Andy Morrison in nine episodes of NBC's Law of the Plainsman western, with Michael Ansara and... appeared as the character Gladstone. |
||||||
| Invasion | December 23, 1966 | June 4, 1944 | Cherbourg, France France The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France... |
15 | ||
| Two nights before the D-Day invasion of Europe Europe Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting... , the two time travelers arrive in Cherbourg. The two are almost immediately taken captive by the local Gestapo Gestapo The Gestapo was the official secret police of Nazi Germany. Beginning on 20 April 1934, it was under the administration of the SS leader Heinrich Himmler in his position as Chief of German Police... . Dr. Phillips is taken to be brainwashed while Dr. Newman is allowed to escape so that he can be followed. |
||||||
| The Revenge Of Robin Hood | December 30, 1966 | June 14, 1215 | King John John of England John , also known as John Lackland , was King of England from 6 April 1199 until his death... 's Castle, England England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental... |
16 | ||
| The Earl of Huntington, formerly Robin Hood Robin Hood Robin Hood was a heroic outlaw in English folklore. A highly skilled archer and swordsman, he is known for "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor", assisted by a group of fellow outlaws known as his "Merry Men". Traditionally, Robin Hood and his men are depicted wearing Lincoln green clothes.... , is petitioning King John John of England John , also known as John Lackland , was King of England from 6 April 1199 until his death... to sign the Magna Carta Magna Carta Magna Carta is an English charter, originally issued in the year 1215 and reissued later in the 13th century in modified versions, which included the most direct challenges to the monarch's authority to date. The charter first passed into law in 1225... , or the barons (who have raised armies) will overthrow the king. Dr. Phillips has arrived just outside of the throne room and overhears the end of the conversation. When King John orders his men to arrest the Earl of Huntington, Huntington puts up a valiant fight (with swordplay) but is apprehended when he runs into Dr. Phillips on his way out. They are questioned by the king as to where the barons are meeting, but when they don't give up the information, they are taken to the dungeon to be tortured for the information. Dr. Newman had arrived earlier in the dungeon, and when the time is right, he overcomes the guards and frees the two prisoners. The two time travelers escape first, but Huntington is recaptured on his way out. On their way to warn the barons, the two travelers are caught by the Merry Men. After escaping the king's men, rescuing the Earl of Huntington and kidnapping the king, the episode ends with King John reluctantly signing the Magna Carta. |
||||||
| Kill Two By Two | January 6, 1967 | February 17, 1945 | Minami Iwo South Iwo Jima South Iwo Jima is the southernmost island of the Volcano Islands group of the Ogasawara Islands, 60 km south of Iwo Jima. It is 1300 km south of Tokyo, 330 km SSW of Chichijima. Its area is 3.4 km², shore length, 7.5 km, and highest point 916m, the highest in the... |
17 | ||
| The two time travelers arrive about 700 miles Southeast of Tokyo Tokyo , ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family... , Japan Japan Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south... in the South Pacific on the island of Minami Iwo, one of two islands off the coast of Iwo Jima Iwo Jima Iwo Jima, officially , is an island of the Japanese Volcano Islands chain, which lie south of the Ogasawara Islands and together with them form the Ogasawara Archipelago. The island is located south of mainland Tokyo and administered as part of Ogasawara, one of eight villages of Tokyo... , two days before the Battle of Iwo Jima Battle of Iwo Jima The Battle of Iwo Jima , or Operation Detachment, was a major battle in which the United States fought for and captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Empire of Japan. The U.S... during World War II World War II World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis... . They manage to overpower the observer left on the island to radio the position of the U.S. Navy United States Navy The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S... ships but are captured themselves when a Lieutenant Nakamura surprises them. Instead of imprisoning them or killing them, he offers them an opportunity to capture or kill the Japanese soldiers. Nakamura gives Doug and Tony a one-hour head start but no weapons. Dr. Newman has a badly sprained ankle, so Dr. Phillips sneaks back and manages to take five grenades from the supply room. The two sides play a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse, but Lieutenant Nakamura seems strangely suicidal. |
||||||
| Visitors From Beyond The Stars | January 13, 1967 | 1885 | In space Space Space is the boundless, three-dimensional extent in which objects and events occur and have relative position and direction. Physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless four-dimensional continuum... above Mullins, Arizona Territory Arizona Territory The Territory of Arizona was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from February 24, 1863 until February 14, 1912, when it was admitted to the Union as the 48th state.... |
18 | ||
| The time travelers arrive on an alien spacecraft in space above the Americas Americas The Americas, or America , are lands in the Western hemisphere, also known as the New World. In English, the plural form the Americas is often used to refer to the landmasses of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions, while the singular form America is primarily... . Two aliens soon appear, pull a gun, and force the travelers into an area that translates between their different languages. The aliens tell the two travelers that they are going to take all of the protein (food) from Earth Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets... and that there will be no life left when they leave, just as they have done with other planets. The aliens also tell them that there are three kinds of people: those who cooperate, those who can be made to cooperate and those whom they must kill. "Resistance is impossible," they say. The aliens (from Alpha 1) land their ship at a farm near Mullins, Arizona Territory (approximately 112°W 34°N) in the year 1885. Their first objective is to take over the farm house, which they do. Their second objective is to take over the town, which they almost succeed in doing. Dr. Phillips has been made cooperative by the aliens. Dr. Newman has to get help from the sheriff and the bar owner in order for his plan to take the aliens' control unit away from them to succeed. Meanwhile, two of the same species of aliens (who no longer need to raid planets for food) appears in the Time Tunnel control room and demand that they prove that they didn't destroy the ship or face the destruction of the Earth. After they are shown an image of the ship leaving Earth safely, the aliens leave. |
||||||
| The Ghost Of Nero | January 20, 1967 | October 23, 1915 | Italian Alps in Villa Galba, Northern Italy Northern Italy Northern Italy is a wide cultural, historical and geographical definition, without any administrative usage, used to indicate the northern part of the Italian state, also referred as Settentrione or Alta Italia... |
19 | ||
| The travelers arrive at the Italian Alps just outside of fictional Villa Galba during the Italian Campaign Italian Campaign (World War I) The Italian campaign refers to a series of battles fought between the armies of Austria-Hungary and Italy, along with their allies, in northern Italy between 1915 and 1918. Italy hoped that by joining the countries of the Triple Entente against the Central Powers it would gain Cisalpine Tyrol , the... in World War I World War I World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918... , and enter the cellar to avoid an artillery Artillery Originally applied to any group of infantry primarily armed with projectile weapons, artillery has over time become limited in meaning to refer only to those engines of war that operate by projection of munitions far beyond the range of effect of personal weapons... bombardment. A German German Empire The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German... advance team has just arrived at the villa. A German corporal is mysteriously stabbed to death while investigating a crypt marked Nero Nero Nero , was Roman Emperor from 54 to 68, and the last in the Julio-Claudian dynasty. Nero was adopted by his great-uncle Claudius to become his heir and successor, and succeeded to the throne in 54 following Claudius' death.... , which was exposed by a bomb. Fearing that the Germans will think they did it, the travellers hide and accidentally find a secret passage to the upper floors of the estate, where the owner, an Italian count Count A count or countess is an aristocratic nobleman in European countries. The word count came into English from the French comte, itself from Latin comes—in its accusative comitem—meaning "companion", and later "companion of the emperor, delegate of the emperor". The adjective form of the word is... named Galba–who is descended from Roman Roman Empire The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean.... emperor Galba Galba Galba , was Roman Emperor for seven months from 68 to 69. Galba was the governor of Hispania Tarraconensis, and made a bid for the throne during the rebellion of Julius Vindex... –offers to protect them from the Germans. When the Germans arrive at the room, Galba tells the Germans that the two travelers are neutral American guests of his. The German major orders them to stay in the room as prisoners while the Germans use the villa to observe the movements of Italian Italy Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and... forces. A German officer is possessed by the ghost of Nero and tries to kill the descendant of Galba, whom Nero blames as his assassin. The ghost also tries to kill the nobleman by possessing Tony. Project HQ utilizes the services of a paranormal Paranormal Paranormal is a general term that designates experiences that lie outside "the range of normal experience or scientific explanation" or that indicates phenomena understood to be outside of science's current ability to explain or measure... researcher, who suggests zapping Tony with 1,000,000 volts of electricity Electricity Electricity is a general term encompassing a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge. These include many easily recognizable phenomena, such as lightning, static electricity, and the flow of electrical current in an electrical wire... for one milisecond through the Tunnel to force the ghost out. This nearly kills Tony, so HQ attempts to bring him back to the present. Nero is transported instead, and almost destroys HQ before the scientists can send him back. When the Italian army retakes the Villa, the ghost of Nero enters a young Italian Corporal Corporal Corporal is a rank in use in some form by most militaries and by some police forces or other uniformed organizations. It is usually equivalent to NATO Rank Code OR-4.... by the name of Benito Mussolini Benito Mussolini Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism.... , who vows to drive the Huns from his country and restore the glory of the Caesar Caesar (title) Caesar is a title of imperial character. It derives from the cognomen of Julius Caesar, the Roman dictator... s. The travellers are transported to a new era at this point. Note: Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary in May 1915, but it was not until August 1916 that Italy declared war on Germany. Count Galba also appeals to Nero for help against the "Huns Huns The Huns were a group of nomadic people who, appearing from east of the Volga River, migrated into Europe c. AD 370 and established the vast Hunnic Empire there. Since de Guignes linked them with the Xiongnu, who had been northern neighbours of China 300 years prior to the emergence of the Huns,... ", a common nickname for the Germans in WWI. But the real Huns invaded Italy four centuries after Nero's demise. |
||||||
| The Walls Of Jericho | January 27, 1967 | 1550 BC | Near Jericho Jericho Jericho ; is a city located near the Jordan River in the West Bank of the Palestinian territories. It is the capital of the Jericho Governorate and has a population of more than 20,000. Situated well below sea level on an east-west route north of the Dead Sea, Jericho is the lowest permanently... in Israel Israel The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea... |
20 | ||
| The travelers arrive outside of the tent of Joshua Joshua Joshua , is a minor figure in the Torah, being one of the spies for Israel and in few passages as Moses's assistant. He turns to be the central character in the Hebrew Bible's Book of Joshua... during the night, two days before the end of the Israelite Israelite According to the Bible the Israelites were a Hebrew-speaking people of the Ancient Near East who inhabited the Land of Canaan during the monarchic period .The word "Israelite" derives from the Biblical Hebrew ישראל... siege of Jericho. Joshua comes to believe they are who they say they are–time travellers–and sends them to spy inside the city. Doug and Tony save a young virgin from being sacrificed Human sacrifice Human sacrifice is the act of killing one or more human beings as part of a religious ritual . Its typology closely parallels the various practices of ritual slaughter of animals and of religious sacrifice in general. Human sacrifice has been practised in various cultures throughout history... to the Levant Levant The Levant or ) is the geographic region and culture zone of the "eastern Mediterranean littoral between Anatolia and Egypt" . The Levant includes most of modern Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, the Palestinian territories, and sometimes parts of Turkey and Iraq, and corresponds roughly to the... ine deity Chemosh Chemosh Chemosh , was the god of the Moabites . The etymology of "Chemosh" is unknown. He is also known from Ebla as Kamish.... by the high priest High priest The term "high priest" usually refers either to an individual who holds the office of ruler-priest, or to one who is the head of a religious caste.-Ancient Egypt:... of Jericho. Doug is captured and sent to the dungeon to be tortured as an Israelite spy. Tony escapes into a house with an unlocked door. When the resident arrives, he calls her (Rahab Rahab Rahab, was, according to the Book of Joshua, a woman who lived in Jericho in the Promised Land and assisted the Israelites in capturing the city... ) because, from the Biblical Bible The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations... account, she is the one who sheltered the two Israelite spies. (Rahab is the sister of the almost-sacrificed virgin.) After Tony rescues Doug from the dungeon, they take refuge on the roof of Rahab's house, but are betrayed by her servant woman Azah, who desires the reward of 1,000 talents of silver. Doug escapes to tell Joshua the information that he seeks. Tony and Rahab are about to be stoned Stoning Stoning, or lapidation, is a form of capital punishment whereby a group throws stones at a person until the person dies. No individual among the group can be identified as the one who kills the subject, yet everyone involved plainly bears some degree of moral culpability. This is in contrast to the... to death, but when the Israelites complete their march, blow their trumpets and shout, the walls of the city fall down as what appears to be a tornado Tornado A tornado is a violent, dangerous, rotating column of air that is in contact with both the surface of the earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. They are often referred to as a twister or a cyclone, although the word cyclone is used in meteorology in a wider... traces the destruction. Ann, a skeptic, decides that since a tornado is a natural phenomenon, that the fall of the walls was not a supernatural event, while Ray is convinced it was supernatural (perhaps because tornadoes are not known to strike in the Holy Lands). The travellers are transported to a new era after telling Rahab she'll be safe. Special Note: In some time zones, during the original broadcast of this episode, the program was interrupted by an ABC News Bulletin regarding the death of three astronauts (Virgil "Gus" Grissom, Edward White, and Roger Chaffee) in a fire in the Apollo 1 Apollo 1 Apollo 1 was scheduled to be the first manned mission of the Apollo manned lunar landing program, with a target launch date of February 21, 1967. A cabin fire during a launch pad test on January 27 at Launch Pad 34 at Cape Canaveral killed all three crew members: Command Pilot Virgil "Gus"... command module, while preparing for launch of the first manned Apollo space mission, on the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center. In other time zones, the interruption came while "Rango Rango Rango was a Western situation comedy starring comedian Tim Conway which was broadcast in the United States on the ABC television network in 1967.... " was airing. |
||||||
| Idol Of Death | February 3, 1967 | October 12, 1519 | near Veracruz, Mexico Veracruz, Veracruz Veracruz, officially known as Heroica Veracruz, is a major port city and municipality on the Gulf of Mexico in the Mexican state of Veracruz. The city is located in the central part of the state. It is located along Federal Highway 140 from the state capital Xalapa, and is the state's most... |
21 | ||
| Hernán Cortés Hernán Cortés Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca was a Spanish Conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the rule of the King of Castile in the early 16th century... (played by Anthony Caruso Anthony Caruso (actor) Anthony Caruso was an American character actor in over 100 American films, usually playing villains, including the First Season of Walt Disney's Zorro as Don Juan Ortega... ) has captured the royal family of the Tlaxcalan Tlaxcala (Nahua state) Tlaxcala was a pre-Columbian city state of central Mexico.Tlaxcala was a confederation of four altepetl — Ocotelolco, Quiahuiztlan, Tepeticpac and Tizatlan — which each took turns providing a ruler for Tlaxcala as a whole.-History:Tlaxcala was never conquered by the Aztec empire, but was... people of Mexico Mexico The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of... just as his army of 3,000 Tlaxcalans begins its deadly rampage through Cholula Cholula (Mesoamerican site) Cholula , was an important city of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, dating back to at least the 2nd century BCE, with settlement as a village going back at least some thousand years earlier. The great site of Cholula stands just west of the modern city of Puebla. Its immense pyramid exceeds the Pyramid... during the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire. He is questioning them about the location of a golden mask, the symbol of ruling authority to these Indians. Doug and Tony arrive before the torture begins and are captured trying to save the royals. Once Cortés gets the information he wants, he kills the king and queen but keeps the timid royal heir alive for the moment. While Cortés is away watching the burning of his ships to prevent the rebellion of his troops, a member of the tribe frees the royal heir and the two travelers. The four of them try to retrieve the mask before the Spaniards gain it. Project HQ, meanwhile, has enlisted the aid of a Mexican named Castillano to help pinpoint the travellers' location in Veracruz Veracruz Veracruz, formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave , is one of the 31 states that, along with the Federal District, comprise the 32 federative entities of Mexico. It is divided in 212 municipalities and its capital city is... in order to bring the two scientists back. It turns out, however, that Castillano is more concerned with acquiring the mask for himself. He insists that the project team bring back the mask before their colleagues. When HQ transports the mask, Doug, Tony and the young chief are in the cave containing the mask, being forced by a Spanish Spanish people The Spanish are citizens of the Kingdom of Spain. Within Spain, there are also a number of vigorous nationalisms and regionalisms, reflecting the country's complex history.... captain to collect the gold gifted to the pagan god. The transport of the mask threatens to collapse the cave, so the team tries to send it back, but Castillano grabs the mask and threatens to shoot anyone in his way. A short gun battle breaks out in HQ and the mask is successfully sent back. The time disturbances, however, cause the cave to collapse onto the greedy captain. The young chief, now confident in his ability to lead his people, saves the mask while Doug and Tony are transported to a new era. |
||||||
| Billy The Kid | February 10, 1967 | April 23, 1881 | Lincoln, New Mexico Territory Lincoln, New Mexico Lincoln is an unincorporated community in Lincoln County, New Mexico, United States, located approximately 57 miles west of Roswell and just south of the Lincoln National Forest. The town had a population of about 800 in 1888, and Main Street has been beautifully preserved by current residents.... |
22 | ||
| The travelers arrive in Lincoln, New Mexico Territory, but a gang on horses chases them into the sheriff's office. The gang kills the deputy who is guarding Billy the Kid Billy the Kid William H. Bonney William H. Bonney William H. Bonney (born William Henry McCarty, Jr. est. November 23, 1859 – c. July 14, 1881, better known as Billy the Kid but also known as Henry Antrim, was a 19th-century American gunman who participated in the Lincoln County War and became a frontier... (played by Robert Walker, Jr.). The young outlaw plans to shoot the travellers, but Doug manages to shoot Billy. The scientists then escape out of town. Billy, whose belt buckle deflected the bullet, pursues them and catches them in an abandoned shack outside of town. Before Doug and Tony can be shot, Lt. General Heywood Kirk sends an audio transmission to the room stating that Billy is surrounded by law enforcement. The travellers then overpower Billy and tie him up. Tony goes back to town to get help from the sheriff Sheriffs in the United States In the United States, a sheriff is a county official and is typically the top law enforcement officer of a county. Historically, the sheriff was also commander of the militia in that county. Distinctive to law enforcement in the United States, sheriffs are usually elected. The political election of... , but is mistaken for the Kid and arrested. When sheriff Pat Garrett Pat Garrett Patrick Floyd "Pat" Garrett was an American Old West lawman, bartender, and customs agent who was best known for killing Billy the Kid... arrives back in town he verifies that Dr. Newman is not Billy the Kid, but the townspeople are convinced that he is and besiege the sheriff's office. Garrett sends out a deputy to start a cattle stampede to disrupt the lynch mob Lynching Lynching is an extrajudicial execution carried out by a mob, often by hanging, but also by burning at the stake or shooting, in order to punish an alleged transgressor, or to intimidate, control, or otherwise manipulate a population of people. It is related to other means of social control that... , allowing Garrett and Tony to escape the jail and return to the shack to arrest Billy. Billy, however, has been rescued by his gang. Doug evaded them and headed for town. When he arrives back in town, he finds Billy waiting for him. Billy demands a showdown in the streets, but Garrett and Doug arrive and save him. Garrett arrests Billy and his cohort, and the travellers are transported to a new era. |
||||||
| Pirates Of Deadman's Island | February 17, 1967 | April 9, 1805 | Near the Barbary Coast Barbary Coast The Barbary Coast, or Barbary, was the term used by Europeans from the 16th until the 19th century to refer to much of the collective land of the Berber people. Today, the terms Maghreb and "Tamazgha" correspond roughly to "Barbary"... of Africa Africa Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area... |
23 | ||
| The travellers arrive somewhere in the Mediterranean on a pirate Piracy Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence at sea. The term can include acts committed on land, in the air, or in other major bodies of water or on a shore. It does not normally include crimes committed against persons traveling on the same vessel as the perpetrator... ship during the First Barbary War First Barbary War The First Barbary War , also known as the Barbary Coast War or the Tripolitan War, was the first of two wars fought between the United States and the North African Berber Muslim states known collectively as the Barbary States... and are captured and taken to an island. Captain Beal, a Barbary pirate, orders that the strangers be shot. However, the nephew of the king of Spain Spain Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula... , Armando, was also captured and pleads for the lives of the Americans, saying the travellers can watch over him until a ransom can be paid. Doug, Tony and the boy attempt several escapes, but are recaptured each time. Beal then decides to kill Doug and Tony for good, but the shelling from several U.S. Navy United States Navy The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S... ships–commanded by Captain Stephen Decatur Stephen Decatur Stephen Decatur, Jr. , was an American naval officer notable for his many naval victories in the early 19th century. He was born on the eastern shore of Maryland, Worcester county, the son of a U.S. Naval Officer who served during the American Revolution. Shortly after attending college Decatur... , who has arrived to defeat the pirates in the First Barbary War–puts an end to the pirates' plans. The pirates head for their ship to engage in battle. Tony is hit by a shot on the beach is and presumed dead. The pirates take Armando and Doug onto their ship during the battle. Tony recovers and swims out to the U.S. flagship. The Time Tunnel personnel accidentally transfer Captain Beal back to HQ, and he causes a ruckus and kidnaps Ann. She persuades him to go back to his ship, where he is intentionally killed by one of his own crew. HQ then transfers Armando and Doug back to the island before the pirate ship is destroyed. They then transfer first Armando and then Doug to Captain Decatur's ship to save them from the shelling. Both Doug and Armando are seriously wounded, however, and it is feared they may both die. The newly retired Time Tunnel staff doctor, Dr. Benjamin Berkhart, insists on going back to save their lives and help the wounded American sailors. Dr. Berkhart arrives and treats Doug's shock with an injection and administers an anesthetic to Armando. Happy knowing he will live out the remainder of his life in this time period, Dr. Berkhart goes to look after the wounded sailors as the travellers are transported to a new era. Note: This is the last episode to have the opening narration. |
||||||
| Chase Through Time | 24 February 1967 | 1547 and two other time periods | Grand Canyon Grand Canyon The Grand Canyon is a steep-sided canyon carved by the Colorado River in the United States in the state of Arizona. It is largely contained within the Grand Canyon National Park, the 15th national park in the United States... , a futuristic beehive community, a Pleistocene Pleistocene The Pleistocene is the epoch from 2,588,000 to 11,700 years BP that spans the world's recent period of repeated glaciations. The name pleistocene is derived from the Greek and .... rainforest Rainforest Rainforests are forests characterized by high rainfall, with definitions based on a minimum normal annual rainfall of 1750-2000 mm... |
24 | ||
| The travellers arrive near the Grand Canyon Grand Canyon The Grand Canyon is a steep-sided canyon carved by the Colorado River in the United States in the state of Arizona. It is largely contained within the Grand Canyon National Park, the 15th national park in the United States... , Arizona Arizona Arizona ; is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. It is also part of the western United States and the mountain west. The capital and largest city is Phoenix... , in 1547. Meanwhile, back at HQ, Raul Niman (Robert Duvall Robert Duvall Robert Selden Duvall is an American actor and director. He has won an Academy Award, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and a BAFTA over the course of his career.... ) is a spy for an unspecified country or organization. Now that his mission is over, he has planted a nuclear bomb somewhere in the complex, and the timer has been placed in the Time Tunnel control room. In order to place the timer, he killed the person monitoring the time tunnel just before a security check. No other avenue of escape is left, so he jumps into the Time Tunnel. The Tunnel had been tuned to the location of Doug and Tony, so Niman arrives near the Grand Canyon at the same time. The two travellers are told that they must apprehend Niman and get him to tell them the location of the bomb. But the lock on the time period drifts and moves Niman to another time, so the two travellers are sent after him. They arrive in the year 1,000,000 A.D., ten years after Niman has arrived. Niman is helping the inhabitants of this future age to build a time machine so that the 'masters' can spread their "ultimate human society"–actually a repressive, orderly society based on bee Bee Bees are flying insects closely related to wasps and ants, and are known for their role in pollination and for producing honey and beeswax. Bees are a monophyletic lineage within the superfamily Apoidea, presently classified by the unranked taxon name Anthophila... society–throughout different ages. The two travellers are pressed into service to help him build the time machine, but the Time Tunnel personnel are able to move them–along with Niman–before they can come to trouble. However, two people from that time are accidentally moved as well: Niman's guard Vokar (Lew Gallo Lew Gallo Lew Gallo was an American character actor and producer from Mount Kisco, New York, best known for his role as Maj. Joseph Cobb on the 1960s ABC World War II series Twelve O'Clock High. He also made appearances on other series including Rawhide, Dr. Kildare, The F.B.I., Gunsmoke, The Twilight... ) and a sympathetic female worker named Zee (Vitina Marcus Vitina Marcus Vitina Marcus is an American actress of Sicilian and Hungarian descent. Her parents were Rose and Frank Marcus, and her Sicilian grandmother was named Vitina.-Career:... ). All five of them arrive in 1,000,000 B.C. and the chase continues until they all fall into a cell in a giant beehive Beehive A beehive is a structure in which bees live and raise their young.Beehive may also refer to:Buildings and locations:* Bee Hive, Alabama, a neighborhood in Alabama* Beehive , a wing of the New Zealand Parliament Buildings... . Niman is reminded that if the Time Tunnel is blown up, they will all be stuck here. Niman tells them where the timer is located and it is disabled. But the Time Tunnel can only transfer two people at a time; Doug and Tony are moved first, and then the two from the future are moved. The Tunnel can't do anymore moves at this time, so Niman is apparently left to face angry giant prehistoric bees. |
||||||
| The Death Merchant | March 3, 1967 | July 2, 1863 | Adams County, Pennsylvania Adams County, Pennsylvania Adams County is a county in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. As of the 2010 census, the population was 101,407. It was created on January 22, 1800, from part of York County and named in honor of the second President of the United States, John Adams... |
25 | ||
| The two travellers arrive in the middle of the Battle of Gettysburg Battle of Gettysburg The Battle of Gettysburg , was fought July 1–3, 1863, in and around the town of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The battle with the largest number of casualties in the American Civil War, it is often described as the war's turning point. Union Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade's Army of the Potomac... during the American Civil War American Civil War The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25... , where Dr. Tony Newman is quickly shell-shocked by an artillery Artillery Originally applied to any group of infantry primarily armed with projectile weapons, artillery has over time become limited in meaning to refer only to those engines of war that operate by projection of munitions far beyond the range of effect of personal weapons... blast. Dr. Doug Phillips retreats from the battlefield with a small group of Union Union Army The Union Army was the land force that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the U.S. Army, the Northern Army and the National Army... soldiers, whose commander tells him to put on a Union uniform to avoid getting shot. The Time Tunnel personnel send a shock through time to revive Tony and he is found by a small group of Confederate Confederate States Army The Confederate States Army was the army of the Confederate States of America while the Confederacy existed during the American Civil War. On February 8, 1861, delegates from the seven Deep South states which had already declared their secession from the United States of America adopted the... soldiers. Suffering from amnesia Amnesia Amnesia is a condition in which one's memory is lost. The causes of amnesia have traditionally been divided into categories. Memory appears to be stored in several parts of the limbic system of the brain, and any condition that interferes with the function of this system can cause amnesia... , he becomes convinced he is the lieutenant Lieutenant A lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer in many nations' armed forces. Typically, the rank of lieutenant in naval usage, while still a junior officer rank, is senior to the army rank... whom the Confederate soldiers were expecting and dons a Confederate uniform. The Union soldiers had intercepted the courier so they know that a man named Michaels, who has stolen some gunpowder Gunpowder Gunpowder, also known since in the late 19th century as black powder, was the first chemical explosive and the only one known until the mid 1800s. It is a mixture of sulfur, charcoal, and potassium nitrate - with the sulfur and charcoal acting as fuels, while the saltpeter works as an oxidizer... from the Union army, is going to sell it to the Confederate army. Both sides are attempting to find Michaels first and get the gunpowder. Mr. Michaels is actually the early-16th century philosopher Machiavelli Niccolò Machiavelli Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli was an Italian historian, philosopher, humanist, and writer based in Florence during the Renaissance. He is one of the main founders of modern political science. He was a diplomat, political philosopher, playwright, and a civil servant of the Florentine Republic... (played by Malachi Throne Malachi Throne Malachi Throne is an American actor, most noted for his roles on Star Trek and It Takes a Thief.Throne was born in New York City... ), who has been moved to this period by the Tunnel due to similarities with Doug's "pattern". When the Confederates show up, Machiavelli is willing to give them the gunpowder because the war is much more interesting when the sides are evenly matched. Tony takes Doug prisoner. Tony, Doug and Machiavelli eventually make their way to the cave Cave A cave or cavern is a natural underground space large enough for a human to enter. The term applies to natural cavities some part of which is in total darkness. The word cave also includes smaller spaces like rock shelters, sea caves, and grottos.Speleology is the science of exploration and study... where the gunpowder is stored. Doug and Tony fight, which results in Tony regaining his identity after being knocked out by Doug. The Time Tunnel transfers Machiavelli back to his own time (January 3, 1519) and then moves the two travellers to a new era. Note: In this episode, Machiavelli says that he is working on his book, The Art of War The Art of War (Machiavelli) Art of War is a treatise by the Italian Renaissance political philosopher and historian Niccolò Machiavelli.The format of Art of War is a socratic dialogue... . This should not be confused with the book The Art of War The Art of War is an ancient Chinese military treatise that is attributed to Sun Tzu , a high ranking military general and strategist during the late Spring and Autumn period... by Sun Tzu Sun Tzu Sun Wu , style name Changqing , better known as Sun Tzu or Sunzi , was an ancient Chinese military general, strategist and philosopher who is traditionally believed, and who is most likely, to have authored The Art of War, an influential ancient Chinese book on military strategy... , which bears the same title when translated into English English language English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria... . |
||||||
| Attack Of The Barbarians | March 10, 1967 | 1287 | East Asia East Asia East Asia or Eastern Asia is a subregion of Asia that can be defined in either geographical or cultural terms... |
26 | ||
| Doug and Tony–wearing their usual attire despite having left the previous era in soldiers' uniforms–arrive somewhere in Mongolia Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East and Central Asia. It is bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, east and west. Although Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan, its western-most point is only from Kazakhstan's eastern tip. Ulan Bator, the capital and largest... or Eastern China East China East China is a geographical and a loosely-defined cultural region that covers the eastern coastal area of China.Although an intangible and loosely defined concept, for administrative and governmental purposes, the region is defined by the government of the People's Republic of China to include... and are captured by Mongols and taken to the tent of Batu Khan Batu Khan Batu Khan was a Mongol ruler and founder of the Ulus of Jochi , the sub-khanate of the Mongol Empire. Batu was a son of Jochi and grandson of Genghis Khan. His ulus was the chief state of the Golden Horde , which ruled Rus and the Caucasus for around 250 years, after also destroying the armies... (Arthur Batanides Arthur Batanides Arthur Batanides was an American film and television actor, originally from Tacoma, Washington.In the 1959-1960 season, Batanides appeared in a supporting role as police Sergeant Olivera in the syndicated crime drama, Johnny Midnight, starring Edmond O'Brien as a New York City actor-turned-private... ). Batu–a grandson of Genghis Khan Genghis Khan Genghis Khan , born Temujin and occasionally known by his temple name Taizu , was the founder and Great Khan of the Mongol Empire, which became the largest contiguous empire in history after his death.... –feels he is the rightful heir of Genghis, but he has to overcome Kublai Khan Kublai Khan Kublai Khan , born Kublai and also known by the temple name Shizu , was the fifth Great Khan of the Mongol Empire from 1260 to 1294 and the founder of the Yuan Dynasty in China... . Doug is thought to be dead, so Tony is torture Torture Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion... d on the rack for information on the weaknesses of the nearby enemy fortress. Batu and most of his guards leave once Tony passes out. Doug wakes up and carries Tony away from the camp, where they are found by Marco Polo Marco Polo Marco Polo was a Venetian merchant traveler from the Venetian Republic whose travels are recorded in Il Milione, a book which did much to introduce Europeans to Central Asia and China. He learned about trading whilst his father and uncle, Niccolò and Maffeo, travelled through Asia and apparently... (John Saxon John Saxon (actor) John Saxon is an American actor who has worked on over 200 projects during the span of sixty years. Saxon is most known for his work in horror films such as A Nightmare on Elm Street and Black Christmas, both of which feature Saxon as a policeman in search of the killer... ). The travellers seek safety in the fortress, where Tony falls in love with Princess Sarit (Vitina Marcus Vitina Marcus Vitina Marcus is an American actress of Sicilian and Hungarian descent. Her parents were Rose and Frank Marcus, and her Sicilian grandmother was named Vitina.-Career:... ), the only daughter of Kublai Khan Kublai Khan Kublai Khan , born Kublai and also known by the temple name Shizu , was the fifth Great Khan of the Mongol Empire from 1260 to 1294 and the founder of the Yuan Dynasty in China... . Batu comes up with a plan to kidnap Sarit and marry her, thereby uniting the various Mongol tribes behind him in his quest. Batu's men succeed in kidnapping Sarit, but she is freed by Doug and Tony. Batu's forces then launch a massive assault on the fortress. Doug and Tony are able to make artillery shells by mixing gunpowder Gunpowder Gunpowder, also known since in the late 19th century as black powder, was the first chemical explosive and the only one known until the mid 1800s. It is a mixture of sulfur, charcoal, and potassium nitrate - with the sulfur and charcoal acting as fuels, while the saltpeter works as an oxidizer... and potassium nitrate Potassium nitrate Potassium nitrate is a chemical compound with the formula KNO3. It is an ionic salt of potassium ions K+ and nitrate ions NO3−.It occurs as a mineral niter and is a natural solid source of nitrogen. Its common names include saltpetre , from medieval Latin sal petræ: "stone salt" or possibly "Salt... in empty water jugs. General Kirk is able to send back igniters Pyrotechnic initiator A pyrotechnic initiator is a device containing a pyrotechnic composition used primarily to ignite other, more difficult-to-ignite materials, e.g. thermites, gas generators, and solid-fuel rockets... to make the bombs successful. The tide is turned in the battle, and the travellers are transported to a new era. |
||||||
| Merlin The Magician | March 17, 1967 | 544 | Cornwall Cornwall Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of... , England England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental... |
27 | ||
| Merlin Merlin Merlin is a legendary figure best known as the wizard featured in the Arthurian legend. The standard depiction of the character first appears in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae, written c. 1136, and is based on an amalgamation of previous historical and legendary figures... the magician appears in Time Tunnel HQ and freezes the personnel. He then brings the two travellers out of their "time limbo" (between destinations) back to the Time Tunnel control room in suspended animation so that he can instruct them to do what he asks, though they may die in the effort. He then sends them to Cornwall Cornwall Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of... in the year 544. There, they fight off a band of Viking Viking The term Viking is customarily used to refer to the Norse explorers, warriors, merchants, and pirates who raided, traded, explored and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.These Norsemen used their famed longships to... s and encounter a young man named Arthur Pendragon King Arthur King Arthur is a legendary British leader of the late 5th and early 6th centuries, who, according to Medieval histories and romances, led the defence of Britain against Saxon invaders in the early 6th century. The details of Arthur's story are mainly composed of folklore and literary invention, and... whose father has been killed by the Viking raiders. Merlin appears and orders the travellers to protect Arthur at all costs. A band of Vikings then attack and Doug is felled by a sword while Tony and Arthur are captured. Merlin prevents the Time Tunnel crew from moving the two travelers out of this time, going so far as to injure Dr. Raymond Swain with an electric shock Electric shock Electric Shock of a body with any source of electricity that causes a sufficient current through the skin, muscles or hair. Typically, the expression is used to denote an unwanted exposure to electricity, hence the effects are considered undesirable.... . When Doug awakes, he is in the castle of King Leodegrance Leodegrance King Leodegrance is the father of Queen Guinevere in Arthurian legend. His kingdom of Carmelide is sometimes identified with a location somewhere in the southwest of England, but may be located in Breton Cornouaille near the town of Carhaix, which is the Carhaise of L'Histoire de Merlin King... of Cameliard and is being cared for by the king's daughter, Guinevere Guinevere Guinevere was the legendary queen consort of King Arthur. In tales and folklore, she was said to have had a love affair with Arthur's chief knight Sir Lancelot... (Lisa Jak). Merlin heals Doug and has Guinevere fetch the doctor new clothes. Tony escapes from his bonds and frees Arthur, but they are later recaptured. Doug goes to look for weaknesses in the Viking-held castle, and he and Guinevere, who followed Doug, are captured as well. Guinevere is imprisoned in a room by the Viking chieftain Wogan (Vincent Beck). Arthur, Doug and Tony are imprisoned in a cell. Merlin frees them from their bonds, but tells them that they must free themselves from the locked room, since there is a limit to how much magic he can perform at a time. Doug and Tony blow the door of the cell off by improvising a pressure cooker from water, a pot and two thumbscrews. Doug gathers Leodegrance's troops and brings them back to fight, but Merlin says that the Vikings will not be frightened by these "gentlemen knights," so he changes their clothing to that of Vikings, which is the last way Merlin can help them in this venture. The knights storm the castle and drive the Vikings out while Tony kills Wogan in a sword fight. Arthur declares he will make Doug and Tony his first knights, but they are transferred by the Tunnel. The episode places Vikings in England approximately 250 years before the Viking Age Viking Age Viking Age is the term for the period in European history, especially Northern European and Scandinavian history, spanning the late 8th to 11th centuries. Scandinavian Vikings explored Europe by its oceans and rivers through trade and warfare. The Vikings also reached Iceland, Greenland,... and their first recorded appearance in the British Isles. Historians date the beginning of the Viking Age as 8 June 793, the day of the first Viking raid on the abbey on Lindisfarne Lindisfarne Lindisfarne is a tidal island off the north-east coast of England. It is also known as Holy Island and constitutes a civil parish in Northumberland... . |
||||||
| The Kidnappers | March 24, 1967 | 8433 | Planet orbiting Canopus Canopus Canopus |Alpha]] Carinae) is the brightest star in the southern constellation of Carina and Argo Navis, and the second brightest star in the night-time sky, after Sirius. Canopus's visual magnitude is −0.72, and it has an absolute magnitude of −5.53.Canopus is a supergiant of spectral... |
28 | ||
| An alien time traveller from the future called OTT appears in the Time Tunnel control room and kidnaps Dr. Ann McGregor. After the kidnapping, a metal punched card Punched card A punched card, punch card, IBM card, or Hollerith card is a piece of stiff paper that contains digital information represented by the presence or absence of holes in predefined positions... is discovered that has a set of time and space coordinates. Time Tunnel HQ then directs Doug and Tony to those coordinates. HQ attempts to bring the three back together, but OTT arrives, stops the transfer, and steals their space-time converter. Doug and Tony find out that the head of alien encyclopedic project (the Curator, played by Michael Ansara Michael Ansara Michael Ansara is a Syrian-born American stage, screen, and voice actor best known for his portrayal of Cochise in the American television series Broken Arrow, Kane in the 1979-81 series Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, and Commander Kang on three different Star Trek TV series.- Early life and... ) wanted them–the first time travellers from Earth–and Ann was just the bait to get them. The project involves gaining all knowledge from important historical Earth figures for an in-depth database of Earth, but the process leaves the subjects in a permanent vegetative state. The Curator intends to do the same to Doug, Tony and Ann, and has administered sleeping pills to them in the guise of nutritional supplements. They didn't take them, however, and come to discover that the aliens have a significant vulnerability: they derive their energy directly from the light of their sun and so are inactive and vulnerable at night. Doug, Tony and Ann find the converter and successfully send her and the device back to the Time Tunnel Headquarters. Doug and Tony are then shifted to another era. Note: This episode gives the distance to Canopus as 98 light years when it is actually 310 ± 20 light years. |
||||||
| Raiders From Outer Space | March 31, 1967 | November 2, 1883 | Near Khartoum Khartoum Khartoum is the capital and largest city of Sudan and of Khartoum State. It is located at the confluence of the White Nile flowing north from Lake Victoria, and the Blue Nile flowing west from Ethiopia. The location where the two Niles meet is known as "al-Mogran"... , Sudan Sudan Sudan , officially the Republic of the Sudan , is a country in North Africa, sometimes considered part of the Middle East politically. It is bordered by Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the northeast, Eritrea and Ethiopia to the east, South Sudan to the south, the Central African Republic to the... |
29 | ||
| The two travelers arrive in the middle of the Battle of Khartoum Battle of Khartoum The Battle of Khartoum or Siege of Khartoum lasted from March 13, 1884 to January 26, 1885. It was fought in and around Khartoum between Egyptian forces led by British General Charles George Gordon and a Mahdist Sudanese army led by the self-proclaimed Mahdi Muhammad Ahmad... between British British Empire The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the... and Arab Arab Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing... forces in the Sudan Sudan Sudan , officially the Republic of the Sudan , is a country in North Africa, sometimes considered part of the Middle East politically. It is bordered by Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the northeast, Eritrea and Ethiopia to the east, South Sudan to the south, the Central African Republic to the... . This chapter is loosely based on the campaign of General Gordon Charles George Gordon Major-General Charles George Gordon, CB , known as "Chinese" Gordon, Gordon Pasha, and Gordon of Khartoum, was a British army officer and administrator.... . In their efforts to hide from the battling armies, they encounter two aliens who take them prisoner. The alien leader (from Aristos) then contacts the Time Tunnel control center and tells them not to interfere. Rather than kill them, the aliens are ordered by their leader to bring the two travelers back to their base. After explaining their plan to conquer Earth Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets... by destroying the city of London, the aliens order Dr. Newman to be taken out in the desert and killed with a dehydration ray while Dr. Phillips will be put in a machine to extract all of his knowledge. But the alien ordered to kill Dr. Newman leaves when they are encountered by two British soldiers. Dr. Newman is thought to be an Arab spy, so he leads them to the alien base where one of the soldiers is killed. The Time Tunnel is also able to move Dr. Phillips out of the alien machine to where Dr. Newman is. But in response, the aliens send a bomb in to the Time Tunnel control room that will explode in sixty minutes unless all personnel are evacuated to the upper levels of the complex. Unable to attack the aliens effectively with the resources they have on hand, the two travelers and the British soldier return to Khartoum. There, they acquire grenades and gunpowder. When they return to the alien base, they attack it successfully enough to enter, but have insufficient resources left to destroy it. However, just before the bomb explodes in the Time Tunnel control room, the Time Tunnel transfers the bomb to the alien base, destroying it a few minutes later. Note:The Battle of Khartoum was fought in 1884-1885. |
||||||
| Town Of Terror | April 7, 1967 | September 10, 1978 | Fictional town of Cliffport, Maine Maine Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost... |
30 | ||
| The travellers arrive in a hotel cellar Basement __FORCETOC__A basement is one or more floors of a building that are either completely or partially below the ground floor. Basements are typically used as a utility space for a building where such items as the furnace, water heater, breaker panel or fuse box, car park, and air-conditioning system... containing sophisticated equipment. When they get to the lobby of the hotel, the proprietor (played by Mabel Albertson Mabel Albertson Mabel Albertson was an American actress.Albertson was born in Lynn, Massachusetts, the daughter of Russian-born Jewish immigrants Flora Craft and Leopold Albertson. Her brother was actor Jack Albertson... ) tells them that there is no cellar. When they attempt to show her, she immobilizes them. The Time Tunnel frees them from their immobilization by moving them. Doug and Tony flee and are pursued. A force field around the town prevents their escape, but two young people–Joan (Heather Young) and Pete–soon encounter them. The travellers find out that the townspeople have been immobilized and aliens are using the forms of the townspeople to appear as humans. The aliens are planning to transport all of the oxygen Oxygen Oxygen is the element with atomic number 8 and represented by the symbol O. Its name derives from the Greek roots ὀξύς and -γενής , because at the time of naming, it was mistakenly thought that all acids required oxygen in their composition... from Earth's atmosphere to their atmosphere-poor home planet of Andros. The aliens also start sucking oxygen out of the Time Tunnel headquarters, nearly asphyxiating the staff. Joan and Pete help the travellers procure dynamite Dynamite Dynamite is an explosive material based on nitroglycerin, initially using diatomaceous earth , or another absorbent substance such as powdered shells, clay, sawdust, or wood pulp. Dynamites using organic materials such as sawdust are less stable and such use has been generally discontinued... , which are made into time bombs. Doug and Tony successfully destroy the alien control room, destroying their ability to remove Earth's oxygen, freeing the townspeople and saving Time Tunnel personnel. In the final shift of the series, Doug and Tony end up back on the Titanic, and a synopsis of that episode ("Rendezvous With Yesterday") is shown in clips. |
||||||
Movies excerpted
- TitanicTitanic (1953 film)Titanic is a 1953 American drama film directed by Jean Negulesco. Its plot centers on an estranged couple sailing on the maiden voyage of the , which took place in April 1912.-Plot:...
(1953) - Destination MoonDestination Moon (film)Destination Moon is an American science fiction feature film produced by George Pal, who later produced When Worlds Collide, The War of the Worlds, and The Time Machine. Pal commissioned the script by James O'Hanlon and Rip Van Ronkel...
- How Green Was My ValleyHow Green Was My Valley (film)How Green Was My Valley is a 1941 drama film directed by John Ford. The film, based on the 1939 Richard Llewellyn novel, was produced by Darryl F. Zanuck and written by Philip Dunne. The film stars Walter Pidgeon, Maureen O'Hara, Anna Lee, Donald Crisp, and Roddy McDowall...
- KhartoumKhartoum (film)Khartoum is a 1966 film written by Robert Ardrey and directed by Basil Dearden. It stars Charlton Heston as General Gordon and Laurence Olivier as the Mahdi and is based on Gordon's defence of the Sudanese city of Khartoum from the forces of the Mahdist army during the Siege of Khartoum.Khartoum...
- Pearl Harbor - Now It Can Be Shown
- The Story of Ruth
- The 300 SpartansThe 300 SpartansThe 300 Spartans is a 1962 Cinemascope film depicting the Battle of Thermopylae. Made with the cooperation of the Greek government, it was shot in the village of Perachora in the Peloponnese...
- Prince ValiantPrince Valiant (1954 film)Prince Valiant is a 1954 adventure film in Technicolor and Cinemascope, based on the comic strip of the same name by Hal Foster. A young man seeks to join the Knights of the Round Table in order to restore his father to his own kingship, and uncovers a plot against King Arthur.-Plot summary:The...
- Taras Bulba
- A Farewell to ArmsA Farewell to Arms (1957 film)A Farewell to Arms is a 1957 American drama film directed by Charles Vidor. The screenplay by Ben Hecht, based in part on a 1930 play by Laurence Stallings, was the second feature film adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's 1929 semi-autobiographical novel of the same name. It was the last film produced...
- The BuccaneerThe Buccaneer (1958 film)The Buccaneer is a 1958 War film, made by Paramount Pictures like the 1938 version and shot in Technicolor and VistaVision. It takes place during the War of 1812, and tells a heavily fictionalized version of how the pirate Jean Lafitte helped in the Battle of New Orleans and how he had to choose...
- To Catch a ThiefTo Catch a Thief (film)To Catch a Thief is a 1955 romantic thriller directed by Alfred Hitchcock and starring Cary Grant, Grace Kelly, Jessie Royce Landis and John Williams. The movie is set on the French Riviera, and was based on the 1952 novel of the same name by David Dodge...
- The Day the Earth Stood Still
Novels
Prolific science fiction author Murray LeinsterMurray Leinster
Murray Leinster was a nom de plume of William Fitzgerald Jenkins, an award-winning American writer of science fiction and alternate history...
published a 1964 Pyramid Books
Pyramid Books
Jove Books, formerly Pyramid Books, is a paperback publishing company, founded in 1949 by Almat Magazine Publishers . The company was sold to the Walter Reade Organization in the late 1960s. It was acquired in 1974 by Harcourt Brace which renamed it to Jove in 1977 and continued the line as an...
novel titled Time Tunnel with cover art somewhat similar to the television series' Tunnel. The actual plots were quite different. The 1964 novel was set in France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, the tunnel (an odd natural phenomenon) was discovered by a professor
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
, and it only established a fixed connection between the present (1964 in the novel) and Napoleonic era
Napoleonic Era
The Napoleonic Era is a period in the history of France and Europe. It is generally classified as including the fourth and final stage of the French Revolution, the first being the National Assembly, the second being the Legislative Assembly, and the third being the Directory...
1804—based on large masses of iron, which formed the temporal connection (or tunnel) when they did not move in space over the ages. Once the tunnel was formed, it was found people could go both ways. So could things. For instance, brand-new "antiques" for the 20th century and marvels of modern industry for the Napoleonic era. But you had to be careful - because what would happen to "now" if you did something in 1804 that changed history..?
In any case, in 1967 Leinster wrote a loosely based novelization
Novelization
A novelization is a novel that is written based on some other media story form rather than as an original work.Novelizations of films usually add background material not found in the original work to flesh out the story, because novels are generally longer than screenplays...
of the television series, entitled The Time Tunnel and also published by Pyramid. The Time Tunnel was the most important - and most secret - weapon ever developed. Scientists Ton Newman and Doug Phillips knew that the destiny of the world depended on it. Now the Tunnel was threatened with destruction - and the only way Doug and Tony could save it was to take a blind leap into the whirling mists of time.
This was followed later in the year by Timeslip: Time Tunnel Adventure #2, the last novel based on the TV series. The front and back covers feature photos from the series.
In Time Bomb, the experimental nuclear missile was sent through the Time Tunnel - but something went wrong, and it wound up buried in the capital of a great nation, over a century ago. Now, excavation equipment was moving toward the site - any day a bulldozer blade might set it off, destroying a mighty city and plunging the world into war. Time travelers Tony Newman and Doug Phillips had only one chance to head off disaster - to go through the Time Tunnel and make the accident "unhappen." The trouble was, there was a war on in the past - and the bomb was in enemy territory.
Comics
There were two comicsComics
Comics denotes a hybrid medium having verbal side of its vocabulary tightly tied to its visual side in order to convey narrative or information only, the latter in case of non-fiction comics, seeking synergy by using both visual and verbal side in...
that came out that were directly related to The Time Tunnel TV series. These were put out by Gold Key Comics
Gold Key Comics
Gold Key Comics was an imprint of Western Publishing created for comic books distributed to newsstands. Also known as Whitman Comics, Gold Key operated from 1962 to 1984.-History:...
(Western Publishing Co.) in 1966-7:
- The Time Tunnel: The Assassins - April 14, 1865, Abe gets a second chance.
- The Lion or the Volcano? - August 24, 79 A.D., PompeiiPompeiiThe city of Pompeii is a partially buried Roman town-city near modern Naples in the Italian region of Campania, in the territory of the comune of Pompei. Along with Herculaneum, Pompeii was destroyed and completely buried during a long catastrophic eruption of the volcano Mount Vesuvius spanning...
. It's the lions or Vesuvius for Doug & Tony — which will it be? - Mars Count-Down - 1980. Will the US make it to MarsMarsMars is the fourth planet from the Sun in the Solar System. The planet is named after the Roman god of war, Mars. It is often described as the "Red Planet", as the iron oxide prevalent on its surface gives it a reddish appearance...
? Will Doug & Tony make it back to Earth? - The Time Tunnel: The Conquerors - D-DayD-DayD-Day is a term often used in military parlance to denote the day on which a combat attack or operation is to be initiated. "D-Day" often represents a variable, designating the day upon which some significant event will occur or has occurred; see Military designation of days and hours for similar...
1944. The Nazis get a second chance—this time with weapons from the future. - The Captives - June 25, 1876, mid-America. Custer gets a second chance.
Record album
The Time Tunnel 1967 ABC-TV JapanJapan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese book with record album. 33⅓ RPM record licensed and manufactured for exclusive release in Japan by Asahi Sonorama
Asahi Sonorama
is a Japanese book, magazine, and manga publisher and a division of Asahi Shimbun Publications, which is a subsidiary of the publisher of the Asahi Shimbun. "Sonorama" is a coined word combining sonus, the Latin word for "sound", and horama, the Greek word for "sight"...
company and was released during the show's original airing in 1967. The record is pressed in blue-vinyl and contains the time-travel drama "Adventure in the Lost World." The highlight of this package is the colorful 12-page booklet which showcases original storybook artwork of the record's episode with the intrepid time travellers being terrorized by rampaging dinosaurs and angry cavemen.
Soundtrack album
An album of music from the series, featuring the episodes "Rendezvous With Yesterday" (tracks 2-4) and "The Death Merchant" (tracks 5 and 6) was released by GNP Crescendo as part of the collection The Fantasy Worlds of Irwin Allen.- The Time Tunnel: Main Title - John WilliamsJohn WilliamsJohn Towner Williams is an American composer, conductor, and pianist. In a career spanning almost six decades, he has composed some of the most recognizable film scores in the history of motion pictures, including the Star Wars saga, Jaws, Superman, the Indiana Jones films, E.T...
(:39) - To The Tunnel/Tony Enters Machine/Tony's First Trip/Titanic Trot/The Titanic - John Williams (10:06)
- Tony's Tall Tales/Althea's Attack/Doug's Arrival/Hose Nose/Telegraph/Approaching The Berg - John Williams (7:11)
- The Iceberg Comet/Time Transfer/The Jungle - John Williams (10:24)
- In The Battle/Lost Trail/Anne Worried/Michael's Dog/No Sign/Omens/Corporal Shot/The Trunk - George DuningGeorge DuningGeorge Duning was an American musician and film composer. He was born in Richmond, Indiana and educated in Cincinnati, Ohio at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, where his mentor was Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco....
(7:16) - Doug Duels/Tony Returns/Doug Chased/Tony Again/Pal Fight/More Pal Fight/What's Happened/Stand Back - George Duning (7:35)
- The Time Tunnel: End Title - John Williams (:50)
Games
The Time Tunnel 1966 boxed board game from Ideal Toys (No. 2326-7). The playing board design shows characters and events from the prehistoric era into the future. The box insert has a spinner board and other parts include playing cards, token, and marker disks. The second game is The Time Tunnel: Spin-To-Win, a 1967 boxed board game from Pressman Toys, which features a box insert playing board that has a tunnel-like design representing different past years in history and plastic tops are spun on the playing board to determine "Time Travels."Pinball
Pinball
Pinball is a type of arcade game, usually coin-operated, where a player attempts to score points by manipulating one or more metal balls on a playfield inside a glass-covered case called a pinball machine. The primary objective of the game is to score as many points as possible...
games - Bally Manufacturing created a pinball called Time Tunnel in 1971 based loosely on the TV series, but production was stopped due to copyright infringement. The game was re-released with revised artwork as Space Time.
Other
- The Time Tunnel coloring bookColoring bookA coloring book is a type of book containing line art for a reader to add color using crayons, colored pencils, marker pens, paint or other artistic media...
- The Time Tunnel Viewmaster set - Saalfield #9561, 1966A story book to color, 80 pages, Sawyer #B491, 1966. Three Viewmaster slides from "Rendezvous With Yesterday" and 16-page story booklet that tells the pilot episode.
After the original run
In 1982, two feature length TV movies were put together from 4 complete episodes with portions of the first episode as introductory material. Aliens from Another Planet, was produced using episodes 24 ("Chase through Time") and 18 ("Visitors from Beyond the Stars"). Revenge of the Gods was a compilation of episodes 7 ("Revenge of the Gods") and 20 ("The Walls of Jericho).Despite the series having only been on the air for one year, the number of websites and fan reminiscences concerning it attest to the series having made an impression on its audience.
The series was re-shown on American television in the early-mid 1990s, and it was re-shown on British television after the success of the 1997 Titanic
Titanic (1997 film)
Titanic is a 1997 American epic romance and disaster film directed, written, co-produced, and co-edited by James Cameron. A fictionalized account of the sinking of the RMS Titanic, it stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson, Kate Winslet as Rose DeWitt Bukater and Billy Zane as Rose's fiancé, Cal...
movie due to the Titanic-related content of the first episode. It was also parodied by Alexei Sayle
Alexei Sayle
Alexei David Sayle is a British stand-up comedian, actor and author. He was a central part of the alternative comedy circuit in the early 1980s. He was voted the 18th greatest stand-up comic on Channel 4's 100 Greatest Stand-ups in 2007...
as Drunk in Time on British television. In the U.S., it can now be seen on the Encore Action cable network at various times.
The first 15 episodes were released on DVD in North America on January 24, 2006. The second volume, containing the final fifteen episodes, was released June 6, 2006. It also includes the unaired 2002 pilot and the made-for-TV film The Time Travelers as special features.
The Time Tunnel is being shown on the AmericanLife TV Network
AmericanLife TV Network
Youtoo TV, formerly known as American Life TV Network , GoodLife TV Network, and Nostalgia Television, is an American cable-television channel launched on May 1, 1985. It now claims over 15 million subscribers throughout the U.S...
cable channel, as of September 2007.
The Time Tunnel was very similar to a later time-travel show, NBC's Voyagers!
Voyagers!
Voyagers! is an American science fiction time travel-based television series that aired on NBC during the 1982–1983 season. The series stars Jon-Erik Hexum and Meeno Peluce.-Plot:...
(1982–83).
- Both shows ran for only one season, and had extremely high budgets.
- In both shows, the time travelers would "fall" through an elaborate and colorful special-effect backdrop, and "land" in the targeted time period. (In this regard, The Time Tunnel was often more convincing; in Voyagers, it often seemed obvious that stunt men were jumping from an off-camera ledge.) In each case, they would "fall" just softly enough to avoid major injuries.
- The Time Tunnel ("Rendezvous with Yesterday") and Voyagers! ("Voyagers of the Titanic") both used the Titanic as a plot setting. In the respective stories, both Tony Newman and Jeffrey Jones try desperately to warn of the coming disaster, and both of them fail. (In a somber warning against such tampering, Bogg conceded that "Sometimes, history's cruel. But it's going to happen, and we can't change that.")
- Both shows usually dropped the characters into other major historical events.
- Both shows always had the characters back in their original "period" costumes at the beginning of each episode. (Voyager Phineas Bogg stood out the most, being dressed as a 17th century pirate.)
- Like Tony and Doug, Jeffrey Jones could never return to his own time (1982). The Omni that transported them through time had circuits that only allowed it to go to 1970 at the latest. (The trip that Bogg took to 1982 was a result of his Omni malfunctioning.)
Remakes
Two attempts were made to resurrect the show. One produced a pilot episode, but neither resulted in a new series.2002 remake
In 2002, FoxFox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly referred to as Fox Network or simply Fox , is an American commercial broadcasting television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Launched on October 9, 1986, Fox was the highest-rated broadcast network in the...
showed interest in remaking this series. A pilot was produced by Twentieth Century Fox Television, Fox Television Studios and Regency Television in association with Irwin Allen Properties. Executive Producers were Kevin Burns
Kevin Burns
Kevin Burns is an American television and film producer, director, and screenwriter. His work can be seen on A&E, National Geographic Channel, E!, Animal Planet, AMC, Bravo, Travel Channel, Lifetime, and The History Channel.-Early life:...
and Jon Jashni. Sheila Allen
Sheila Allen
Sheila Allen is an American actress.Sheila Ann Mathews was born in New York City. She was married to producer Irwin Allen until his death in 1991. She appeared in several of her husband's TV series and movies through 1986....
was credited as one of the producers. It was not picked by Fox, in order to make room in its schedule for Joss Whedon
Joss Whedon
Joseph Hill "Joss" Whedon is an American screenwriter, executive producer, director, comic book writer, occasional composer and actor, founder of Mutant Enemy Productions and co-creator of Bellwether Pictures...
's Firefly
Firefly (TV series)
Firefly is an American space western television series created by writer and director Joss Whedon, under his Mutant Enemy Productions label. Whedon served as executive producer, along with Tim Minear....
.
The new series had a much much darker, serious tone. Doug Phillips (David Conrad) is the main character, and Tony Newman is now Toni Newman, a female minor character. The unaired pilot episode is available on DVD from Fox Home Entertainment on The Time Tunnel: Volume Two, Disc Four.
In this remake, the (21st century) Time Tunnel is a Department of Energy research project into "hot fusion", which produces nearly limitless energy. When they initiated the reactor (an event not shown in the episode), it caused an unintended "time storm". For four hours—240 minutes—the time storm was uncontrollably whipping around in the past and changing history. The DOE was able to anchor one end of the storm by using the Tunnel like a lightning rod.
On their way into the tunnel complex, Flynn tells Doug Phillips, a former friend, that Phillips has been recruited because he has a detailed knowledge of the Battle of Hürtgen Forest
Battle of Hurtgen Forest
The Battle of Hürtgen Forest is the name given to the series of fierce battles fought between U.S. and German forces during World War II in the Hürtgen Forest, which became the longest battle on German ground during World War II, and the longest single battle the U.S. Army has ever fought...
. The head of the Time Tunnel likens their team to FEMA
Federal Emergency Management Agency
The Federal Emergency Management Agency is an agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security, initially created by Presidential Reorganization Plan No. 1 of 1978 and implemented by two Executive Orders...
, in that they don't send a team back for a rain storm but they do for hurricanes. However, they can only go through time to where the other end of the storm is at the current moment, so they have a limited amount of time in which to fix what is wrong and to be retrieved by the Time Tunnel.
The team (Doug, Toni, Flynn, J.D. and Wix) must go back to WWII in 1944, to the Battle of Hürtgen Forest in Germany. They are to retrieve a person who was moved there by the time storm from 1546. During the mission, Doug Phillips meets his grandfather, a soldier who will be killed in this battle. Doug knows this, but cannot tell him and save his life because it would change history. Toni Newman tells him that she used to have three brothers and two sisters before the time storm accident, but is now an only child. They find out that the displaced person is a (very confused) medieval monk who is carrying bubonic plague
Black Death
The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, peaking in Europe between 1348 and 1350. Of several competing theories, the dominant explanation for the Black Death is the plague theory, which attributes the outbreak to the bacterium Yersinia pestis. Thought to have...
. When the team is almost captured, two of them have switched to German uniforms and pretend to be Colonel Klink and (Sergeant) Schultz, complete with fake documents. Everyone who came in contact with the monk is given an antibiotic injection and the time ripples stop. But Flynn has been fatally stabbed, so he reveals that Phillips was a bitter man before the "240", but he now has a family. Flynn told Phillips this information to give him incentive to keep the timeline the way that it is.
Reality changes due to the time storm
There are some notable differences between the series world and the real world:- Traffic lights use red for "go" and green for "stop" while yellow retains its meaning.
- There are 49 states in the USA. The title sequence shows New JerseyNew JerseyNew Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
disappearing and the territory being divided between New YorkNew YorkNew York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
and PennsylvaniaPennsylvaniaThe Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
. - The title sequence shows the USSR winning the race to the moon as the American flag dissolves into the Soviet flag.
- The New York Yankees are now the Boston Yankees.
2006 remake
The SciFi ChannelSyfy
Syfy , formerly known as the Sci-Fi Channel and SCI FI, is an American cable television channel featuring science fiction, supernatural, fantasy, reality, paranormal, wrestling, and horror programming. Launched on September 24, 1992, it is part of the entertainment conglomerate NBCUniversal, a...
announced in 2005 that it was going to create a new pilot for its 2006/07 season. Allen's wife, Sheila, and two producers of the 2002 FOX remake (Kevin Burns
Kevin Burns
Kevin Burns is an American television and film producer, director, and screenwriter. His work can be seen on A&E, National Geographic Channel, E!, Animal Planet, AMC, Bravo, Travel Channel, Lifetime, and The History Channel.-Early life:...
and Jon Jashni) began work on the new pilot. John Turman
John Turman
-Credits:*Full Moon in Blue Water *The Crow: Stairway to Heaven *Hulk*Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer *Ben 10: Alien Swarm...
(Hulk
Hulk (film)
Hulk is a 2003 American superhero film based on the fictional Marvel Comics character of the same name. Ang Lee directed the film, which stars Eric Bana as Dr. Bruce Banner, as well as Jennifer Connelly, Sam Elliott, Josh Lucas, and Nick Nolte...
) wrote the script. The series never materialized.
Related material
Two movies made previously, The Time TravelersThe Time Travelers (1964 film)
The Time Travelers is a science fiction film directed by B-movie director Ib Melchior that inspired the 1966 TV series The Time Tunnel as well as the 1967 remake Journey to the Center of Time...
(1964), as well as the 1967 remake Journey to the Center of Time
Journey to the Center of Time
Journey to the Center of Time is a 1967 science fiction film, directed by David L. Hewitt, and starring Scott Brady and Anthony Eisley. It is a remake of The Time Travelers , and was also known as Time Warp.-Plot:...
, are both somewhat similar to this series. Both employ time travelers hopelessly lost in the infinite corridors of time, with no way to get back their own time period. Although the movie made in the early 1960s, The Time Machine
The Time Machine (1960 film)
The Time Machine is a 1960 American science fiction film based on the 1895 novel of the same name by H. G. Wells in which a man in Victorian England constructs a time-travelling machine which he uses to travel to the future...
, might have inspired the series to be produced, the plot and characters are not similar enough to entertain similarities between the two. Ib Melchior
Ib Melchior
Ib Jørgen Melchior is a novelist, short story writer, film producer, film director, and screenwriter of low-budget American science fiction movies, most of them released by American International Pictures...
also has connections to these movies and Irwin Allen on other material, such as Lost in Space
Lost in Space
Lost in Space is a science fiction TV series created and produced by Irwin Allen, filmed by 20th Century Fox Television, and broadcast on CBS. The show ran for three seasons, with 83 episodes airing between September 15, 1965, and March 6, 1968...
, and it is debated in various publications and websites as to who created what first -Melchior or Allen. Tunnel Through Time
Tunnel Through Time
Tunnel Through Time is a 1966 science fiction novel written by American science fiction and fantasy author Lester Del Rey. It is a children's time travel adventure.-Plot summary:...
by Lester Del Rey
Lester del Rey
Lester del Rey was an American science fiction author and editor. Del Rey was the author of many of the Winston Science Fiction juvenile SF series, and the editor at Del Rey Books, the fantasy and science fiction branch of Ballantine Books, along with his fourth wife Judy-Lynn del Rey.-Birth...
was also produced in 1966. The spirals on the cover art for the TV series bear similarity to the cover art on Del Rey's book as sold through Amazon.
Fictional secret histories
Secret historySecret history
A secret history is a revisionist interpretation of either fictional or real history which is claimed to have been deliberately suppressed, forgotten, or ignored by established scholars.-Secret histories of the real world:...
is sometimes used in a long-running science fiction or fantasy universe to preserve continuity with the present by reconciling paranormal, anachronistic, or otherwise notable but unrecorded events with what actually happened in known history. Whatever Doug Phillips and Tony Newman did, they never could really change anything and sort of acted like Temporal Agents, who keep history as it really happened. Alternate History or Alternate Timelines never entered into this TV series story lines.