UFO (TV Series) The Psychobombs (1970) User Reviews

Ahhhh!!! Psychobombs!!

[planktonrules · 8/10 · 11 May 2010]

This episode begins with an ordinary guy begging Commander Straker for a lift---saying he was having car trouble. Everything seemed to go fine until suddenly this man goes crazy and attacks Straker. When Straker awakens from the pummeling, he finds a note that had been stuffed into his clothes demanding, in effect, that SHADO surrender. It's obvious that aliens had somehow taken care of this guy, but what SHADO doesn't yet know is that there are two more like him--and the three all possess super-human abilities making them extremely difficult to stop. Once they begin their attacks on SHADO, these zombie-like suicide agents are quite formidable and are totally ordinary by all appearances--plus, interestingly enough, these folks don't even know that they are under alien control and have long periods of normality.

This is a very interesting episode--especially since you can actually see some parallels to today's suicide bombers. I am sure that this was not the intention of the writer--but the similarities are there. One of the alien-controlled agents' most interesting abilities is the way that they can steal fingerprints! Cool and quite clever. Not surprisingly, however, Colonel Foster falls for a hot woman who happens to be one of these agents--this sort of thing seems to happen a lot to Foster, the buff stud of SHADO (see various other episodes to see what I mean). Overall, a very interesting show that brings a new type of threat to the planet...evil 'psychobombs'!

A wonderfully entertaining episode of a great tv series.

[ronnybee2112 · 9/10 · 29 October 2022]

This episode is a good example of the UFO tv show. The plot details of this episode are a bit fuzzy in spots,and some of it does seem rather unlikely,but any thoughts or concerns about this all fade to the background as the action unfolds and takes center-stage. I saw it as a very interesting and imaginative show. 9/10

Dear reader,you are under no obligation to read any further. Apparently I am required to write 600 characters,which seems rather arbitrary and silly,in my opinion. I am done with my review,so please feel free to leave at any time. Hopefully,the word requirement will be met soon and I can move on.

(I just checked,not yet.) If there were a 600 character LIMIT,I would run-out of room 1/3 of the way through a 'clever' review.

Oh no!! NOT Room 22!!??

[joegarbled-79482 · 8/10 · 19 November 2023]

"The Psychobombs" is an interesting episode of "UFO". Like "The Cat With Ten Lives", we get the aliens landing a UFO and using mind control on innocent humans, getting them to target SHADO installations, but this time, without the siamese pussy cat. As with astronaut Jim Regan, the three victims don't realise they are being controlled and they don't remember anything about what they've done for the aliens.

The first attack is by a mousy bank clerk by the name of Clark. He hoodwinks Straker into giving him a lift. He attacks Straker like an "angry orangutan" then disappears. Straker discovers that Clark left a detailed description of SHADO installations and personnel and a threat on them unless SHADO surrender and cease operating. He checks out as "Mr Average", a family man with zero criminal activity. "Average" as he might be, he karate chops through a security fence and calmly waits to be arrested by SHADO Security. They rough-handle him, but the guy is back to normal and doesn't remember how he got there. He's stripped and X-rayed. He has no weapons on him, yet when the aliens exert their malign force, he turns into a "psychobomb" as Dr Jackson calls them, and using high voltage wires, he blows the base to smithereens.

Attack number two is by construction manager Clem Mason (played by the wonderful Mike Pratt who played Jeff Randall in the real "Randall And Hopkirk: Deceased". Sadly, he already looked unwell.) He manages to bypass security in a Skydiver submarine pen, even the finger print scan, having burned off the real guy's fingerprints.... OUCH!! Naturally with the aliens supplying him with super human/alien strength, thick tungsten steel security doors prove to be no barrier and he boards Skydiver. Straker orders them to submerge, drowning Mason but he also uses high voltage to blow Skydiver out of the water.

The third "psychobomb" is a beautiful secretary named Linda (played by Deborah Grant). Col Lake has tracked her down as the likely villain as she was stopped by a motorcycle cop. Linda crushed his throat with one hand. Foster has gone to question Linda, but just as Alec Freeman would've done, he offers to buy her lunch! Because she can't remember killing the cop, nor killing her boss, she answers his questions in a honest fashion and he believes she is totally innocent...or WANTS to believe. Although Straker and SHADO HQ are the third and final target and Linda is almost certainly the means of destruction, she is taken to SHADO HQ. Straker prefers to fight her "on his terms". Virginia Lake is dumbfounded, but like Foster and Freeman, she finds that there is no changing his mind, once he's made a decision.

In the infamous Room 22, Lake gives Linda a hard time, reducing Linda to tears, but Linda is Linda, and honestly doesn't know WHY she's being detained or anything. Lake leaves Linda in the hands of an armed guard. The aliens work their evil magic and Linda disposes of him and crashes her way into the control room. Fans of tough girls beating up men will enjoy how she flings three SHADO men, then Paul out of her way, making a bee line for....convenient high voltage wires!! Foster realises that high voltage is the trigger. Sky Four is after the UFO. Straker bluffs Linda that the UFO that controlled her has been destroyed. She still speaks in a detatched voice: "Surrender....you have....no choice." Instead of short circuiting the wires and destroying the base and everyone in it, she just grabs the ends, killing herself instantly. Sky Four then reports that the UFO has been destroyed.

I think it is left up to us, to decide that Sky Four destroyed the UFO in the nick of time, OR, Linda's humanity outwilled the alien control of her, and having already "murdered" two men, she would rather die than take out the base and everyone in it, including Paul Foster of course. He is obviously gutted and cradles her body, Straker being Straker just walks away as the end music begins.

The characters were well defined by this episode. Straker, Foster and Lake behave just as we expect them to. The ability of the aliens to do so much damage without even leaving their ship shows their danger. As Straker often says, one UFO evading SHADO defences is one too many.

Solid 8/10.

Cool as hell.

[swgreenmachine · 10/10 · 13 February 2022]

This is the coolest episode ever. Cool beyond description. The sound effects, the music, the directing, all just amazing. I communicated with Michael Billington via email years ago. He recounted that the episode had " a certain polish" to it. Just goes to show sci-fi doesn't need to be campy and nerdy.

Boom!

[lor_ · 7 September 2023]

A UFO manages to penetrate SHADO's defenses, and lands on Earth, with a beautiful blonde (Deborah Grant) emerging, plus two men living nearby also coming under the mesmerizing control of the aliens.

The sexy blonde seems to come to her senses and runs o the highway in search of help. The policeman reprimands her for not parking her nearby car properly. She doesn't have proper registration, she suddenly flees, pursued by the cop on his motorcycle. When he catches up with her, the aliens have her back under their sway and he chokes the cop, and escapes.

This mini-invasion has escalating consequences. David Collings gets a ride from Ed, claiming car trouble, and knocks Ed unconscious, also under the aliens' control, and SHADO investigates. Collings leaves a blackmail note with Ed, demanding that SHADO shut down completely. Collings follows up by blowing up a facility (and dying in the process) to show he means business.

Tom Adams shows up to investigate. But the third alien-controlled human is working at a construction site where he suddenly leaves to team up with Deborah and wreak havoc.

Plenty of suspense builds as the two survivors carry out the aliens' plan, several steps ahead of Ed and SHADO. Sabotage leads to Ed's life also in peril. As the organization's chief psychologist, Vladek Sheybal is briefly spellbinding as he explains with dramatic emphasis his theory that humans can go berserk and become "psychobombs", deftly predicting the solution to this UFO-caused mayhem.

A fine sequence near the climax has Billington and Deborah wandering in a garden with quite romantic visuals (worthy of a 1960s Shampoo commercial!), while we wait for her to literally "explode".