"Blind Rage"--
At an unnamed military base, Lt. Jerry Banks hitches a ride from Sam, the driver of a military waste truck, with both driver & passenger unaware of its content--a damaged tank emitting--a colorless gas....
David
Blair has been a boarder at the Banks family home for some time, evident in his close relationship with Carrie (wife) and Patty (daughter).
David: "Well, you and Jerry and Patty have made feel like I'm part of the family, and its been a long time since I've had that feeling.Sort of enjoyable."
Carrie: "Well, you are a part."
At the dumping ground, Lt. Banks generously helps remove the waste, but receives a face full of the tank's gas...
That evening, the family (David included) says grace before dinner--Jerry adding "friendship" --a reference to you-know-who. That evening, Jerry awakens to find his eyesight has diminished to the point of blindness. David and Carrie take Jerry to the base hospital, where a less than forthcoming Dr. Anderson informs the family of Jerry's condition:
Dr. Anderson: "His vision was affect by the trauma of the fall."
Carrie: "His eyes are hurt?"
Dr. Anderson: "Fortunately, the visual impairment was not caused by the broken glass."
Carrie: "
I don't understand. Are you saying's that Jerry's blind?"
Dr. Anderson: "--its just a temporary condition."
Carrie: "How long will it last?"
Dr. Anderson: "We can't be sure. We're going to have a specialist--an ophthalmologist examine him tomorrow, but I'm certain there's no permanent damage to his eyes."
Understandably, Jerry is frightened by his situation--
Carrie: "How do you feel?"
Jerry: "Scared...that's how I feel...scared."
Carrie: "I know that. It was a terrible accident."
Jerry: "More...more terrible than you think....I didn't just fall through that glass. I didn't see it!"
Carrie: "The doctor says the blindness is only temporary--"
Jerry: "I couldn't see it before...i mean before...I got up, turned on the lights...nothing. Blind. I was blind!"
David: "Jerry, did you tell that to the doctor?"
Jerry: "..tried to. Too busy sewing me up. Hey David, thanks."
David: "Yeah."
As David and Carrie leave the hospital, Sam (the waste disposal driver helped by Jerry) is wheeled in to the ER, after inexplicably crashing his vehicle though a guardrail with a sign clearly marked "Road closed / Bridge out" sign, but dies.
Ambulance driver:
"Sam was the best wheel man on the post. It's like he was blind or something!"
Needless to say, David sees a connection between Jerry & Sam.
The following morning, Dr. Anderson expresses his concerns about Jerry & Sam's conditions to Colonel Drake, and believes they are connected--to something else. The Colonel tries to redirect the cause and effect--
Drake: "So you see, there were only two people involved in the problem."
Anderson: "Problem?? One man is dead, and another is dying--"
Drake: "Well, we can't be certain of that!"
Anderson: "Oh, yes, we can! The laboratory animals exhibited the same symptoms! Err-blindness, deterioration of the nervous system...and death. We've got to find out how those two men were exposed!"
Sgt. Murkland: "One of the X-202 empty canisters was thrown away along with the material that was marked for disposal. It wasn't quite empty.The non-com who was responsible has been transferred to one our research units in Greenland...as a private!"
Anderson: "You plan to ship Stanley's remains--then Banks to Greenland??"
Drake: "I expect that you will use all the skills at your command to help Lieutenant Banks."
Anderson: "Then we need to double our research staff.
Drake: "Oh. Will additional personnel help you find the antidote sooner?"
Anderson: "Well, I can't be sure--"
Drake: "How long has Lieutenant Banks got?"
Anderson: "Four days. maybe less."
Drake: "Well major, you were here working on the gas a long time before I took command, so it seems to me that the X-202 is your responsibility. Now I'll be glad to assist in any way I can with this..uh..incident."
Anderson: "I understand, sir..as long as no else finds out about .any of this."
Drake: "We're both career army--"
Anderson: "I said I understood, sir."
Drake: "Yeah, well, see I never asked to command this chemical research post...you know my problem with Washington...and now that I've finally served my penance, I expect to get that General star. Now, I'm leaving in six weeks, and I don't want anything to delay that departure."
After Anderson leaves--
Drake (to Sgt. Murkland) : "I've got a job for you
, Sargent."
David visits Jerry, learns of the events leading to Jerry's condition, and of the way he was treated. David suggests taking his case to a higher authority, but Jerry writes off the idea, since--
Jerry: "Army doctors are still in the Army, just like me."
Jerry begs David to go to the dump site & find the X-202 canister (with Jerry's phoned-in order). Banner reluctantly agrees. At the dump, David (wearing a gas mask) locates the canister, but is attacked by Sgt. Murkland in a Hazmat suit, causing Banner to tumble down a hillside, lose the mask, and rupture the canister, shooting gas in his face. Murkland mans the crane claw & dumps debris on Banner--more than enough to trigger a Hulk-out. The confused Murkland attempts to crush the Hulk with the claw, but the enraged creature breaks the implement--pushing it to the hillside, then sends the X-202 tank crashing into the crane cab..right into the Sargent's hands.
The Hulk inadvertently runs into a nearby maneuvers exercise, frightening a loudmouthed drill instructor.
Murkland spills the details of his Hulk encounter to Drake, but the colonel chalks up the man's experience as being the result of drinking too much. Anderson informs Drake that Jerry's condition is leading to his death, but the colonel is only concerned with suppressing knowledge of the entire matter, reminding the guilt-ridden Anderson that's he's as involved as everyone else.
David speaks to Anderson, relating his discovery of the X-202 and his theory on its effects on Jerry & Sam; Anderson asks David to wait while he gets "wheels moving". Soon, David's vision blurs, and is examined by Anderson--with Drake & Murkland watching. David then addresses the 800-pound gorilla of the base:
David:
"Is it nerve gas? I mean, that's what you people do here, isn't it? Chemical warfare research. Are you working on an antidote?"
Anderson:
"Yes."
David:
"...but what I saw written on the blackboard--"
Drake:
"That's classified information, and afraid we can't--"
Anderson:
"Yes, Mr. Blair, the formula."
David:
"I think you're using the wrong approach."
Anderson: "What?"
Drake:
"I wasn't aware that you were a scientist."
David: "I know a great deal about metabolism. The substance we were exposed to--I think you'll find--has altered our Basal metabolism."
Anderson: "But it was never intended to. It's a weapon--purely defensive. Not a nerve gas...merely a mixture intended to disable. There is no way--"
David: "Doctor, what you intended and what actually happened is not the point! I think the cure--the antidote--is in the metabolism. If you could increase it..20..30 times normal--"
Drake: "Mr.Blair--"
David:
"I just think you should try it, that's all."
Drake: "We're going to do everything we can to make you comfortable--"
David:
"Colonel, forgive me, but I'm the one that's blind. Why won't you listen to me?"
Drake has had enough. He orders Murkland to place David in room 316--no visitors. No one in the room believes that's a good thing.
Elsewhere, Jerry & Carrie discuss the canister & wonder why David has not returned; Carrie spots two MPs wheeling Banner to a room. Alarmed, Carrie quickly forms a plan--beginning with posing as a doctor (by stealing a lab coat, stethoscope and clipboard from the doctor's lounge). Making her way past the MPs with the ruse of David needing x-rays, she wheels David to her car, but is spotted by Drake & Murlkland, who initiate a shutdown of the base before they reach the gates. To avoid capture, Carrie instructs David to try to find his way to a back road fence to rendezvous with her.
With Carrie in custody, Drake instantly suggests drugging her in order to learn all she knows, but Anderson flatly refuses to have any part of it.
Anderson: "What are you going to charge Mrs. Banks with, anyway?"
Drake:
"Helping a prisoner to escape, for one thing."
Anderson:
"We're finished, colonel. You know that, don't you?"
Drake:
"Maybe you're finished, major, but not General Drake."
Anderson: "General?"
Ignoring Anderson's mocking question, Drake & Murkland head for the training area in search of David. Banner carefully navigates across the base hills, but stumbles into an area marked
Chemical Research Training Area - WARNING - Gas Masks Required...
Sure enough, David hits a tripwire setting ff planted tear gas bombs--drawing Drake's unit to the area; David moves forward, only now, he's set off explosives--and his rage. The Hulk rises--his vision blurred, but returning. Drake's unit spots the creature with Murkland wildly
"I told you so-ing" Drake. The colonel wisely orders his men to
capture the Hulk, unfortunately, one of his men shoots the Hulk, sending him on the offense, leaping into the center of the troop transport, and angrily tossing Murkland & Drake to the ground. Back on the road, a tank crew tries to run down the Hulk--mistake. Despite the powerful tank's effort to move forward, the Hulk pushes it back and down the side of a hill, then makes his escape.
Days later, a recovering Jerry watches as Drake is escorted from the base--facing a court martial. Anderson gives Jerry discharge instructions, and hopes his own court martial ends with his retirement. Apparently, Anderson followed David's advice--
Anderson:
"You can tell your friend he was right--about the body's metabolic rate being the key.He led us to the antidote that got you through this."
His vision fully recovered, David take a moment to enjoy a look at nature, before moving on.
NOTES:
Jack McGee does not appear in this episode.
This is not a cure-related episode, but one must wonder how and why he ended up staying near a military base, considering the risk he's taking in that environment.
"Blind Rage" addresses a question the Hulk's comic book fans had up to that point: what would the military do if they encountered the TV Hulk? We had a taste, and you can only imagine what would happen to him in the hands of a career-minded colonel working at a chemical warfare base.
David's
"Well, you and Jerry and Patty have made feel like I'm part of the family, and its been a long time since I've had that feeling." reminds the audience that no matter what friends he makes during his travels, his real self--the David Banner self--has been deprived of normal family connections for two years. The situation made worse by the fact he--up to this episode's timeline--cannot break his vow of letting anyone from his Banner side believe he's dead.
The line seems like it was the intentional set up for
"Homecoming"--airing a little over a month away.
By now, you would think one as insightful about his condition as David would suspect that a Hulk-out might be the key to healing his optic nerves in the way its healed other injuries he's suffered over the past two years.
GUEST CAST:
The short-lived career of child actress
Michelle Stacy (Patty Banks) includes a part as Mary-2, a "Cub" earning the sympathy of Jessica-6 in
Logan's Run (MGM, 1976)--
That said, she's best remembered for the hilariously jaw-dropping role as Young Girl with Coffee from
Airplane! (Paramount, 1980) --
Nicolas Coster (
Colonel Drake) has a career in TV dates back to the Golden Age, with appearances in almost every genre. His first trip into the fantasy TV realm were on 1978 episodes of CBS' other superhero series:
The Amazing Spider-Man (
"A Matter of State") and
Wonder Woman (
"The Deadly Dolphin").
Other roles--
- A Fire in the Sky (NBC, 1978)
- Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (NBC, 1980) - "Olympiad"
- Alfred Hitchcock Presents (USA Network, 1986) - "Deadly Honeymoon"
- War of the Worlds (Syndicated, 1989) - "The Rising of Lazarus"
- Star Trek: The Next Generation (Syndicated, 1990) - "The Offspring"
- Timecop (ABC, 1998) - "Lost Voyage"
- Saving the King (Blue Miramar Films, 2017)
Don Dubbins (Sgt. Murkland) has the honor of speaking one of the most memorable lines of dialogue in fantasy TV history:
"I told you not to trust him!! I told you!!"
--from
The Twilight Zone's
"Elegy" (CBS, 1960). Dubbins is also well remembered as the talkative Nazi-lover who planted explosives at an elementary school days away from holding its first integrated classes in
Dragnet'
s "The Big Explosion" (NBC, 1967). But, back to fantasy...
- From the Earth to the Moon (Warner Brothers, 1958)
- Men into Space (CBS, 1959) - "Building a Space Station"
- One Step Beyond (ABC, 1959) - "The Navigator"
- Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (ABC, 1967) - "Rescue"
- The Invaders (ABC, 1967) - "The Captive"
- The Illustrated Man (Warner Brothers / Seven Arts, 1969)
- Search (NBC, 1972) - "Flight to Nowhere"
- Nightmare at 43 Hillcrest (Dan Curtis Productions / ABC's Wide World of Mystery, 1974)
- The Six Million Dollar Man (ABC, 1977) - "Death Probe: Part 1"
- Project U.F.O. (NBC, 1978) - "Sighting 4007: The Forest City Incident"
- Starman (ABC, 1987) - "Appearances"
Lee Bryant (
Carrie Banks) - is this episode's other actress who would go on to star in
Airplane! Bryant's role was Mrs. Hammen, the hysterical woman who needed help calming down--
..a role she reprised in
Airplane II: The Sequel (Paramount, 1982). Her fantasy roles include--
- Capricorn One (Warner Brothers, 1977)
- Alfred Hitchcock Presents (USA Network, 1986) - "Road Hog"
- Alien Nation (FOX, 1990) - "Green Eyes"
- Alien Nation: Dark Horizon (FOX, 1994)
Finally,
Designing Women's Meshach Taylor (
M.P.) got his start in fantasy--or horror, as the ill-fated doctor who discovered teenaged Damien Thorn's marrow cells mirror that of a Jackal in
Damien: Omen II (20th Century Fox, 1978)
Other fantasy roles--
- The Howling (Avco Embassy, 1981)
- Explorers (Paramount, 1985)
- Warning Sign (20th Century Fox, 1985)
- Ultra Warrior (Concorde pictures, 1990)
Well, you one-upped me...I hadn't realized that the little girl was in Airplane!, too!
