“Conspiracy Theory”

I must start this review by repeating something I’ve made crystal clear by now. Flash Gordon has to take place on Mongo or in space at least. Not on Earth.

This episode is a classic case in point. The sequences on Mongo are engaging, and even intriguing in some cases. The sequences on Earth? 90210 with aliens. Pure garbage.

We start with the idea that there has been damage done to the fabric of interdimensional space. Rankol asks for help from Flash’s father, but he refuses to have anything to do with Rankol. Rankol decides to go with plan b, which is to open a rift and send a bounty hunter to bring Zarkov back to him.

Meanwhile, as Dale is getting reamed out by her boss for consistently losing the ratings war with all-style, no-substance reporter Susan Glass, when she gets a call from a kid who caught Rankol’s bounty hunter coming through a rift on his phone-cam. She does her best to kill the story despite the fact that it could help her job tremendously, but the kid is desperate for his 15 minutes of fame so he goes to Susan Glass.

Baylin and Flash find that Zarkov has been kidnapped and they track them down to where the rift is but lose them going into it. Baylin recognizes the kidnapper as Genessa, a protege of hers. Baylin goes after Zarkov alone leaving Flash and Dale to worry about the story getting out.

Ok, the “story” getting out is a bit much. It’s a horribly produced storyline designed to show Dale’s work and their soap operaish romance. It was completely forgetable.

Zarkov is brought before Rankol who treats him as an equal, and bestowing upon him the robes of a Mongo scientist. He shows Zarkov such respect that he has never known on Earth so combined with the fact that the work Rankol is asking for help on would save the universe, it’s no wonder Zarkov would agree to help him.

It’s a great subtext for the storyline seeing the ‘crazy’ Dr. Zarkov, who is thought of as goof, giving in to finally getting the respect he never got…and in most cases probably deserves.

As Flash and Dale fail to convince Susan to kill the story, the brainstorm on other options when they are overheard by a government agent of sorts who was investigating the claims of aliens in the park. He overhears everything and then kidnaps the two of them and injecting them with truth serum. Of course there are the stupid, romance questions they ask of each other as well as giving up all the information that they are trying to hide.

Boring. And horribly acted. Not a good combination.

Baylin uses chocolate as an enticement to find out who Genessa was working for and where she could be found. She tracks them down to Rankols and proceeds to knock Genessa down and force the reluctant Zarkov back to Earth. Zarkov eventually does go, but he holds some questions of what if in his mind. It’s great for future episodes should they choose to go with such subtleties.

Flash and Dale are able to sneak out of their bondage and knock the agent out. Flash decides to take the badge and bully the kid into believing he’s a goverment agent. He forces the kid to admit it was a hoax.

OK…Flash, in white t-shirt and blue jeans, a mean government agent. It’s…never mind. Too tough to write about without laughing.

But the government agent wakes up and proceeds to drive his van right at Flash and Dale, when Baylin and Zarkov come through. They quickly get out of the way and the van goes right through to Mongo and is trapped.

Meanwhile Zarkov returns to his lab to work on the rift sensor further, but you can tell there is a bittersweetness to it as he takes off his Mongo robe.

All in all, Zarkov’s tale is well done and advances the storyline. The rest? Not so much.

C-

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