Deep Ice: Gone. They’re all gone. (Howard Koch’s War of the Worlds II, Episode 3: The Tor)

Wanna know what the eight most beautiful words in the English language are? “I can’t find a copy of episode 3”.

I looked. I really did. This isn’t even a case of “Used booksellers were offering it for more than I was willing to pay.” I literally couldn’t find a copy up for sale anywhere.

To set things up a bit for the final episode, I’ll include the recap of episode 3 from episode 4’s opening narration:

It was the worst of times. Water was expensive. Life was cheap. Ronald Ratkin, the world’s first trillionaire is tightening his stranglehold on the world. Using his influence with bureaucrats and businessmen, Ratkin has ensured that his water conglomerate, April Showers, is now the sole supplier of water throughout the globe. He has put ice sectioners on strike and water purifiers on hold indefinitely. Mission Red, President Sandra DeWitt’s desperate attempt to thwart Ratkin, has met with disaster. While searching Mars for water, the crew of Orion 1 encountered the Martians, who invaded Earth sixty years ago, only to discover that these same Martians are now slaves of a conquering alien species, the Tor. And the Tor are on their way to Mars to evaluate humanind’s suitability for servitude. While attempting to flee Mars, Orion’s crew is trapped by Jessica Storm, commander of Ronald Ratkin’s personal shuttle, the Artemis. Her orders are to eliminate Orion’s crew and claim Martian water for Ronald Ratkin. Commander Jonathan Ferris had no choice but to submit,. because Ratkin had kidnapped his wife, Nancy. Meanwhile, unemployed water purification technician J. D. Clark became obsessed with radio personality Tosh Rimbauch’s opposition to the President. He took it upon himself to right the wrong caused by the President, and attempted to assassinate her. Now, President DeWitt lies paralyzed, perhaps for the rest of her life. In our last episode, Tosh Rimbauch, suspended by WXXY for his role in the assassination attempt, decided to set out on his own. More outrageous than ever, he starts a JD Clark defense fund. He knows that his listeners will support him if he can get into syndication. But in order to produce his own radio show, he needs to find money. Nancy Ferris managed to escape Ronald Ratkin by kidnapping his son and heir, Ethan. She brought him to the home of her friends, Thomas and Jennifer Connors. But before they could decide what to do with him, Ethan escaped, headed for Steinmetz Psychiatric Hospital. On the way, he teamed up with streetwise Kyle Jordan. Together, they travelled to Connecticut in search of Ethan’s long-lost mother. But Ronald Ratkin has other ideas. After years of sheltering and grooming his heir for greatness, he knows that allowing Ethan to see his mother, Mrs. Ratkin, in a pitiful state, with horrible memories, could turn Ethan against his father. Ratkin sent Doctor Geoffery Evans to Steinmetz, where Evans administered a lethal concoction to the unsuspecting Mrs. Ratkin. Just as Jessica Storm was poised to erase Orion’s crew from existence, first mate Mark Rutherford appeared, sent by the Martians to bring them all back to Mars. Curious and cautious, Jessica Storm accompanied the crew to the tunnels, miles beneath the Martian surface. The earthlings found themselves trapped in endless tunnels that slowly drove them mad. In a savage battle of wills, Jessica Storm kills both Nikki Jackson and Mark Rutherford. Suddenly, she finds herself facing the Tor. It was all a test, and she passed. Now she alone will escape the destiny that awaits Orion’s crew. The fate of the world rests in the hands of the Orion crew. But the Tor have other plans. Both for the crew, and for Earth.

You may have noticed that about two thirds of that recap is of events that actually happened on the last tape of episode 2. Yeah. I did get a chance to listen to episode 3 once, years ago. I think I got it out of the library. It’s a lot of filler.

I don’t remember there being any development in the plot with DeWitt, but we get what might actually be payoff for the stupid, boring dinner party scene back at the beginning with Rimbauch coming up with the idea of trying to get Clark off on the whole assassination thing by claiming that he was suffering from Incompetent-Leadership-Induced-Insanity: he wants to establish the legal precedent that if the government is terrible, someone who tries to kill them is not culpable for their actions, the plausibility of which was established back when we found out that people have successfully gotten off on murder charges by claiming overpopulation-induced-madness. It’s very this stupid thing’s obsession with insulting society.

I don’t recall the bits about Nancy and Ethan at all, though I do recall Ratkin sending Evans to off Ethan’s mom. I don’t remember how they get back to Mars either. I remember episode 2 ending with Jessica giving the order to kill the Orion crew, and I remember that they’re on Mars in episode 3, but not how the transition worked. I do recall that the cliffhanger was a real bummer. The ending is pretty unambiguous: Mark Rutherford’s dead. Nikki Jackson’s dead. Ethan’s mom is dead. The narrator failed to mention it, but Jonathan Ferris is dead too, killed by Jessica’s sidekick Walsh (The guy Ratkin calls right before Artemis launches to tell him to kill Jessica Storm if she shows any signs of being insufficiently evil). And two of the others, Pirelli and Talbert, I think, get into a fight and almost beat each other to death. It’s completely clear and unambiguous that our heroes have been completely defeated and the bad guys won.

I bet that’ll stick.