Space Precinct, for those not in the know, was a British science fiction police procedural television series produced from 1994 to 1995, and was created by Gerry Anderson. Anderson was responsible for a number of sucessful television series, including Thunderbirds, Space: 1999, and Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons. The series followed a human police officer, Patrick Brogan, who has transferred from New York City to Demeter City, a police precinct on the distant planet of Altor.
The first episode drops viewers straight into the action, as Brogan and his partner, Jack Haldane, are on a stakeout, waiting for an alien they suspect is smuggling illegal Xyronite immigrants. When the smuggler is killed in the ensuing encounter, Brogan ends up having to rely on his informant, Slick Ostrasky, to help find the man in charge. However, when Slick is killed Brogan and Haldane get put on protection detail so that the only witness to the killing, a Melazoid businessman called Armand Loyster, can identify the murderer.
I can vaguely remember the Space Precinct series when it first aired in the UK in the mid 90's, and had a few of the action figures. However, my recollections of the series are only really vague memories, and as such I wasn't sure what to really expect sitting down to watch the show again. Whilst there were times that the episode felt a little cheesey, with some effects and sets that looked thrown together, and there was a little humour thrown in too, I was shocked at how grim and gritty it was at times too.
The episode opens with a stakeout that goes wrong, leading to Brogan getting into a gunfight with an alien inside a slaughterhouse. Gutted alien carcasses hang from the ceiling, and the almost demonic looking alien that he's chasing tries to kill him. Brogan ends up having to shoot the alien in order to protect himself, and just murders the guy.
This darker tone ended up carrying across much of the episode. When Slick Ostrasky, played by Pink Panther's Burt Kwouk, is killed he's tied into a car that is made to crash, resulting in a massive explosion; all whilst he's begging the murderer to let him go.
The episode seemed to be made the same way any adult police procedural show would be, albeit with a futuristic layer pasted on top. Instead of regular beat cops you've got exotic aliens. Instead of car chases people are in flying cars. But at its heart this is a story about an evil man that will murder to get away with his crimes, and police officers who want to bring him to justice.
I remember the show being on television in the early evening, almost as if it were designed for a family audience in the way that Star Trek was. I even think the BBC showed it around the same time as Star Trek. But after watching it now, with fresh eyes, I'm not so sure if it was designed for a family audience. If you took out the fantastical and it was a modern, real world setting this would not be a show that you'd want your kids to seem. A number of people die quite brutally, one of whom gets shot in front of a video monitor so that Brogans kids see it.
Space Precinct has genuinely surprised me by the tone of the content. I was expecting something a bit lighter, and more adventure focused like Anderson's other works. Instead there's a show that whilst not the most visually impressive things around has some very adult and engaging content at its core. The story in this episode would work just as well in a modern day setting, and I think that's why the episode held up so well. I'm excited to see if the rest of the series continues like this, or if it leans more into the science fiction side of things. If it does, I think it may lead to some weaker moments, as the police procedural aspect worked so well.
Whilst some of the effects, such as laser beams and an alien's frog-like tongue looked very dated the model work on display was absolutely brilliant. By this point Anderson had been producing shows made using models for decades, and that experience shows. The flying car chases look great, and the model ships break through terrain in spectacular fashion. The explosion that kills Slick is on screen for only a few seconds, but you can see where they spent a lot of time, effort, and money building the models before the blow them to pieces.
'Protect and Survive' is an interesting first step into the Space Precinct universe. It seems to not quite know what kind of tone it wants to have, but it certainly manages to impress.
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