Written by Brian Clemens | Directed by Cyril Frankel

"Richard Barrett, one of the Champions. A fire, and not logical way of escape for Richard Barrett, but once again the gifts given to him by the unknown race of people from the lost city in Tibet are called on and used. Three people: Craig Stirling, Sharron Macready and Richard Barrett; endowed with the qualities and skills of super humans. They are gifts that are secrets to be closely guarded, but it is a secret that enables them to use their powers to their best advantage as the Champions of law, order and justice."

While on a seperate mission from Craig and Sharron, Richard is tossed from a helicopter in the Australian desert. He gets amnesia due to the great fall and has no idea who he is and why he's in the middle of the outback. What he has also forgotten is that a soon- to-be-exploded nuclear device has been tampered with and will contaminate much of Australia, including Sydney. Wandering the desert with an old prospector (Banner) who refused to leave the test site, Richard encounters the saboteur, who crashed his helicopter, and in the ensuing fight, Richard's memory returns, but now he must disarm the nuclear device even though he does not have the necessary knowledge.

This is a strange episode in the sense that we see one agent, in this case Richard, have to rely on himself for the majority of the episode. However, without Craig and Sharron's help, who are many hundreds of kilometres away, Richard could not have saved the day. We do get to see Richard try and remember who he is, always with a sense of confusion as he does not understand what is going on. We, the audience, do have a sense of tension as we know what is going to happen but observe Richard battle with his faint memories in the hope that he can "come back" in time to save the day. The sense of desperation on Craig and Sharron's part is also of great interest as they are unaware of what is really happening with Richard.

Unfortunately, a few downsides, though minor, hurt the epiode as a whole. The set is very bad. The budget limitations would have made it impossible to shoot outdoors so the Australian outback is recreated in a studio. The studio walls (painted like a desert horizon) are not convincing, in fact, at one point the edges of a door way are visible in what is supposed to be the sky! Also, all the Australian characters are portrayed by non-Australians. Banner, who is in all of the episode, is played by an American or Canadian who didn't put much effort into his Australian accent. This is more noticable to an Australian (like myself) but I think anyone would cringe just a little.

On the plus side for Banner, he says the best line in the episode. Just after Richard has been bitten by a deadly snake and Banner is burying him, Richard "rises from the dead". Banner remarks that he was looking for a big rock as Richard's grave head stone, and that he even thought up a little poem to write on it.

Banner: "Rest in peace poor nameless git, you upped and died when you got bit. Nice isn't it?"
Richard: "Hmmm...it's different!"

Overall, "Happening", is a good episode. The lack of realism as explained above and some other small elements knocks the rating down a little.

Michael Gough Jack MacGowan Grant Taylor Bill Cummings

Joss Banner General Winters Aston