The Invaders 1.14

Panic

David Vincent arrives in rural West Virginia on the trail of a man whose touch is deadly. The locals don't know what to make of the number of recent deaths of people who seemed healthy. David is convinced that it is something related to the Invaders and that a young man in a red plaid jacket is the one causing it. A policeman, probably an Invader, tails David as he searches for the young man in the red plaid jacket.

David knocks out and disarms the policeman who has been tailing him. He takes the policeman's gun and uses it to convince Nick Baxter, the young man, to come quietly. He puts on gloves to make sure he doesn't inadvertently touch his prisoner. Nick is an Invader with a disease that is almost instantly fatal to humans. Other Invaders are searching for Nick. David and Nick evade the other invaders and meet Madeline, a young woman, who takes them to her home.

Madeline introduces David and Nick to Gus, her father. They don't have a telephone. David pays Gus to walk 3 miles to a café and call the sheriff. He doesn't tell Gus or Madeline everything he knows but he warns them that Nick is dangerous and should not be touched. David ties Nick up but later, while they are waiting for Gus to return, David passes out. Madeline and Nick are gone when he wakes up. Gus returns with what he thinks are sheriffs but are actually Invaders. David fights with the Invaders and kills them both. Gus is stunned when he sees the Invaders disintegrate and wants to know what happened to Madeline.

Gus and David head to where they think Nick and Madeline are headed. They take a short cut and get there just before Nick and Madeline. There see a saucer on the ground and Invaders preparing to leave. David gets Madeline away from Nick but Nick shoots and kills Gus. The saucer takes off but before it leaves a beam is fired from the saucer that kills Nick.

Thoughts

I don't have any clear recollections of this or any other episode of this show, from when I watched it in the 1970s, but this feels very much like the sort of episode that I might have seen at that time.

There is a dog that belongs to Madeline and Gus in a few scenes. There is one scene where Madeline puts some food on the ground next to Nick. The dog looks at the food and starts to move towards it. I don't think it was supposed to do that.   

I liked this episode. It isn't great but there is something about the way it is put together that works for me. I like how the focus seems to be on the situation at hand and there is little focus on exposing the Invaders for what they are.

Notes

Lynn Loring played the part of Madeline. She had a career in television that began in 1951. She made a number of guest appearances on shows such as The Wild, Wild West and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. She was married to Roy Thinnes (David Vincent) at the time this episode was filmed. They worked together three more times in the next 10 years. They had two children together before they divorced in 1984. Her acting career ended in the mid-1970s but she continued to work behind the camera into the early 1990s.

Robert Walker, Jr. played the part of Nick. His career as a screen actor lasted from the late 1950s to the early 1990s. He made guest appearances on Star Trek: TOS, The Time Tunnel, Six Million Dollar Man, and Charlie's Angels. He passed in 2019.

R.G. Armstrong played the part of Gus. His career in front of the camera includes over 180 credits and lasted from the mid-1950s to the late 1990s. One of his last roles was as the Old Man in Season 2 of Millennium. Most of his early work was guest appearances in TV westerns, including two appearances on Maverick. He also made appearances on Twilight Zone, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour. This is the first of two appearances he made on The Invaders. The other episode is from Season 2 and he plays a different character in that episode.