Wherein faceless alien peoples will microwave your brain! I love how most of the time with these episodes they managed to squeeze in a decent amount of plot into the short timespan without it feeling rushed, at least to me. You get the bizarre toy factory that takes over the top floor of the s***ty tenement building that's run by alien strangers in disguise, the frigging telekinetic power games, they do kind of shoot themselves in the foot there by teaching her to use the Force! (why not wait until she was safely aboard the ship before doing that?) Then there's the twist ending which is probably one of my favourites, as it's a pretty great one. I find it similar to the ending of "The Tale of the Dream Girl", in that it's about somebody discovering something shocking about themselves that they never imagined. And that's a bit of a scary idea, that you don't even really know yourself. It's a strange kind of a sad ending. Poor girl, she really did have it all completely wrong! The aliens were never villains at all and she was one of them, they only wanted to take her home... What was next in store for her on planet earth, government experiment for life or circus freakshow exhibit? I always find that there's at least one thing to like in any given episode of this show, there's still a lot of fun to be had to this day. I like the hideous cheap pastel nightmare aesthetic of the "Toy Chest"(real subtle guys!) toy factory, it reminds me of the spaceship of the Killer Klowns! And when the aliens/robots are revealed the design is basic to say the least, but it's neat enough. They're like the Putty Patrol! Good lord the uh, "replacement elevator operator" is so freaking odd! Such an actor! He actually does give a decent performance, I like how he's vaguely sinister but also manages to convey the grave urgency that the girl go with the aliens even if he can't tell her why or force her to go. That's one of the things I love about this show, the memorable eccentric weirdos! Speaking of which, I like the scenes where the freaky guy with the dopey look on his face is talking to the girl through her TV. That's always creepy to me, if my TV asked me if I thought it was talking to me in the middle of the night I'd probably wet my pants! It's all ridiculously goofy, but there remains such an awesome rich charm there that I'll love forever. Goodbye people I don't know! X
