Mind control and the manipulation of nubile groupies by a rock star nursing a platinum-selling grudge against the rapacious vultures of the music industry should have gone to Number One with a bullet in "The Pied Piper," but thanks to an impressively underwhelming performance by guest-star Martin Mull, this intriguing, even provocative premise drops off the charts fast. Not that the lukewarm script-by-committee (which includes David Ketchum, AKA Agent 13 from "Get Smart") does much to amplify its premise beyond token gestures to the rock and roll lifestyle while Alan Crosland's tepid direction trips weakly behind the beat.
Pop sensation Hamlin Rule (Mull) wows sellout audiences wherever he performs--even Diana Prince is a fan--with his literally hypnotic flute-playing that is more than a Jethro Tull-like affectation. (That band's frontman Ian Anderson is famous for brandishing that instrument.) In concert with a sonic disintegrating device he invented, Rule has also perfected a mind-controlling system keyed to his flute that he uses to brainwash already-impressionable young women. For sex and decadence? No. That's too rock and roll. He trains them to rob the concert venues he is playing at as revenge against all the ten-percenters who have scavenged all the money he has earned from his artistic genius. Why Rule didn't make a mint selling his inventions to the military-industrial complex instead must remain a mystery.
Chief among his victims is UCLA co-ed Elena Atkinson (Eve Plumb), daughter of Diana's Inter-Agency Defense Command boss Joe Atkinson (Normann Burton), which is where Wonder Woman starts to come in. Joe is distressed about Elena's neglecting her studies to traipse after Rule, so Diana, about to leave for Los Angeles with Steve Trevor to investigate Rule's string of robberies, invites Joe to come with her instead to check up on Elena. Once in LA, Diana begins to uncover Rule's nefarious operation--including one head-spinning situation when Rule could have discovered her secret identity had he stuck around a few moments longer--as Elena, tapped to advance in Rule's outfit, begins to regret her camp-following but is trapped by Rule's spell.
Given more to do than advance the storyline, Burton still has to follow Lynda Carter's lead while Plumb lacks color and conviction in a pivotal role. However, it is an utterly bland Mull who breaks up the band, projecting dishwater charisma as a slightly snarky, vaguely passive-aggressive dweeb whose performance chops, including his lame rendition of the Paul Williams song "Love Conquers All" (sounding like a reject from Williams's contributions to Brian De Palma's 1974 musical "Phantom of the Paradise"), stick a fork into Rule's credibility as a rock star. This episode really should have been titled "Wonder Woman Meets Jethro Dull."
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