{"id":2486,"date":"2023-08-04T08:16:51","date_gmt":"2023-08-04T08:16:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/timeslip.org.uk\/?page_id=2486"},"modified":"2024-02-13T11:32:58","modified_gmt":"2024-02-13T11:32:58","slug":"timeslip-2-an-introduction","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/timeslip.org.uk\/index.php\/features\/timeslip-2\/timeslip-2-an-introduction\/","title":{"rendered":"Timeslip 2 – An Introduction"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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SIDEWAYS IN TIME – The Timeslip Sequel That Never Was<\/span><\/h3>

The following feature appeared in the July 2020 edition of SFX magazine. It has been amended <\/span>slightly to bring it up to date.<\/span><\/em><\/p>

The innovative 26-part science fiction series Timeslip was first shown on ITV from September <\/span>1970 to March 1971. It made a lasting impact on its audience and was repeated in 1973 – \u201974.<\/span><\/p>

Its four linked multi-episode storylines included: an attempt to uncover the whole truth about a <\/span>secret project 30 years back in the Second World War; human cloning; a faulty lifespan <\/span>longevity drug with a terrible impact; and future scientific manipulation of the climate which runs <\/span>out of control (in the eight-part adventure The Year Of The Burn Up). The show may have been <\/span>short-lived, but it was remembered fondly.<\/span><\/p>

The only further adventures for teenage time travellers Liz and Simon came in the comic-strip in <\/span>Look-in – \u201cthe junior TV Times\u201d – in the early 1970s, initially with artwork by one of the favourites <\/span>of comics fans, Mike Noble, who already had Gerry Anderson strips such as Captain Scarlet <\/span>and Zero X under his belt from his days on TV21. <\/span>But had time slipped another way, there could have been up to 13 further episodes of the show – <\/span>and who knows what else…<\/span><\/p>

A magazine piece in 1990 revealed that Victor Pemberton, one of the series\u2019 writers, had <\/span>obtained the rights to make a new series from ITC – something he confirmed in person at a Cult<\/span> TV weekend in 1994. He and his fellow writer from the show Bruce Stewart had indeed devised<\/span>
new outlines. But as time slipped away, the project failed to materialise and details became <\/span>sketchy.<\/span><\/p>

Steve Hardy, who set up the original official website for the series in early 2003 and its <\/span>successor version, recalled that Pemberton had brought Stewart – who wrote the first 19 <\/span>episodes of the original – on board. Together, they tried to get a sequel off the ground through<\/span>
Pemberton\u2019s company Saffron Productions Ltd in conjunction with UK production company <\/span>Zenith. <\/span>Pemberton and Stewart, it turned out, came up with a couple of storylines to pitch to potential <\/span>broadcasters. <\/span>\u201cThe trouble was,\u201d said Hardy, \u201cin the intervening years, the paperwork had got lost.\u201d<\/span><\/p>

\u201cWhen I asked Victor about it, some 15 or so years ago now, he suggested I contact Bruce. <\/span>When I approached Bruce, he said I should ask Victor…\u201d <\/span>Pemberton and Stewart, both now dead, each claimed they no longer had any of the <\/span>documentation and neither of them could recall any important points about the plots. <\/span>The breakthrough in finding out details came in March 2020 when a member of the Timeslip <\/span>Facebook page tipped off Hardy about an auction of paperwork for an aborted TV sequel. Hardy <\/span>decided to obtain it for the group P.A.S.T. Projects which has acted as a focus for Timeslip <\/span>fandom.<\/span><\/p>

He persuaded the vendor to shut down the eBay auction and negotiate the sale privately to <\/span>P.A.S.T. Projects. The vendor was, in fact, handling the disposal of Victor Pemberton\u2019s archive <\/span>with the result that \u201cquite a few\u201d items thought to be lost had come to light, sparking Hardy\u2019s <\/span>curiosity that other items of interest might crop up. <\/span>Hardy purchased the Timeslip material along with other items that did indeed prove of interest. <\/span>There was documentation on Victor\u2019s series Tightrope – a 13-part 1972 children\u2019s thriller starring <\/span>Spencer Banks (ex-Timeslip) and John Savident – and Pemberton\u2019s personal scrapbook <\/span>containing newspaper and magazine clippings documenting his career, especially his 1968 <\/span>Doctor Who story Fury From The Deep, still missing from TV archives.<\/span><\/p>

\"\"<\/a>\u201cThe documentation itself is fascinating and acts as a roadmap of the sequel\u2019s development,\u201d <\/span>said Hardy. <\/span>\u201cThere are story outlines, proposals, character profiles, correspondence with various potential <\/span>co-producers of the series and even correspondence with Stephen Hawking\u2019s agent as part of <\/span>Saffron\u2019s attempt to secure Professor Hawking as the series\u2019 technical adviser!\u201d (The scientific <\/span>adviser for the original show was Geoffrey Hoyle, son of the distinguished astronomer Fred <\/span>Hoyle.)<\/span><\/p>

Pemberton proposed a storyline, Return To The Time Barrier, which consisted of six half-hour <\/span>episodes. <\/span>In it, Liz and Simon are now in their early 30s. Their apparently chance meeting after many <\/span>years has been manipulated. They again experience timeslips, prompting Simon to seek out <\/span>Commander Traynor, the ambiguous figure from the original stories, now a recluse living on an <\/span>otherwise uninhabited island. <\/span>Simon and Traynor are puzzled as to why the barrier is active again; then Liz\u2019s daughter <\/span>disappears and it becomes apparent that the barrier was reactivated to use Liz and Simon for <\/span>some purpose.<\/span><\/p>

A timeslip resulting in Simon meeting a descendant of his precedes the reappearance of the <\/span>menacing clone version of Traynor from the original show. The clone now plans to destabilise <\/span>the way time functions in a bid for supreme power. <\/span>Pemberton\u2019s outline touches on a grand theme of how sections of the universe seem to act like <\/span>a giant computer, even down to the possible evolution of the human race, and that without the <\/span>right software, the results can be menacing.<\/span><\/p>

Another outline, by Stewart, entitled Timeslip 2: The Year Of The Time Bomb, presents a friendly <\/span>but mysterious new character. He is misguided rather than evil in his plan to collect prominent <\/span>characters from history to help guide the human race away from its path of destruction through <\/span>pollution and over-exploitation of resources. <\/span>The theme echoes ideas raised in Stewart\u2019s original Burn Up story (which Pemberton wrapped <\/span>up in its last episode) of environmental concerns predicting, in 1970 – \u201971, what has been <\/span>referred to as climate change or global warming.<\/span><\/p>

The new story of course involves Liz and Simon, again as adults, as well as Liz\u2019s daughter <\/span>Hannah, and Commander Traynor who Simon encounters in a future projection. This time <\/span>Traynor is involved with a group fighting an industrial corporation engaged in the secret and<\/span>
illegal disposal of toxic waste. <\/span>Bruce Stewart drastically rewrote this outline, basing his second version around a conflict <\/span>between the real Traynor – who Simon finds hiding away on an island and who refuses until late <\/span>in the story to confront his evil clone double – and his clone who turns out to be the villain.<\/span><\/p>

Other papers in the acquisition include a letter of agreement, dated April 1990, between Stewart <\/span>and Pemberton\u2019s company Saffron that Stewart should write a sequel outline for \u00a3100; and <\/span>correspondence from Spencer Banks – who originally played Simon – to Pemberton, including <\/span>Banks\u2019s comments on the new work. <\/span>Banks notes that the introduction of the historical characters reminds him of Terry Gilliam\u2019s <\/span>comic fantasy film Time Bandits (1981), though he concedes that the new work is \u201cimaginative <\/span>and there are some extremely good things\u201d.<\/span><\/p>

\u201cThere was always strong<\/span> credible<\/span> drama,\u201d Spencer writes of the original series in one letter, <\/span>adding: \u201cThe principle of the time barrier was unique (no super sci-fi machinery, exotic light <\/span>effects), it was simple and sinister.\u201d <\/span>Banks posits that the often antagonistic brother-sister side of Liz and Simon\u2019s relationship is why <\/span>the chemistry between them really works, drawing comparisons to the \u201880s US private eye <\/span>series Moonlighting which starred Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd – \u201cthough without the glitz <\/span>and the implied sex!\u201d<\/span><\/p>

He praises some developments such as Hannah, Liz\u2019s daughter, but queries how the motives of <\/span>the malevolent forces are portrayed, saying: \u201cIf the story follows the line of profit at all cost then <\/span>the issues should be in realistic context. Individuals bent on world domination are for Bond films <\/span>– need to be outrageous to work and the story equally so.\u201d
<\/span><\/p>

A 1993 letter from Dawn Airey, controller of Children\u2019s & Daytime Programmes at the ITV <\/span>Network Centre, to Victor Pemberton\u2019s project partners Zenith warns: \u201cTIMESLIP would go into <\/span>the Autumn ’95\/Winter ’96 offers, and although I am enthusiastic about the project a significant <\/span>number of additional proposals will inevitably be received in the next 12 months that will also <\/span>compete for these slots. <\/span>So knowing the chances of a commission are slim, but with the knowledge I was a fan of the <\/span>series, I will leave it up to you as to whether or not Zenith South will invest in the development of <\/span>this series. I hope you do!\u201d<\/span><\/p>

Sadly, it wasn\u2019t to be, with subsequent papers revealing letters showing Pemberton\u2019s frustration <\/span>at getting no positive responses to a proposed sequel. This was despite proposed involvement <\/span>from ITC suggesting that it would require at least 13 episodes to secure American co-funding. <\/span>And though a TV follow-up may not have arrived, a small though loyal number of fans kept the <\/span>flame burning over the years.<\/span><\/p>

P.A.S.T. Projects organised several events for the show\u2019s followers including a mini-convention <\/span>in 2007 in Cuffley, Hertfordshire, close to the time barrier location site. Series creator and script <\/span>editor Ruth Boswell and stars Cheryl Burfield and Spencer Banks were among the guests <\/span>happily sharing their memories of the show with the fans. <\/span>There was also the launch in 2009 of the 93-minute making of… documentary Behind The <\/span>Barrier at the Rex Cinema in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire, and a 40th anniversary celebration of <\/span>the series back in Cuffley in 2010, with Ruth, Cheryl and Spencer again joining other guests <\/span>from the show for these landmark celebrations.<\/span><\/p>

Chris Gibbings<\/span><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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