Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea Episode Guide Year 3

Aye, Admiral. There's that rock again. Now we can hit bottom.
Familiar shot of Seaview hitting bottom.

Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea

Production information and notes by Mark Phillips
Story synopses, Mike Bailey

No Escape From Death Original Airdate: February 19, 1967

Seaview's out hunting for a secret underwater base when a hostile sub rams and sends her to the bottom. Bulkheads are close to collapsing and fires break out aboard ship. Nelson is knocked unconscious by falling cargo and then rescued from drowning by Crane. Sharkey gets the bulkheads temporarily shored but several men are missing or dead and they'll never get off the bottom unless they can repair the engines and get water pumped out. Seaman Clark volunteers to try to release a stuck valve and ends up needing to be rescued by Crane.

Black and white footage (tinted red) from season one episode Submarine Sunk Here.
Bonked Nelson tinted red from Season one's Submarine SUnk Here.

Black and white footage (tinted blue) from season one episode Hail To The Cheif.
Resurrected and tinted blue, Seaman clark
works on that darned stuck gear.

When Crane realizes they've gone down within swimming range of the underwater base, he gets the Admiral's permission to take Kowalski and Patterson with him to swim over for a look-see. While they're out diving, a giant Portuguese man-of-war gobbles them up and Nelson realizes then, what project the secret base was working on. The three divers survive inside the creature and hunt for a way out. Nelson, in the meanwhile, is pushing to get the missile room to fire at the creature before it rips Seaview apart. Repairs are effected, Crane and company manage to escape the creature, and Nelson orders missiles fired all in that order. The creature and the sea lab are destroyed and Seaview sails into the sunset (so to speak.)

Destroyed sea lab from season two's Jonah and the Whale.
Oops, wrecked sealab from
Jonah And The Whale.

Written: William Welch
Directed: Harry Harris

Guest Cast:
Clark...........................Paul Carr
Repairman.............Ray Didsbury
Trapped crewman...Carl Reindel

Mark Says: My vote as the worst episode of Voyage ever, a tired story stitched with clips from past shows. Virtually unwatchable.

Mike Says: Interesting. I actually found this episode refreshing in an odd roundabout way. Because it bodily lifts action sequences from previous bigger budgeted, better directed episodes, the inserted footage makes the show feel snappier than it might otherwise. On the other hand, any Voyage junkie can recognize the footage for what it is and therefore, as Mark points out, it doesn't go down well. Rather than being one of those, 'lets all recall past adventures stories,' No Escape From Death pretends to be a new adventure. But it's not new at all, having been stitched together from hauntingly familiar footage, especially in the case of Paul Carr's reappearance for the first time since either season one (as Clark) or season 2 (as the deceased Benson,) depending on how you look at things. To anyone who knew what was going on, a cheap and demeaning trick. (Extensive use of protracted sequences from Submarine Sunk Here, Hail to the Chief, Jonah And The Whale and Graveyard of fear .)

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