Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea Classic Episode Mutiny

Voyage to the Bottom
of the Sea
Classic Episode Guide - "Mutiny"
Continued - page 3

Crane arrives in Pearl to find Nelson recovered -- perhaps a little too recovered. His intense, fast-talking mood might be explained away as the reaction of a man who has just brushed perilously close with death. On the other hand, he's popping pills at an alarming rate. In a flurry, he brushes off his ordeal and departs with Crane for Seaview.

Back on Seaview, Nelson is greeted with a rousing burst of applause, huzzahs and relief. Stark says there's no one he'd rather turn command over to than Nelson, and the Admiral uncomfortably points out that Captain Crane is in command of the Seaview.
Stark: Well, not while she's in the Navy and there are two Admirals on board, right Captain?
Nelson simply says: Let's get underway, Lee. The sooner this mission is over, the sooner we'll become civilians again. He then pointedly instructs Crane to join he and Stark in the Nose as soon as they're underway.

      Welcome back, Admiral
Tell me about this creature.
Is it possible you're exaggerating?

Nelson doesn't exaggerate.

In the nose, Jiggs says, Tell me more about this creature of yours, Harriman.
Nelson: It's not just one creature, Jiggs. It's millions of creatures combined to form one central organism.
Crane: Like a Portuguese Man-Of-War.
Nelson: Exactly, Lee, like a Portuguese Man-Of-War -- more than a thousand feet across.
Stark: A thousand feet across? Oh, come now. You've been adrift too long, Harriman. Is it possible you're exaggerating?
Crane: Admiral Nelson doesn't exaggerate.
Admiral Stark delivers a fabulous double-take at Crane, and the Captain proceeds with an analogy: It's like the Seaview, Admiral, now all of us, the crew, you and I, inside, we're like individuals;

outside, we're like one big creature.
Nelson: Precisely, Lee. But there's one important difference between the Seaview and the coelenterate.
Stark asks, What's that?
The dialogue that follows sums up Nelson's function as the scientist/warrior.
Nelson: It (the creature) has only a central nervous system, it can only respond. But we have brains, many brains. We can do more than respond, we can think. We can function together as a team, and that's out strength.
They are abruptly called to the control room where Seaview's instruments are going wild, just like on the Neptune before she went down.


We can do more than respond, we can think.

Nelson notes the same depth and bottom readings he witnessed on Neptune, and realizes they have reached the spot where she went down. He instructs Lee to order the sub dived, and Seaview is very soon plunging, out of control for the bottom, her controls, like the ill-fated Neptune's, frozen and useless.

Not only that, but Nelson seems to be frozen and useless; as Seaview plunges out-of-control toward the bottom and whatever monster awaits them on the way down, Nelson stares fixed at a doodle-like drawing he's been fiddling with and circles with his pencil repeatedly. Crane becomes increasingly aware that there is something wrong with his friend.



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