Characters appearing or mentioned in this episode

 

matron

female carer (unnamed)

male carer (unnamed)

Harry

Sapphire (as Mrs. P)

Steel

Victoria

Stanley

Enid

Ruby (mentioned only)

Silver (mentioned only)

Beastie

Gold (mentioned only)

 

Didja Notice?

 

One of the carers recalls a time going to the movies with her husband (Harry) in Brighton. They went to see Kind Hearts and Coronets. This is a 1949 British comedy film.

 

Steel and the aged Sapphire cannot remember how they got to the retirement home. Steel recalls that they were at a theatre and they'd had an argument about Ruby. Recall that Sapphire and Steel were on a mission at the Capitol Palace theatre in the previous adventure "Water Like a Stone", where Ruby was lost seemingly for all time at the end of "Water Like a Stone" Part 4. Our current episode then segues (via flashback) into the said argument at the theatre, an argument we did not get to hear previously; it must have taken place shortly after the events of "Water Like a Stone" Part 4.

 

During the flashback argument between Sapphire and Steel, Steel insists that Ruby has ceased to exist on this plane of reality. Sapphire reminds him that they themselves had ceased to exist once until they were rescued by Silver. This must be a reference to "The Trap" Part 4, the final episode of the TV series, where they were trapped in a lonely cafe outside of space-time.

 

Steel comes to a realization that it must be the Transients who trapped Sapphire in the retirement home. The Transients are the ones who trapped the pair of them in "The Trap" Part 4.

 

The Transient voice torments the female carer with a wicked poem about "girlies" out of their element, including the line "down comes the doodlebug". "Doodlebug" was a nickname for the German's V-1 flying bomb in WWII, essentially a bomb with wings and an engine that flew through the sky towards a target until it ran out of fuel, then fell and exploded on impact wherever it landed.

 

One of the male carers asks Harry, "Where are the others?" and Harry responds, "Oh, they're all being dismal Jimmies." In British argot, a "dismal Jimmy" is a melancholy or gloomy person.

 

Sapphire tells Steel she remembers the lighthouse, the steam train, Gold, the railway station, and the Mary Celeste. These are references to past adventures: "The Lighthouse", "The Passenger", "The Railway Station", an untold story aboard the American brigantine Mary Celeste mentioned in previous episodes, and their specialist acquaintance Gold (who assisted them in "The Passenger").

 

At the end of this chapter, it turns out that Mrs. P is merely Sapphire's "DeGray shadow" as Steel refers to it. The real Sapphire has been mutated in the Beastie for the past 400 years of her existence at the retirement home.

  

Memorable Dialog

 

I can hardly remember what it was like to be her.mp3

we ceased to exist once.mp3

sometimes I.mp3

eternal darkness.mp3

what are we fighting for?.mp3

that scares you doesn't it, Steel?.mp3

this partnership has ceased to function efficiently.mp3

my poor, sweet, abandoned Sapphire.mp3

the Transients trapped you here.mp3

the Transients wanted us out of their way.mp3

I've suffered like them.mp3

we started to experience a little of the human spirit.mp3 

 

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