'A group of people are in an underground cavern, searching for something. A dark and shadowy labyrinth, rock walls and sandy floor. Someone disturbs a rock, and there glides from behind the rock, a snake, only this snake has a human skull for it's head... This was the cliffhanger at the end of an episode'.
I had reluctantly come to the conclusion that I had probably dreamt the whole thing. I could find no referemce to anything like it anywhere, in the shows I had watched and those I had only read about; Sky, King of the Castle, Children of the Stones, Shadows, The Owl Service, The Tomorrow People, The Omega Factor...
The scene seemed too nightmarish for it to be a childrens television show anyway, and I had ascribed it to some vague memory, mixed up with some nightmare... until, of course the other day, I found out what it was much to my total astonishment.
I think I was looking at Amazon at Sapphire and Steel box sets, and looking at what other people had bought. One of the DVDs that someone else had bought after buying a Sapphire and Steel box set was a programme called 'Raven' from 1977, and a description saying that it was 'little seen'. Hmm, I thought. I had never heard of it. This in itself quite excited me. Thought probably not surprising. Just when you think you've discovered the limit of 1970s childrens supernatural/science fiction dramas, along comes another one. Moving on quickly to Youtube, I discovered that someone had, helpfully, uploaded the entire series.
There it was. The end of episode 4.
My memory was remarkably accurate.
A group of people are in a cave. They are looking through a hole in the wall. We see five heads from within the hole in the wall. They call for one of their friends. Somethin rises at the bottom of the screen. We cut to a shot of the one woman, screaming. We cut to another shot. We are looking into the hole, from the outside. Something emerges from the hole. We see it for a split second before the credits kick in. A human skull, on what seems to be the body of a snake.
I, of course had to check the beginning of episode 5 to see what happens next.
We have a reprise. The human skull, on what seems to be the body of a snake emerges once more, and the body of the snake is in fact an arm, the hand of which is holding the snake... and the arm belongs to a man, who climbs through the hole. 'Well' he says 'he needed rescuing too, but its a bit late for him!'.
I am reminded of that old adage of 'never meeting your heroes'. A slight disappointment that there is not an actual skull-headed snake..? Oh well...
I have only flicked through the episodes on Youtube. Apparently the entire series is released on DVD. I've read a few reviews of it online. Despite the skull-headed snake not being a skull-headed snake, the programme looks, to be frank, absolutely incredible. It seems to concern a plan to build a nuclear power station over a series of ancient caves, freeing ancient elemental forces. It seems to base a lot of its ideas on Celtic myth and astrology. One clip I saw sees one character explaining why tunneling from one cave system to another was asking for trouble; 'the cave system forms a zodiac... capricorn and cancer are negative female signs in direct opposition; there had to be fireworks'. Another clip I saw sees a white-eyed figure of a man, translucent against a swirling chaotic void. A magical symbol is overlaid on the screen as it cuts between scenes of the man vanishing into the psychedelic void and the people attempting to call him back.
This is almost like occult programming aimed at children. One modern day reviewer has called the programme 'deeply unsettling'.
And despite the fact that there is no skull-headed snake, the end of episode 4 is still looks fairly nightmarish to me...
