I'm ashamed to think I might have contributed in any way to this disgusting charade.
So, this is how the Quatermass saga ends. In 1973, two decades after the first six-part serial aired, Nigel Kneale conceived a fourth and final story for his signature character, but the BBC balked at the projected budget and shelved it. Soon after, Kneale permanently cut ties with the Beeb and moved over to ITC, which mounted a two-pronged attack on the material under the direction of Piers Haggard (who was just coming off the television version of Dennis Potter's Pennies from Heaven) in 1979. The goal was to produce a four-part miniseries that could then be edited down to feature length for foreign distribution. It is the latter cut, titled The Quatermass Conclusion, that I was able to get from Plan Nine, although now that I've had a taste I'd very much like to see what the main course is like.
Right from the start, society has broken down, as Prof. Quatermass (John Mills) learns when he's beset by some violent punks on his way to a television appearance. Before they can do any permanent damage he's rescued by a radio astronomer (Simon MacCorkindale) who's due to appear on the same program, providing the UK's take on the US and USSR's "Hands in Space" initiative. Mills is introduced as a "father figure of space research," but he has nothing but scorn for the grandstanding of the superpowers and instead tries to use the show to broadcast a plea to his granddaughter, who has run away from home. Unsurprisingly, she turns up among the mobs of young people -- unruly neo-Luddites calling themselves the Planet People -- who are ready to take off for parts unknown without the help of science, man.
For his part, Mills retreats to the countryside with MacCorkindale, who introduces the distinguished scientist to his wife (Barbara Kellerman), an archaeologist by training who also proves susceptible to the forces that are drawing young people en masse to ancient meeting places where they are subsequently vaporized, leaving nothing but a chalky residue. That's the situation that Mills is confronted with and, as usual, he has a hard time convincing incredulous government officials that he knows what to do about it, even when he has one -- district commissioner Margaret Tyzack -- on his side. Eventually he's given the go-ahead to convene a task force including a Russian scientist (Brewster Mason) to work on the problem, but not before a huge gathering at Wembley Stadium goes up in smoke. I expect that was something of a wake-up call to the powers that be.