50 Years Ago: Logan's Run (1976)

In the 23^rd century, the survivors of a nuclear war live inside The City of Domes, a paradise of plenty. The world is a hedonist’s delight with the Love Shop and other pleasures, but the metropolis is not without a downside. 

Every citizen must die at age 30, and hope for “renewal” in a state-sponsored ritual called Carousel that keeps the civilization perfectly balanced.  Policing this edict are a cadre of armed law enforcement officials, the Sandmen.  

One such Sandman, Logan 5 (Michael York) is tasked by the city’s controlling Computer with determining if the destination of refugees, called Sanctuary, is real.  Logan enlists the help of a young woman, Jessica (Jenny Agutter) in escaping the city, but is tagged as a “runner” and hunted by his former partner, Francis.  

When Logan and Jessica manage to escape the city, first they find a malevolent robot, Box, and later see the outside world for the first time.  

In the ruins of Washington D.C., they meet an Old Man (Peter Ustinov) who proves that the edict of “death at 30” is not natural.

Logan's Run serves as a critical "bridge" production of the 1970s. It blends the dystopian qualities of such film predecessors as Soylent Green (1973) and Planet of the Apes (1968), with the elaborate, expensive visual effects and action-adventure qualities of the Star Wars (1977) age.

Logan's Run is based on the William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson novel of the same name, which was first published in 1967. The novel depicted a bizarre world set post-"Little War," in which the ascendant youth society of the turbulent late 1960s (think student demonstrations and sit-ins) had grown to become the globe's dominant social force. In an attempt to stave off overpopulation, starvation, and poverty, a new society of the young was forged in which the mandatory age of death was 21 years of age. It was "never trust anyone over thirty" (or 21 here...), but as a governing philosophy.

Citizens of this New World Order had "palm flowers" embedded in their hands which displayed their age and their chronological proximity to "Last Day."  On said "Last Day" (their 21st birthday...) they would willingly report for mandatory termination at a local Sleep Shop. Those who didn't choose death would illicitly "run" instead, seeking escape through an underground railroad, in search of a place called "Sanctuary." Policing the populace and destroying these rebellious runners is the bailiwick of a young, fascist military force called "Sandmen."

In the book, a dedicated Sandman named Logan 3 teamed with a female runner named Jessica to locate Sanctuary, but he was secretly a double-agent for the government, tasked with the destruction of Sanctuary. Logan was pursued on his "run" by a Sandman friend named Francis, who also boasted a secret identity...as Ballard, an ally of runners and the man who knew where Sanctuary was actually located. In the book, Sanctuary was but a rocket trip away, on Mars...

Many aspects of Nolan and Johnson's brilliant novel were significantly altered for the blockbuster film, which earned over 50 million dollars on a cost of less than 10 million.  

Specifically, Michael York's Logan 5 (not Logan 3) was the hero of the silver screen version, and his Sandman comrade, Francis (Richard Jordan), became a dogged enemy and Agent of the State instead of a secret aide to the Runners. 

Also, the Sleep Shops (actually seen in Soylent Green....) were replaced with the bizarre but impressive public spectacle of Carousel, a festival in which those aged thirty (not twenty-one) would be blown up before the eyes of excited crowds who believed that the doomed were actually being "renewed," miraculously reincarnated.

The general setting was altered for the film too. In Logan's Run the movie a nuclear war rather than a "Little War" precipitated the creation of the City of Domes, meaning that the world outside the City was almost entirely destroyed....post-apocalyptic rather than merely futuristic. Perhaps the most significant change in the movie was that there was no real Sanctuary...no place of safety and peace for the runners. Instead, Sanctuary was a myth, a fairy tale.

Despite such radical changes from the source material, Logan's Run thrives as a worthwhile, exciting, and intriguing science-fiction artifact of the 1970s for quite a few reasons. The one-of-a-kind disco-era visualizations and tenor of Logan's Run -- the aura of “anything goes” hedonism -- continue to ably support the film’s didactic narrative. The glittering, sexy-but-shallow production design, abundantly rich in neon and mini-skirts, suggests youth and sexuality, even forty years later.

But perhaps the finest aspect of Logan's Run is indeed the film's capacity to build in the viewer's imagination a believable and frightening future dystopia. The City of Domes and its byzantine laws and practices fit the very definition of an authoritarian or totalitarian state.

Let's gaze a little at what the pieces of that definition are, and how Logan's Run successfully conforms to them.

First, according to one definition, a totalitarian state "creates myths, catechisms, cults, festivities and rituals" designed to "commemorate" the State. The central myth of the City of Domes, of course, is "Renewal," the State-supported lie which promises immortality. Upon death, the souls of the fallen (those who attend Carousel) will transmigrate to new, young bodies. 

This lie is reinforced by the numbering system employed to "name" individual citizens (Logan 5, Jessica 6, Francis 7, etc.) These numbers, which replace last names in this future society, explicitly indicate the march of generations; that a new baby is actually a "new" version of a person who has already existed, "died" and "renewed." The numbers are also totally de-humanizing. Humans become one in a vast indistinguishable line.

The Carousel "festival" -- a state-sponsored celebration of "Last Day" -- is attended by all citizens of the City of Domes, and is essentially the equivalent of, for example, a contemporary NASCAR race, only govt. run. The people down on the track or field (those who are ostensibly to be renewed...) circle around and around, and many of them "wreck" before our eyes, blown apart by a ceiling-mounted laser device that resembles a crystal. Spectators watch and cheer for Carousel participants to "renew," but what they are really cheering for is the violent, explosive deaths of friends and fellow citizens.

The State has thus transformed a mandatory death sentence into the very "ritual" or "festival" inherent in the tradition of totalitarianism, one that actually reinforces (or "commemorates" as the definition goes), the Law of the State: mandatory death at 30. 

Economically, this ritual of Carousel combines the "bread and circuses" aspect of Rome's gladiator games -- satisfying the blood lust of the crowd -- with a "spiritual" or "religious" church function: the honoring of the dead (or dying); the belief in transmigration or reincarnation.

This ritual of Carousel is also supported by a State-created and encouraged catechism, an education in the faith meant to indoctrinate the people, here termed in short-hand, "One for One." 

In the film, we witness Logan and Francis debate the dogma/doctrine of "One for One." Francis accepts it blindly (by simply repeating it mindlessly) while Logan questions it...the first sign of his independent streak. 

This easy-to-remember phrase means -- in simple terms -- that one person dies/one person renews. It's the seamless, simple transmigration of the soul or spirit from the dead to the living. From Logan 4 to Logan 5. From Francis 5 to Francis 6. It's so simple that there can be no denying it. 

It's essentially programming through mnemonics and repetition, a phrase/teaching/sound-byte repeated so often and so widely that it is accepted blindly for "truth." The idea of "One for One" (and catechism) is part and parcel of entrenched absolutism (or totalitarianism) because it is representative of a "cliche-ridden language whose formulaic utterances are designed to impede ambivalence, nuance and complexity."

People don't die in the City of Domes, they "renew" (as if they are just TV programs, not living human beings.) The light on your palm which signals your death is not a "death clock" but, tellingly, a "life-clock." Sandmen don't kill. No, they never kill, according to Logan. They simply "terminate" Runners. And Runners are like "Terrorists" aren't they? Just a faceless boogeyman...not real flesh and blood people. Additionally, the day of a citizen’s death isn't called "Death Day or "Execution Day," but known by the pleasant euphemism Last Day.

This is precisely how Orwell's double-speak, jargon and euphemisms work. These phrases are widely-disseminated simplifications designed to impede questioning; to preserve and nurture an authoritarian regime and its agenda.

A totalitarian state is also defined as one with a "culture of military solidarity" in which "the pursuit and elimination" of Enemies of the State has become a primary purpose. 

Again, it's easy to detect how Logan's Run fits this aspect of the definition of totalitarianism. In general, the Sandmen lord it over the non-military personnel of the City of Domes, as Francis specifically does when an innocent civilian bumps into him at Arcade. Furthermore, according to City of Domes-style catechism, the Sandmen (the military of this State) are elevated above other citizens in matters of transmigration too. 

"Sandmen Always Renew," the catechism goes.

The enemies of the state are termed "Runners," but they are those, simply, who question the status quo and consequently opt out of Carousel, attempting to live longer than their allotted thirty years. The Sandmen are in place to destroy the Runners and prevent all knowledge of "Sanctuary" from the distracted populace. Runners can't be imprisoned (that would imbalance the population control system); they have to be "terminated" on sight. And again, the State employs euphemisms like terminate (instead of "kill") to make the act more palatable. When a runner dies, the corpse is melted down by strange hovering, futuristic machines, but this gory act is euphemistically termed "cleaning up." If people were to see the destroyed human body and count it as such they might begin to question the government's simplifications and slogans, not to mention the status quo.

Logan's Run succeeds as a film in no small part because of the carefully designed and constructed totalitarian state that our protagonists, Logan and Jessica flee. 

This world -- run by an unfeeling computer -- is so inhuman, so callous, that it does not even permit mothers and fathers to raise children. No, families create a sense of personal loyalty outside of loyalty to government, and that cannot be tolerated in a totalitarian state. 

A good villain goes a long way towards making an effective movie, and in Logan's Run there is a great one: a 23rd century Big Brother ordering mandatory executions and destroying humanity's spirit.

Note too, that like many real life dictatorships, the City of Domes is carefully erected on lies and deceit. Inherent in the system of the City is the belief that one does not need to work or produce.  Its people are occupied entirely with leisure. 

This lie is laid bare when Logan visits the outer workings of the city and finds that a mad robot called "Box" has frozen the 1,056 unaccounted for runners to be used as food for the city goers. Box ran out of plankton and animals some time ago, and now has resorted to capturing and storing unlucky humans in stasis. So the City of Domes is actually feeding on itself to survive. The self-sufficient system (which demands death at 30) is not so self-sufficient after all. 

Rather, it is cannibalizing itself.

Yet if the City of Domes is a cage for its people, it's rather definitively a gilded cage. The people who dwell there, according to the film's opening card "live only for pleasure." And that's another core aspect of the Totalitarian/Absolute State: distraction. 

The government wants your mind on "other things," not the government, not the way things are.  One way to avoid politics and matters of national import is to focus on materialism, on owning things, or in the vernacular: shopping.  Well, the people of the City of Domes have been told to go shopping in perpetuity. 

Their beautiful City is actually a colossal shopping mall, and the film was, in fact, shot in a shopping mall in Texas. This Arcade offers every manner of distraction and entertainment imaginable. 

So if you're feeling vain, why not head over to the New You Shop, where you can get a quickie face lift (or tummy tuck) and come out looking absolutely fabulous? If you hurry, you can make your work-out at the gym this afternoon too (as Logan and Francis do during one critical scene...). If you seek companionship, head over to another part of the mall: the Love Shop -- the 23rd Century equivalent of Studio 54. There you can take legal (and safe!) mood-altering drugs called "lifts" (think Prozac or Xanax). 

Then, you can have casual sex with gorgeous strangers (all under 30!). If you want to stay in your deluxe Sandman apartment tonight instead (conveniently located right off the mall's promenade...), Logan's Run even offers the 23rd century corollary to our Internet Porn: the so called computer "circuit" which materializes sexual partners (male or female), right at your doorstep.

What does all this mean? Well, clearly the City of Domes is consumed with youth, beauty, sex, and hedonism. Again, this is a pointed reflection of our culture in the 1970s, and even more so today. Who cares if the world is burning? We want our MTV!  

Logan's Run's antidote to dystopia may be naive, however, especially in 2026

The film espouses, among other things a renewal of the natural order: a return to the re-born outside world, and a prescribed departure from computers, climate-controlled shopping-malls and 24-hour-a-day leisure. 

Alas, that's a genie you can put back in the bottle easily. 

Although Logan literally sees the "light of day" when he leaves the City of Domes -- his first vision of the natural world is an apricot-colored sun rise -- it is not until he encounters The Old Man (Peter Ustinov) that the pieces of a re-born future start to come together. In the end, the message of Logan's Run is that with age comes wisdom, but -- heck! -- "older" leaders were the ones the original youngsters of the City of Domes inherited the messed-up Earth from in the first place.

One thing is for certain: Logan's Run favors humanity over machines. When faced with the reality that Sanctuary is but a fairy tale, Logan and the humans go on to (hopefully) construct a better society, a new "Sanctuary" where death is not mandatory at 30. 

By contrast, the Computer that runs the City of Domes is not able to conceive of such a silly idea -- a fantasy utopia and paradise -- and it goes haywire in response; short-circuited. Once again, we see imagination as a critical human quality; but it is a heritage that Logan's people have largely neglected for hedonism. It takes the odyssey outside by Logan and the return visit to the City by the Old Man to rekindle it. 

Those who watch Logan's Run and deride it as cheesy or outdated may have missed the point. Perhaps they have not gazed deeply enough at the world it so confidently creates. The film -- for all its silliness and outdated special effects -- reveals what might happen to a society that finally turns irrevocably inward; becoming obsessed with youth and beauty at the expense of wisdom. If we let that future become reality, then Washington D.C. and all the beautiful national landmarks there will end up but monuments to irrelevancy; artifacts of an age when liberty and intellect actually meant something. Indeed, they have become in Logan's Run: meaningless, empty ruins from another epoch.

In the final analysis, Logan's Run is a good cautionary science fiction film, one that reminds us to hold Big Brother accountable. And to -- at least every now and then -- peer out of our happy little gilded cages and ask, precisely, what is happening in all our names.

Totalitarian States believe you are either with them (and Carousel) or against them (Runners), but Logan and Jessica find that a rich life exists beyond dogma, sound-bytes, catechism, and jargon. After their visit to the ruins of Washington D.C., they find that, at the very least, life possesses nuances. And that also -- with human experience and age -- should follow...wisdom.

Logan's Run: The Series in The Press

Ranking Logan's Run: The Series Best to Worst

Logan’s Run: The Series (1977-1978) ran for a mere 14-episodes in the mid-seventies, and certainly had its share of stinkers.  Still, some episodes are also quite good, and hold up well. At this point, I've reviewed each of the installments individually, and hopefully, in detail.

Today, I present my rankings, best-to-worst, of the series installments.

Great Episodes:

“Crypt.” This is the absolute best episode of the series. It originates with a story by Harlan Ellison, and sees Logan, Jessica and REM being forced to contend with a difficult choice.  They are asked to save the lives of several scientists and leaders who have been in suspended animation for years. However, there is a mole in the group. One of the individuals is a murderer. 

The episode is so notable for REM’s use of deductive reasoning in the final act, and for Logan’s statement of principle near the episode climax. Specifically, Logan won’t make an “ends justify the means” decision again, because that’s what he saw happen every day at the City of the Domes.  He will never again tether himself to a corrupt ideal. He will not murder because it is convenient, or because it serves a cause.  This is a statement of principle that suggests the character has grown and learned from his experiences.

“Man out of Time.” This episode, by David Gerrold (under the pseudonym Noah Ward) finds Logan, Jessica and REM contending with David Eakins, a scientist from another time who is visiting the future to determine what finally causes the holocaust that destroys civilization. He finds, to his horror, that his work inventing time travel is the cause of the world’s destruction.

The episode is so powerful because audiences finally get a history of the Holocaust (and its reasons), and even some background on the mysterious “Sanctuary Project,” which clearly ties in with Logan and Jessica’s search for “Sanctuary.”  This episode begins to build an historical mythology for the series that is highly-intriguing.

Good Episodes:

“Pilot.” This story does a solid job of adapting the 1976 film to TV restrictions of the age. The pilot re-introduces the audience to Logan, Jessica, Francis and the City of Domes, while simultaneously adding new ideas to the franchise. 

The Council of Elders is a fascinating and welcome addition, specifically. Those who sit on the council are the ultimate hypocrites, allowed to enter old age peacefully, while their people die at thirty, hoping for renewal.  Those on the council promise Francis a seat there if he delivers the runners Logan and Jessica to Carousel.  The pilot episode also introduces the solar car, and REM, who is quite possibly the best character on the series.  

Production values are strong, and more than that, the series shows real promise. There’s a great ironic scene here in which a freezing Logan and Jessica throw piles of American dollars on the fire, unaware of its value.  The point is made through imagery. War destroys everything. If the world is destroyed, currency and monetary wealth no longer carry value.

“Carousel.” Although burdened by an awkward set-up in which an advanced pacifist society erases Logan’s memory with an amnesia dart, the rest of the episode is quite strong, re-introducing the City of Domes setting to good effect.  

The episode looks hard at Logan and his development as an empathetic person. He learned to question his job, his life, and his society when he first ran. If he were to be robbed of his memory of those selections, would he learn again to question, or would he stagnate, falling back into the role of Sandman?  

We learn, in this case, that questioning authority, and his culture, is part of Logan’s gestalt. He chooses to grow, a second time.

“The Judas Goat.”  Another strong episode that revels in series mythology and history.  The series reintroduces the New You plastic surgery laser seen in the film, and then introduces to the series to the first Runner.  

We learn that the first runner began his escape only years earlier, thus revealing that “running” is a recent phenomenon in the City of Domes (the hints of a broader change taking place, as people question the order of things).  The episode also introduces the idea of Logan and Jessica returning to their home to make meaningful change there.  This is a powerful idea.  Instead of "running," Logan needs to confront his past.

“Futurepast.” This episode -- which on the surface is an android romance between REM and Ariana (Mariette Hartley) -- is actually the most visually stylish of all Logan’s Run entries.  

At a futuristic sleep clinic, Jessica and Logan fall into unending slumber and encounter nightmares that reveal their inner selves. Logan’s dreams are mostly stock footage clips from earlier episodes, but Jessica’s dreams involve the mother she never knew, and a Boogeyman representing Death.  The imagery is carefully and symbolically vetted, making the episode a visual treat.  This episode really looks great, even in 2017.

Mediocre Episodes:

“The Innocent.” This story is sort of like Star Trek’s “Charlie X” meets Stephen King’s Carrie. 

An adolescent girl living only with robots, in a hidden bunker, encounters Logan, and falls in love.  Because of her inexperience and jealousy, however, she becomes a danger to the runners.  

The story ends on a dopey note, with Logan encouraging the adolescent girl to go out and see the post-apocalyptic world, while not actually inviting her to travel with him.  This seems awfully dangerous, given the characters he's encountered! 

The robot designs in "The Innocent" are also some of the worst in TV history.  And yet, the episode boasts some powerful moments, as Jessica is viewed as a “rival” for Logan’s affections.

Bad Episodes:

“Half-a-Life.” Star Trek’s “The Enemy Within” gets purposelessly recycled here, with the Runners encountering a society where people extract their “evil” half using a transporter-like device. Jessica is forced to undergo the process, and Logan and REM must put her back together again.  

So…the post-apocalyptic world possesses transporter technology, converting and duplicating matter?  

That could come in handy in the re-building or feeding of the planet.  Instead, we get a Trek retread.

“The Collectors.”  Two aliens who are collecting specimens from throughout the galaxy to bring back to a zoo on their home world attempt to capture Logan and Jessica for their collection by creating the illusion of Sanctuary for them.  

Although Jessica falls for the delusion hook, line and sinker, Logan questions what he is seeing. 

The parts of the episode that work effectively involve the false Sanctuary setting. The parts that don’t succeed involve the aliens and their captives. Aliens don’t really have a place in Logan’s Run, but here they are, anyway.

"Capture." Logan Run's thoroughly unimpressive and unmemorable stab at The Most Dangerous Game, a long-standing TV trope. 

A hunter and his mate capture Logan and Francis, and the former friends must now work together to survive the hunt. Not offensive so much as it is thoroughly predictable, and unambitious. It's a Most Dangerous Game story that meets a My Enemy/My Ally Story.  We've seen it all before, and we've seen it vetted in a more effective way.

“Fear Factor.” The Runners encounter an insane asylum of the future, and the lead doctor wants to control Jessica’s mind. 

When Logan and REM try to stop him, they are dropped into a torture chamber under the hospital.   

Here we encounter another poorly-conceived culture, with no grounding in reality, or history. Why is a mental hospital operating out in the middle of nowhere, with a full staff? Where does it get its power from? Where do the doctors train for their vocation?  

 “Night Visitors.” The Runners encounter a house occupied by Satan-worshipers, who want to use Jessica’s body as a vessel for a dead woman. 

In this tale, REM -- the android of logic and reason -- concludes that the house is haunted, and is inhabited by ghosts. It's a real low-point for the character's dignity.

Logan and Jessica, meanwhile, don’t bat an eye at the concept of ghosts, despite the fact that they should have no awareness of ghosts at all. There are no dead people in the City of Domes, ater all….everybody renews (one for one).

“Turnabout.” A story that at first attempts to concern religious extremism quickly becomes a mindless run-around, with endless rescues and captures, and even a sword fight.

“Stargate.” Likely the worst episode of the series. This one sees Logan and Jessica single-handedly stopping an alien invasion, while REM timidly acquiesces to disassembly by the extra-terrestrial conquerors.

Logan's Run 40th Anniversary Blogging: "Stargate" (February 6, 1978)

“Stargate” is the final episode of Logan’s Run: The Series (1977-1978), and the installment is a rough and disappointing note to go out on.  It’s another story about aliens on Earth (much like the ill-conceived “The Collectors.”)

At least that story played with a core idea of this franchise: what is Sanctuary? What should it look like?

“Stargate” isn’t grounded in any of the series’ good ideas at all.

Instead, this narrative requires our heroes -- who, let’s remember, are largely inexperienced in the world because of their sheltered City of the Dome upbringing -- to defeat an alien invasion single-handedly. Even REM is pretty useless.

In this story. Logan (Gregory Harrison), Jessica (Heather Menzies) and REM (Donald Moffat) encounter another city in the desert (like “Turnabout’s” Zidor).

This one is run, however, by aliens who wear thermal clothing because they can't stand the cold of Earth's atmosphere. They want to invade the planet, and remake it to their preferences.  They also possess a "stargate" or transporter which can bring aliens to Earth, but it's broken, and they need some of REM's parts to repair it.

The aliens start disassembling REM to use his pieces, but Logan and Jessica seek the help of a human survivor of the city, and attempt to set things right, preventing the alien invasion. This is especially important because they know that they will soon be "replaced" by alien doppelgangers in thermal suits, if they fail.

There are so many disappointing aspects of this story, it is difficult to know where to begin an analysis.  

First, REM seems way off here. He is captured by the alien leader, played by Paul Carr, and then basically submits to disassembly.  He never loses the pleasant, faintly insipid smile from his face, as he is slowly taken apart.  This seems weird, and wrong.  Even an android should have some form of survival instinct.  REM should be protective of his pieces, but he just willingly lets the aliens take his arm, and other bits. No matter what they take, however, he continues to function, so he can speak and relate to the other characters.

Remember how the android Bishop felt, half-destroyed in Alien³? He would have rather been nothing than live half-a-life. And Data, of course, would not have submitted willingly to his disassembly on Star Trek: The Next Generation. He would have fought it (see: "The Measure of a Man.")

An episode like this makes it much more difficult to respect REM as a sentient being, since he apparently has so little respect for himself or his body.  And, again, his behavior here doesn’t seem to ring true with knowledge from previous episodes. At the very least, REM must continue to exist so he can protect Logan and Jessica. He knows that.

Secondly, one has to wonder -- again -- why the series is offering hackneyed alien invasion stories.  Logan’s Run concerns a future dystopia, post-holocaust, as human survivors begin the process of reaching out to communicate with another. That step of contact/communication might be seen as the first step towards re-building civilization.  There is so much for the series to explore on Earth without involving visitors from other worlds.  It could explore the City of Domes, it could discuss what Sanctuary really means, it could adapt elements of the novel (Box!). It could feature civilizations that didn’t learn the lessons of the holocaust.

Instead, we get evil, invading aliens.  And the aliens in “Stargate” look absolutely ridiculous in their puffy thermal wear, as they try to cause global warming and make Earth’s temperature more to their liking.

And, as I’ve written before, episodes such as "Stargate" proceed from an incorrect assumption about the characters and their nature.  Logan and Jessica are not Starfleet officers. They are not scientists stationed on a moon base. They are not explorers or diplomats in any way, shape or form.  

They are, essentially, innocents experiencing the outside world for the first time. And yet we are to believe that they are capable of launching revolutions, stopping alien invasions, and so on.  It’s ridiculous that they can go into a situation like the one in "Stargate," and, basically, save the world.  

The premise is simply not true to what Logan’s Run is supposed to be about; which is discovery, or self-discovery, in Logan and Jessica’s case.

I will say this for the episode: the scene in “Stargate” in which the doppelgangers of Logan and Jessica melt away, like wax dummies, is effectively creepy.  It’s just too bad the imagery comes in service of a terrible story, one of Logan’s Run’s absolute worst.

Looking back at the series today, it’s clear that the best episodes are those which try to explore the intrinsic concepts of the franchise: war, dystopia, refugees, desperation, etc.  The episodes that try to be like Star Trek (1966-1969), only with flame guns and solar cars, are those that drag the series down towards mediocrity.

So Logan’s Run ends, as so many series once did, with no sense of closure or completion. 

How would I have ended things for our runners?  

Well, I would have ended the series with Logan and Jessica realizing that they can’t find “Sanctuary” on the run; that they have to make it for themselves.  I would have ended the series with them returning to the City of Domes, and launching a strategy to overturn the corrupt State, and make it their long-hoped for “Sanctuary.”

I’ll be presenting my list of Logan’s Run episodes -- best to worst -- tomorrow morning.

Next week at this time, I begin my look back at another 1970’s post-apocalyptic series: Planet of the Apes (1974).

Logan's Run 40th Anniversary Blogging: "Turnabout" (January 30th, 1978)

Here’s some bad news: the best hours of Logan’s Run: The Series (1977-1978) are behind us. Only two episodes remain, “Turnabout” and “Stargate,” and both are very poorly done.  If I had to compare them, I’d say that “Turnabout” is somewhat better than “Stargate,” while still proving largely unsatisfactory.

"Turnabout" is a story by Michael Michaelian and Al Hayes wherein Logan (Gregory Harrison), Jessica (Heather Menzies) and REM (Donald Moffat) stop for water in desert and find an unconscious woman in the sand. She's wearing a burqa to hide her face.

An armed patrol on horseback finds the Runners and escorts them to the city of Zidar, a repressive, theocratic society where books are not permitted.  In fact, knowledge is considered a danger.  Soon, Francis (Randy Powell) and another Sandman show up in pursuit of Logan and his friends, and are captured too.

Both groups are taken before "the Judgment Chair.” There, the city leader, a restrictive, draconian man, proclaims that they should be executed in accordance with the traditions of the city With the help of Mia -- the woman they saved in the desert -- Logan and his pals escape, but are captured by Francis. 

Then, they are all captured again, and Francis is forced into a "duel" before the Judgment Chair. 

At the end of the day, there is regime change in Zidor to a more moderate ruling philosophy, and the Runners continue on their way, seeking Sanctuary.

“Turnabout” features some fascinating, if ultimately poorly explored underpinnings.

The desert city of Zidar is depicted, for instance, through a fantastic and intricate matte painting. What the matte painting reveals is very intriguing: Zidar looks like an Islamic city of the Middle East. Just take a gander at some of the architectural flourishes. Look hard enough you’ll spy the domes, and arabesque touches we associate with the historic architecture from this region of our globe.

That’s important, because clearly this episode is an attempted commentary on the restrictions of Islamic fundamentalism, or radicalism. Women in the theocracy of Zidar are treated as second class citizens, with abrogated rights and freedoms, and they forced to hide their features. Furthermore, books and knowledge outside of tradition are considered frightening, and therefore banned by the government.

Since Logan’s Run: The Series suggests here a post-holocaust version of restrictive, extremist Sharia Law in America, the episode seems more relevant post-9/11 than it did when it was produced in the mid-1970’s.  Still, one wonders how this restrictive, anti-woman society came about post-Holocaust, especially in the America heartland.

What world events were the writers responding to here to attempt this social commentary? I suspect that they probably looked at the demonstrations occurring in Iran in 1978. Although the Iranian Revolution didn’t technically occur until April of 1979, there were protests against the Shah, and general unrest in 1978. Perhaps the writers saw where it was going, and what a theocracy would be like.

The fascinating thing about “Turnabout” is that it suggests -- again drawing a parallel to history -- that Zidar was once a society of glittering advancement and advanced judicial precepts. It was a place of learning, and knowledge and freedom. It was a place that welcomed visitors.  But extremists have taken over, and transformed the state to a restrictive one.

This is all quite fascinating material, especially given our 21^st century context, but “Turnabout” treats the themes inherent in this story with a kind of slapdash inadequacy.  Basically, the allegorical extremist state is but an excuse for a Star Wars-esque sword fight between Francis and a Zidor guard (played by Gerald McRaney).

And, Logan, Jessica and REM are so busy running to and fro that they don’t actually cause the revolution that turns-over the society.  Instead, we are simply told at story’s end that the leader has been deposed in favor of a new, and less radical one.  

So our heroes take no productive part in changing the society for the better, and restoring it to its historical nature as a just, civil, even artistic state.  It just happens while they are there…being captured, escaping, being captured, and escaping again.

So even though “Turnabout” clearly references a real life culture (and shift to extremism in that culture), Zidor is still a "straw man" society, there for the collapsing, in accordance with our 1970's American values.  I must admit, I find this cognitive dissonance laughable. According to Logan’s Run lore, the world destroyed itself, based on the values of the Cold War Era.  Russia and the U.S. fight to the death, and launch global nuclear war, over possession of a fearsome technology: time travel (per "Man out of Time.")

Now, long after, Logan, Jessica and REM are championing those very ideals, against other cultures…even though these ideasl destroyed their world. I’m not saying that our values here are bad, just that in a series that discusses how our culture fell, it is weird that our culture is championed…even though it was at least partially responsible for destroying civilization. 

Another series that I love, Buck Rogers in the 25^th Century (1979-1981), features the same fallacy.  Future heroes pursue the ideals American Exceptionalism, but do so after America has been a key player in the destruction, essentially, of the human race in some form of holocaust.

But the real problem with “Turnabout” isn’t this. It’s the general lack of meaningful plot development. Who's rescuing whom? Who's going back for whom?

These plot machinations are all become increasingly tedious.  o much so that it’s clear that the series is on its last legs.  Running around has supplanted ideas as the central tenet of the series.

Next week: The last Logan’s Run episode: “Stargate.”