User Reviews

The Mission: Impossible team members mobilize to free crusading priest Thomas Vallis (Ivar Kants) from imprisonment in a mountain top citadel in an oppressive Baltic state. Vallis knows the location of a sacred artifact within which a microchip containing proof of the crimes of the regime is hidden.

As usual team members adopt false identities to run a sting operation on the baddies. Shannon Reed (Jane Badler) portrays a circus performer, Jim Phelps (Peter Graves) pretends to be owner/operator of a traveling sideshow and Nicholas Black (Thaao Penghlis) pretends to be a Vatican antiques expert.

Meanwhile Grant Collier (Phil Morris) and Max Harte (Anthony Hamilton) pose as a cleaning crew and climb the mountain to attempt to infiltrate the citadel finding and evading multiple booby-traps.

TV shows didn't have the budget or the stars or special effects or even the luxury of long pre-production schedules that feature films have had. So they relied on writing, performances, production tricks and imagination. When it comes to this show a lot of what the viewer is seeing was pioneered on the original Mission: Impossible (1966-1973).

But what is shown here doesn't make a lot of sense. For instance as it unfolds there doesn't appear to be any good reason why Nick has to infiltrate the citadel in a very elaborate way to get the priest out if Grant and Max are also infiltrating the citadel in a completely different way.

The absurdity of the nonsensical circus scene conclusion is nearly beyond description. Much of what leads up to appears to be staged both to give each character something to do and to provide footage for an enticing but misleading trailer to lure in viewers.

It would appear the use of flashy guest stars was sacrificed in order to properly stage this episode with its more elaborate set. In place of well-known American stars they made do quite nicely with talented Australian actors.

Seldom were any of actors from down under appearing on this show anything other than top flight. But they did not serve to diminish the Australianess of a show that was supposed to be American. Ivar Kants was also an Aussie actor they had used as a completely different character in an episode ("Legacy") from the previous season.

By this point in the series it is apparent that the ratings remained a tad limp which is why there are gratuitous shots of Jane Badler's décolletage. Even the shot from the opening titles montage of her dripping wet scaling a boat ladder in a zip-up swimsuit zipped down was moved up in sequence so it is the second shot people see in that montage.