[Sticks]

Notes on Episode 7

Hover Cars
This is an idea borrowed from various Sci-Fi films and comics, but principally the one movie that came to mind was Blade Runner, directed by Ridley Scott. The research into such vehicles is still ongoing, but unlikely to give us anything remotely like those envisaged.

Reds under the beds and McCarthy
During the 1950’s there was a lot of paranoia during the cold war in the United States that a fifth column of communist agents and sympathisers would mount a coup against the US. This was the paranoia of Red’s under the beds. One person to latch onto this was Senator Joe McCarthy, who ran the House Un-American Activities Commission, which decided to investigate alleged influences in Hollywood by communists. He personally destroyed the careers of many innocent people, before he was removed. Not a single shred of evidence of communist infiltration was ever found.

The stash of white slavery catalogs
In this chapter / episode, the Lone Stranger comes across what appears to be pornographic magazines, which turns out to be catalogues for the whit slave trade. This was added in the 1993 rewrite. In the original 1988 version, they were just comics.

Swiss Army Penknife from China
Yes I do have one, but I no longer carry it with me, as it was damaged by a neighbour, so I ended up with a real one, which is what I carry today. This scene was also a nod towards that old 1980’s TV show, MacGyver. (Look it up)

Mein Kampf
A book that the Lone Stranger stumbles across, is the book that Adolf Hitler published first in 1925. Need I say any more?

Exploding cars
I am just as guilty here, but out of interest, the TV show Mythbusters got a car, filled the petrol tank and shot it several times in the petrol tank. There was no explosion. This being hydrogen, I do not know if that would be the effect, I suspect not, but hey, this is poetic licence. However, it could be argued that they were using tracer rounds, there may be a case there.

Incidentally in the 1988 version I had wanted the Lone Stranger to drive the car into the sea as a cliff hanger, but this was how the story decided to play out. Odd that, I had thought I was writing the story, but it took on a life of it’s own.