The Cham-Cham

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Previous episode	Broadcast order: #25	Next episode

For a detailed overview of this episode, click here.

Penelope, Parker and Tin-Tin must unravel the mystery behind the destruction of some rocket transporting aircraft.
Original UK broadcast date: March 24th, 1966

Contents
1) Synopsis
2) Notes
3) Errors


Synopsis

A plane crew open their sealed instructions, telling them and only them where they must fly to. Their craft is transporting two new Poseidon rockets. As the plane takes off, Dangerous Game, a tune by the Cass Carnaby Five, happens to be playing. Later on, the crew make an emergency call to their base, stating they're under attack by three unidentified planes. Their plane is soon shot down. Their call is picked up by International Rescue, who know that this is now the third time this has happened. Alan wonders if Dangerous Game somehow has anything to do with it, as a live performance of it happens to be playing every time a plane is attacked. Brains decides to investigate it.

Jeff contacts Penelope and asks her to investigate the Cass Carnaby Five, who are at the Paradise Peaks hotel in Switzerland. To get into the hotel, Penelope disguises herself as Wanda Lamour, a singer. Parker visits an old friend of his called Maxie at International Artistes Management Ltd. He comes to an underhanded arrangement with him to get Wanda into Paradise Peaks. Parker returns home and when he sees Penelope in her disguise, he doesn't even realize it's Penelope. Knowing her disguise should be enough, she and Parker meet up with Tin-Tin and head to Switzerland.

Penelope and Tin-Tin watch the Cass Carnaby Five play, but Tin-Tin doesn't think the band could have anything to do with the plane sabotage. Tin-Tin later speaks to Cass about his music, and asks if he ever gets tired about playing the same tune all the time. Olsen, the band's music arranger, quickly tries to end that conversation by saying he needs to bring up some points with Cass. As he leaves, Cass says that Olsen can be temperamental, as he sometimes drives them crazy by making last minute changes to the music they're going to play live. Tin-Tin and Penelope meet up, and Parker, who managed to get a job at the hotel as a bouncer, joins them. Parker says he overheard Olsen talking to headwaiter Banino about receiving a message tomorrow morning. Penelope and Tin-Tin decide to go to Olsen's home the next morning, and they contact Jeff to let him know what's going on.

The next morning, Tin-Tin and Penelope ski to where Olsen lives, which is round the other side of the mountain. They see Olsen operate a computer, which initially displays a code which doesn't make any sense. But as Olsen works, the code changes to English text, displaying when the next rocket transporter is due to take off and stating that it must be destroyed! Tin-Tin records footage of the computer, then she and Penelope ski back to the hotel. However, they are seen by Olsen, who calls Banino and tells him to deal with them.

Banino attempts to shoot Penelope and Tin-Tin, but is stopped and knocked out by Parker. Penelope reports to jeff about what they've found. Tin-Tin plays back the footage she'd recorded, which shows Olsen working at the computer. Once Brains sees it, he now knows what happened -it's a cham-cham! He explains that a cham-cham is a new electronic machine that is sensitive to ultrasonic harmonics and micro tones. Now that he knows the technique they've been using, he'll soon break their code. Jeff tells him to go back to the lab to work on the code, and tells Penelope that she and Tin-Tin need to standby for his next message. He tells Scott to get him Washington DC, as they've got to save that next transporter aircraft.

But at Matthews Field, the next rocket transporter plane leaves the hangar. The Commander there is informed that International Rescue are trying to contact them and warn them about what's going to happen, but he refuses to believe they're the real International Rescue. The plane takes off. Back at the hotel, Olsen tells Cass about another change he needs to make to tonight's performance, but as he leaves the room, Tin-Tin enters. She asks Cass to play the tune this way, and whilst he wants to know what's going on, she says she can't go into that. Cass is conflicted over doing what Tin-Tin asks or going with what Olsen said, who was the one who gave him this great contact to play at Paradise Peaks.

Later on, the band start playing. Their music sends out a signal which is picked up at a base, where a Commander and his lieutenant eagerly await it. The lieutenant receives a code from the signal, which gives him the exact coordinates for where the rocket transporter plane is flying. But back at the hotel, Cass has gone along with Tin-Tin's change after all -as Penelope goes onto the stage and starts singing! This changes the code, giving out a new set of coordinates which the lieutenant picks up. As the song finishes, Jeff tells Virgil and Alan to head to the hotel in Thunderbird 2, as Penelope and the others could be in real danger.

Having been sent by his father, Scott arrives at the Air Force base. He reveals that they really did try and help, but now the three enemy fighters are being diverted to fly over this place. The Commander calls action stations, wanting the enemy craft destroyed, whilst begrudgingly saying that International Rescue have done it again. Back at the hotel, Penelope's group leave via cable car. But Olsen starts cutting the cables. Cass tries to stop him but is too late, as the last cable snaps.

Thunderbird 2 arrives just in time to see the cable car hurtling down the mountain. Virgil chases after it and tries firing magnetic grabs, but these fail to stay attached to the cable car. So instead, Parker climbs up onto the roof on the cable car, as Virgil has several cables lowered down. Parker uses Penelope's umbrella to catch onto the cables, which he then starts attaching to the cable car itself. Thunderbird 2 fires its retros and the cable car comes to a stop just in time, but Parker is sent flying off -thankfully, he's able to float down safely thanks to the umbrella.

Most of the group return to the hotel. Penelope thinks nobody here knows they're from International Rescue, although Cass is intrigued as to how they knew about the code. Cass asks where Tin-Tin is, and Penelope tells him she thinks Tin-Tin and Alan went outside for some fresh air. Outside, Alan asks Tin-Tin if she's all cut up about going back to the base tomorrow and leaving Cass and the band. Tin-Tin says she's getting quite used to this hello and goodbye all the time, but it's always nice to get home again.

Notes

-Both times the RTL 2 jets are seen leaving the hangar, a Red Arrow jet from Edge of Impact can be seen.

-The footage of the relief jets taking of was originally from Operation Crash-Dive.

-Wanda Lamour is named after Wanda Brown, one of the puppeteers.

-Cass has a picture of the Duchess from The Duchess Assignment backstage. The Duchess also appears in the episode itself, such as in the background of the room the band play in, and is even seen dancing with someone near Penelope and Olsen.

Errors

-The puppet used for Maxie is later seen manning the reception desk at Paradise Peaks.
-When the three enemy fighter jets are seen taking off, look at the back two -the shadow of the stick connecting the two together can be see on the ground.
-For some reason only Cass seems to be the only one bothered about the cable car alarm going off, and is the only person who investigates it -where are the hotel staff?