The Omega Factor

I saw the series just once, but I longed for each episode to come round. I have the book (which is good) but OHHHHH I would like to see the series again.

Expect atmosphere. Expect uncanny. Expect thrills. If you get the chance, take it. You'll be haunted by the memory! Don't expect fantastic effects, ray guns, funny aliens or obscenities. You don't need those to ice your spine. In fact, good stories, good acting, and good dialogue are far more important, and although it's been a few years now, I seem to remember that the Omega Factor has all those.

Why it isn't on DVD is a mystery worthy of the program itself. It's like Kolchak:Night Stalker and Australia's own "The Evil Touch". An absolute gem, but as with all gems, hard to find.

Channel 2 (in Australia) showed this series, so perhaps if you live in God's own country you might like to pester the ABC into a reshow.

I've only just recently been able to prize the tremulous fingers away from my fear blanched boat-race after watching show runner George Gallaccio's anxiety-inducing, pioneering small screen spook show 'The Omega Factor' again, which actively remains some propah old school creepy telly, mayte! This has the kind of insidious 'creeps-under-the-skin', 70s freak-beard weirdness you just don't see manifested today! And our handsome proletariat hero Tom Crane (James Hazledean) still remains one of my favourite truth-seeking TV psychic protagonists! And the delectably lithe, foofy-haired Crane is ably assisted in his increasingly dark conspiratorial travails by the deliciously dynamic, no less aesthetically appealing scientist Annie Reynolds (Louise Jameson), whose radiant beauty is readily matched by her inquisitive, equally luminous mind!

The Omega Factor's starkly beauteous, majestically moody Edinburgh setting adds a grim, palpably ominous veneer of inclement atmospheric despair, with its dizzyingly eclectic, mind-warpingly wicked terror tales of morbid body snatching, malign government conspiracies, demoniacal displays of terrifying telekinesis, macabre black magic rituals, weird flights of astral projection, deadly duplicity, Machiavellian brainwashing, and old fashioned, black-handed murder! The persistently paranoid, oppressively sinister series that dared to venture far beyond the nebulous veil of reality and eerily expose mad, disturbingly alien, nightmarishly vivid vistas to terminally quake the stoutest heart, unhinge the most resolute of minds, 'The Omega Factor' may even have those fearless, fright-loving boys and girls of all ages anxiously peeking into the dusty voids under the bed before lights out! Don't say I didn't warn you!!!!!!!!!

I don't recall this from when it was on, but having read reviews it seemed to be my kind of thing, so bought the dvd set. Well, with the exception of the 'Powers of Darkness' episode, this is seriously tedious stuff. I have no problem with the acting, cinematography, limited budget, or special effects, but it's just that it is all so dull. I actually fell asleep watching a couple of the episodes. Not recommended.

A man with psychic powers is recruited by a secret department devoted to the rum and uncanny. Good fun and very atmospheric and creepy at times. The first main villain is described as 'The man Crowley refused to meet... just in case.' I wonder if the spooky recurring symbol motif from 'Watchmen' was unconsciously borrowed from the very similar one in the early episodes of this?

In some ways it was ahead of its time and it's a shame a second series wasn't made. Re the other reviewer who suggests Mary Whitehouse put the kybosh on it - this seems unlikely as I found an interview with Louise Jameson online where she says that whenever Whitehouse attacked the show everyone involved was delighted as the ratings would go up.

I too have been waiting 25 yrs for this to be repeated or appear on VHS or DVD, but now it is available as a complete 3 DVD set: http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0009UCET6

Very good review here: http://www.dvdtimes.co.uk/content.php?contentid=58025 which notes:

"When Mrs Whitehouse called the show "thoroughly evil", executives giggled behind their hands, but they also conceded that guidelines had been breached, mistakes had been made, and so forth. They would "forcibly" remind producers about their responsibilities. So they solemnly promised. And while they patronised her - no such reminder was made - they also gave in to her, because when it came to deciding which shows to renew, this one disappeared in the night. I doubt if there was any explicit prohibition, but it was never repeated, never shown on UK Gold, never syndicated abroad, never released on video tape. In the quarter-century since broadcast, these ten 50-minute episodes acquired considerable mystique. Every now and again I would hear about somebody who had a friend who had a copy."