The Andromeda Breakthrough

After the destruction of the alien-designed computer at the Thorness Military Base, Fleming (Peter Halliday), Dawney (Mary Morris), and Andromeda (Susan Hampshire) find themselves to the newly independent country of Azaran, where a duplicate computer had been secretly built by the international conglomerate 'Intel'. They are promptly caught up in a coup engineered by Intel director Gamboule (a Euro-sexy Claude Farell) only to discover that the world is facing an existential threat triggered by original computer (but propagated due to Dawney's carelessness) that only the new computer can stop and only Andromeda can understand the reason for. Although a bit long at 6 x 45-min. Episodes and suffering a bit from a relatively low-budget, this is an entertaining example of the cerebral science fiction that was made for the BBC in the wake of the popular Quatermass series. Unfortunately, only fragments survive of its predecessor ('A for Andromeda'), which starred newcomer, soon to be star, Julie Christie as the titular character. Replacement Hampshire is fine as the slowly 'humanising' gynoid as is the rest of the cast (especially Mary Morris) and the plot, which involves humanity learning how to exploit a vast trove of alien knowledge while remaining independent of is all about science, power, hubris and responsibility. Well worth hunting down (try YouTube), especially for fans of the kind of thoughtful science-fiction the BBC was known for in the early years of TV (but first watching what is available of the original Andromeda series is recommended).