"Phobos Rising" is an episode of The Outer Limits television show. It was first broadcast on December 4, 1998 during the fourth season.
Contents
- 1 Opening narration
- 2 Synopsis
- 3 Closing narration
Opening narration
“How far will mankind have to go before we realize that the only antidote to self-annihilation... is trust.”
Synopsis
Two separate political entities of both Earth and Mars, the Free Alliance and the Coalition, have been in a state of cold war for 30 years. Both are currently mining triradium, a radioactive material that could conceivably be used for weapons that could destroy an entire planet. Amidst fear on both sides, a giant explosion is seen to destroy Earth and sends shockwaves towards Mars, where a Coalition and an Alliance base are currently situated.
Colonel Samantha Elliot (Barbara Eve Harris) believes that the Coalition has been smuggling triradium and is responsible for the destruction of Earth. Major James Bowen (Adam Baldwin) does not believe that they should jump to conclusions, though his credibility is compromised by the fact that there has been an increasingly romantic relationship between him and Major Dara Talif (Joan Chen), the Coalition liaison officer at the base. As the Alliance prepares a strike, James fears that it will only result in a Coalition counterstrike and the destruction of all humanity.
As the story progresses at a faster pace, bad decisions are made due to mistrust and lack of vital information. Things come to a head when the Coalition seemingly launches an attack on the Free Alliance, which is responded to with force, only for it to be revealed too late that the attack drone was in fact a refugee ship containing the survivors of the Coalition base which was destroyed in the initial shockwave. The ship responds by firing before its destruction, which leads to the eradication of the Alliance base, leaving only Bowen and Talif. As they explore the ruins searching for survivors, a transmission comes in from Earth - the explosion the Mars bases detected were not from a disaster on Earth, but on the Moon, where a Free Alliance base had an accident with an experimental anti-matter weapon, completely destroying the moon, and causing devastation on Earth, but not complete destruction. The Coalition and Alliance have agreed to a permanent cease-fire as a response.
Closing narration
“If mankind is to survive we must learn to trust one another... and that trust begins in the human heart.”