Main cast: Jason Gedrick (Tommy), Anny Romand (Juliette), and Page Fletcher (The Hitchhiker)
Director: George Mihalka

Wow, Jason Gedrick was pretty cute when he was younger. Yes, this is one of his earliest TV roles, and since then, age, gravity, and happy living has taken a heavy toll on his looks. His nipples and stomach are exposed for quite a bit in this episode, so I suppose Phantom Zone is worth watching for that if one is desperate enough. Not that there are many other reasons to bother with it.

Furthermore, let’s also be honest: there are far more attractive and capable leading men on the small screen. Imagine wanting to sit through this thing for Jason Gedrick, of all people. How embarrassing!

Mr Gedrick is Tommy, the latest American in Paris that is about to be taken out of the scene in a big way. Tommy is about to graduate and, even better, marry Stephanie, the daughter of the a family that can be considered the closest thing France has these days to the aristocracy.

However, to celebrate the last day of his exams, he and his friend for some reason decide that it will be cute to lure a homeless woman, Juliette, into thinking that they adore her and take her back to their place for some charming sexual assault.

Fortunately, Juliette manages to get away, and when her beau finds out, he decides to get back at those two. This will lead to a chain of events that will completely derail poor Tommy’s dream of being a rich toff in Paris.

This episode is bizarre. For one, why is it called Phantom Zone? There is nothing phantom-y or zone-y here. Secondly, why would anyone want to pick up a homeless woman, unless they have a fetish for people with bad hygiene? Juliette is scourging in trash bins when they encounter her, so it’s not like she’s a glamorous kind of homeless belle. Can’t these guys pick up a lady at a bar or something?

Then, there is the denouement. Why can’t Tommy just go back to America? Why does he have to do what he does?

This episode feels incomplete, as if many, many key scenes had been cut out just to make it fit the run time. That or perhaps the story and the script are terrible in the first place, and the folks behind this show must be really out of decent scripts if they had to waste time and money on this thing.

Don’t bother with this, unless you have a thing for a young Jason Gedrick and there is really nothing else that can dissuade you from this sorry course of action.