Recap: A security guard at the Federal Gold Repository - one of the various made-up agencies that exist in the Six Million Dollar Man/Bionic Woman universe - is taking a coffee break when we see the looming shadow of a tall, furry creature. The creature smashes through the [paper mache] wall of the repository...and then the camera pans back to the guard, who heard the crashing noise and is frantically calling for backup. When he rushes over to the site of the break-in, he's shocked and dismayed to see that whatever superhuman monster smashed its way inside has just made off with a million dollars worth of gold bars. Oscar Goldman and Steve Austin arrive on the scene to investigate the break-in. For the occasion, Steve is donning a groovy '70s shirt unbuttoned halfway down his chest, and he's also sporting a grisly pornstache. As he examines the hole in the wall, he wryly tells Oscar if he didn't know any better, he'd think a bionic man had burst through it. He goes outside to search for clues and bionically spots a giant footprint in the dirt. This sighting triggers a flashback to a previous Six Million Dollar Man episode, when someone gabbled at him about "the legend of Sasquatch, otherwise known as Bigfoot" ... and as the camera zooms in for a closeup, Steve does his best to contort his default blank expression into one of concerned puzzlement. Over at OSI headquarters, Steve and Jaime are undergoing what Rudy jokes is their 10,000 mile checkup. Heh. Rudy informs Steve that his synapse circuitry is a bit slow - no surprise there - and Steve's like, "Wuh? Really?" and strips off his workout jacket so that viewers can ogle his ample mat of grizzled chest hair. Jaime pulls Steve aside and tells him he's acting strange and distant and asks if she did something to upset him. He assures her she hasn't - but concedes that he's been having troubled thoughts lately, then tells her he'd like to show her something. The something ends up being a preserved imprint of a giant footprint that was discovered in the California mountains last year - and it looks much like the one Steve just saw outside the gold repository. As Steve, Jaime, Oscar, and Rudy stare in awe at the giant footprint, Steve's brain starts to trigger a flashback - but then quickly fizzles out. He tells Jaime about his memory recall problem and calls it frustrating, and she reminds him about when her brain nearly broke every time she pushed herself to remember them being a couple during the crossover episodes, then jokes, "I'm the one who wrote the book on partial memory, remember?" She suggests they go for a walk - and Rudy interjects and asks if they wouldn't mind doing one of their slo-mo, side-by-side bionic jogs through the countryside (preferably while Sweet Jaime plays in the background) so he can monitor their heart rates. After the two head out together, Rudy and Oscar stare down at the giant footprint, then exchange solemn glances.
Steve strips down to a pair of tight black shorts and pulls up his white socks so they're almost to his knees...and then he and Jaime bionically jog and leap about through a scenic wooded area. (Sadly, in this segment we don't get to hear Lee Majors croon Sweet Jaime.) A few feet away, we see a petite blonde woman wearing a pink onesie - it's perky Sandy Duncan! - and she's watching Steve and fiddling with some kind of handheld device. Steve senses that something is amiss and stops running, stares confusedly into space, and tells Jaime that he just had a faint recollection of bionically jogging with another woman. Jaime's all, "Wha-a-a? You steppin' out on me with another cyborg?" then activates her bionic ear in time to hear rustling noises up ahead. Steve activates his bionic eye and spots Sandy Duncan - but a few seconds later she clicks on her little device and vanishes. At home that evening, Steve is staring at the preserved footprint when Sandy Duncan suddenly materializes in front of him. She tells him she needs his help in order to save her people...her people being a colony of deep space exploring aliens who have taken temporary residence on earth, have the ability to disappear and reappear wherever and whenever they choose, and wear solid colored onesies. She holds her little device up to Steve's head and uploads the memory of The Six Million Dollar Man two-part episode entitled The Secret of Bigfoot that they had previously erased from his brain. When the upload is complete, Steve is able to fully recall that he encountered Sasquatch in the California mountains (back when André the Giant played him), and that the creature's brute strength closely matched his bionic abilities. Sasquatch brought Steve to the aliens' complex to meet his leader and, for some gratuitous reason, get his naked bionic limbs probed by Shalon - who's played by Stefanie Powers in a horrific auburn wig. Shalon appears to have become so smitten with Steve that she planted a smooch on his lips while he lay unconscious on the examination table. Sandy Duncan tells Steve that Shalon sent her to make contact with him 'cause they need his help to stop the nefarious rebel faction that broke away from their colony, stole a large supply of their wonder drug Neotraxin (a cure for radiation poisoning), and absconded with their giant Sasquatch pet. Before their departure, they forced Bigfoot to destroy the complex's power converter, which resulted in many aliens (Shalon included) suffering exposure to radiation poisoning...and not enough Neotraxin to treat them all. Sounds like this faction is unnecessarily dickish and cruel. Steve quietly mulls over the aliens' dilemma, then promises Sandy Duncan he'll do whatever he can to help.
The rebel faction has taken residence in some kind of warehouse, and they're packing up all the gold they forced Bigfoot to steal at the beginning of the episode...and we get our first really good look at Ted Cassidy (Lurch on The Addams Family), who's encased in a furry brown onesie, a helmet of fluffy curls atop his head, brown paint smeared across his face, and piercing blue eyes that glare maniacally into space. The purple onesie wearing ring leader, Nedlick, tells his cohorts that with the help of Bigfoot, their new base on Planet Earth will be established...and that once they gather all the various ingredients that are needed to create a magnetic force-field around it, they'll be free to plunder and pillage the Earth of whatever they please. Egads! Bigfoot is dispatched to a jewelry store to steal as many emeralds as his paws can carry, and Nedlick is monitoring him through a control device that looks to have some FaceTime type capabilities. When a security guard enters the store and makes a half-hearted effort to stop the seven foot ape, Nedlick uses his device to zap Bigfoot with an electrical shock, barks, "Attack!" and threatens to hurt Shalon if he fails to obey. Bigfoot lets out a tortured growl, then picks up the guard and tosses him across the room...and a satisfied Nedlick orders him to return to their warehouse base, pronto. As Steve and Oscar investigate the jewelry store break-in, Steve stares at the crushed vault door and mumbles, "That's strange", stares mutely into space for a few seconds, then wanders off. LOL. Oscar stares after him, his eyes narrowed suspiciously. Steve tells Sandy Duncan how weird it is that the jewelry thief stole emeralds, but left all the diamonds behind. A perplexed Sandy Duncan decides it might be time for the two of them to FaceTime with Shalon to see if she can shed any light on the situation. Shalon flirtily greets Steve, then explains that the alien rebels require, among other elements, gold and emeralds in order to construct a phase lock magnetic field around their new base to make it immune to attack. She implores Steve to help them prevent the rebels from acquiring any boron isotopes or titanium alloy, and Steve tells her he's on it, and that he has a pretty good idea which research facilities they'd most likely target. Nedlick and his pink onesie wearing sidekick, Dallet, are monitoring Bigfoot as he lumbers toward a research facility. Steve and Sandy Duncan materialize onto the property moments later, and Steve bionically pursues Bigfoot into the building. He finds him milling around near the entrance of the Isotope Storage Room (as it's conveniently labelled) - and Bigfoot whirls around and stares at Steve in puzzlement, no doubt remembering that the last time they saw each other, they were hanging out all friendly-like at the alien colony's California mountain complex. Nedlick gets irked at Bigfoot's inertness and barks, "Sasquatch! Attack!" and the big ape glares at Steve and growls menacingly. When Nedlick threatens again to hurt Shalon, Bigfoot goes into attack mode, tosses Steve in the air, and dashes into the Isotope Storage Room. After Steve re-combobulates himself, he attempts to trap Bigfoot inside by locking the door - but after Bigfoot scoops up as many boron isotopes as he can find, he easily crashes through the locked door and fends Steve off by throwing a large steel drum at him. When a security guard arrives on the scene, Bigfoot also throws a steel drum in his direction and then races off. Steve crawls over to the injured guard to tend to him - just as a group of other guards burst in. They assume that Steve is the isotope thief and yell, "Hit the deck!" while Sandy Duncan, who's waiting for Steve outside, gets herself abducted by Nedlick (I guess before she had a chance to use her control device to vanish) and is forcibly brought to the rebels' warehouse.
Jaime arrives at OSI headquarters to hang with Steve, but is told by security that he's knee deep in shit and isn't allowed to have visitors. Jaime's like, "Er, OK" then loiters outside Rudy's office and activates her bionic hearing so she can eavesdrop on Oscar as he rails to Steve about getting caught red-handed at the scene of a crime, and that he's accused of assaulting a guard with a steel drum, which only a bionic man would have the superhuman strength to pick up and throw. Steve decides to blow the lid off the whole alien/Sasquatch storyline and spills the beans to Oscar and Rudy about the colony of aliens hiding out in the California mountains, their ape-like pet, and the nefarious rebel faction that broke away from the main group after they poisoned many of them with radiation and stole most of their Neotraxin wonder drug. Oscar shoots him a disbelieving stink-eye and tells him that the National Security Bureau has ordered him to power down his bionics and keep him under house arrest. Steve stares back at him in incredulity and cries, "You have to trust me!" ... then abruptly decides, "Ah, fuck that noise" and sprints across the room, leaps off of the balcony, and bionically flees the grounds. Over in the warehouse, Dallet cackles to Nedlick about how Steve's superiors are blaming him for the various break-ins they've commanded Bigfoot to commit - but that he escaped OSI headquarters and somehow managed to fly off in a helicopter. Which we can safely guess is on its way to thwart the rebels' next research facility break-in. Nedlick brings Bigfoot to research facility #2 and orders him to look around for some titanium alloy...and also attack and kill Steve if he happens to show up. Bigfoot obediently lumbers in the direction of the facility and bionically leaps over the fence - just as Steve flies in on his helicopter. Inside the facility, the two square off again....and Bigfoot glares demonically at Steve after Nedlick gives him another electrical zap and threatens again to hurt Shalon if he doesn't follow orders. Bigfoot and Steve throw heavy canisters at each other and wrestle around...until Steve gets knocked out cold. He lays unconscious on the floor while Bigfoot rips out a power converter that starts leaking radiation. As that's happening, some kind of motorized steel thing lowers itself over Steve and crushes his bionic legs. As Bigfoot stares sadly at his former friend's broken cyborg body, Nedlick says, "Well done" and declares that they now have everything they need to create a magnetic force field around their new Earth base. At the hospital, Oscar tells Jaime that Steve is in rough shape - and that even before he got his lower extremities crushed, he'd become so squirrelly that he was running all over town robbing jewelry stores and research facilities. Jaime refuses to believe that of Steve and implores Oscar to start looking into the colony of aliens Steve told him about earlier...and when Oscar stares at her in astonishment, she explains that she was bionically eavesdropping at the door when Steve told him the implausible tale. Rudy wanders over to announce that Steve is pretty much a goner 'cause of all the radiation he was exposed to. In fact, he's so far gone he doubts Steve can survive another day. Jaime's like, "Ooooh nooo!" and asks to be brought to his bedside.
Jaime hovers over Steve, muttering, "Oh Steve..." and when he stirs and softly whispers, "Jaime..", she activates her bionic hearing and listens carefully so she can catch what he's trying to say. He moans, "Many will die...unless...find Shalon...she help...maybe stop them." As Jaime scrunches her face in confusion, he adds, "Jaime...Jaime...beware the Sasquatch. Much stronger than we are. Hurry Jaime...not much time." As he loses consciousness, Jaime cries, "Steeeeeve!" then stares worriedly into space as she mulls over his nonsensical instructions and wonders what the hell to do next. Thanks for reading! If you are enjoying TVofYore's recaps, consider thanking me by buying me a "coffee"!
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