Spanner S01E01 "The Door to Adventure"

SPANNER S01E01
"The Door to Adventure"

The first episode starts at the Kirby Park Community Center in New York. Carol Bright, a volunteer at the center, is speaking with Owen Dhabi, the center’s director, about a teenage girl called Tuesday who shows up at the center at all hours of the day. Miss Bright is concerned about the girl’s home situation and convinces Mr. Dhabi that they should follow her the next time she leaves the center. Reluctantly, Mr. Dhabi agrees.

Bright and Dhabi follow Tuesday to a condemned tenement. She enters the building through a bright blue door. Convinced that Tuesday must be a homeless runaway, Miss Bright and Mister Dhabi follow her into the building.

However, when they step through the blue door they do not find themselves in a condemned tenement, but a peculiar chamber filled with equipment like something out of a Jules Verne novel. Tuesday confronts Bright and Dhabi and their exchange attracts the attention of an elderly gentleman that Tuesday identifies as Mister Spanner. Mister Spanner claims to be Tuesday’s guardian and expresses his appreciation and admiration of Carol and Owen for wanting to ensure Tuesday’s safety.

Still concerned about Tuesday’s well-being, Carol and Owen ask Mr. Spanner who he is and what he does. He dances around the issue for a while until Miss Bright threatens to contact Social Services.

Somewhat reluctantly, Mister Spanner explains that, although he is Tuesday’s guardian, he is also an extraterrestrial. The room they are in his part of his spacecraft, which he refers to as ‘the Vessel.’

Owen and Carol express their skepticism re Spanner’s claims, prompting him to give them a demonstration of the Vessel’s capabilities. He transports them to a distant planet, locked in a deep Ice Age. Stunned, Carol and Owen have no choice but to accept the truth that Spanner is an extraterrestrial.

While they pepper him with questions, Tuesday leaves the Vessel and is captured by one of the planet’s natives, a yeti-like being. Spanner senses Tuesday’s fear and apprehension and leads the others out of the Vessel in pursuit. The three of them are quickly captured by the rest of the yeti’s tribe.

Reunited with Tuesday, held prisoner in a cavern, the foursome plan their escape from the yetis. Owen creates a fire, something the primitive yetis have never seen. The yetis are awed and terrified by the flame, giving Spanner and the others the opportunity to escape to the Vessel.

Safely aboard the Vessel, Carol states that she still has concerns for Tuesday’s well-being, even more so than before in light of recent events. Tuesday protests, revealing that she isn’t actually human so Carol’s concerns for her are unwarranted and unwanted. Owen admits that he is uncertain regarding the proper course of action. Spanner suggests that they all take some time to recover from their adventure and then discuss the matter like civilized beings.

While the four are talking, the Vessel’s doorway vanishes from the ice planet. However, instead of reappearing on Earth, it fades into view on the wall of a building, somewhere in an alien city.