Captain Scarlet And The Mysterons
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Captain Black
Description
Real Name Conrad Turner (Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons)
Conrad Lefkon (New Captain Scarlet)
Date of Birth 17th March, 2029
Hair Black
Eyes Brown
Race Human (formerly)
Mysteron-controlled human (currently) (OCS)
Mysteron likeness (currently) (NCS)
Details
Affiliation Spectrum Organisation (formerly)
The Mysterons (currently)
Role Spectrum Field Agent, Senior Staff Officer, and Colour Code Captain (formerly)
Mysteron Agent (currently)
Allies Colonel White (formerly)
Captain Scarlet (formerly)
Other fellow Spectrum Officers (formerly)
The Spectrum Angels (formerly)
The Mysterons and fellow Mysteron agents (currently)
Status Under the control of the Mysterons, serving as their main agent on Earth.
Voice Actor(s) Jeremy Wilkin (original voice), Donald Gray (Mysteron voice) (Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons)
Nigel Plaskitt (New Captain Scarlet)

Captain Black is the Spectrum Organisation's code name for Conrad Turner, a former colonel in the World Space Patrol and the former Commanding Officer of Fireball XL-3.

He was one of the organisation's top colour-coded senior staff officers who was held in high regard. Unfortunately for Spectrum and the people of Earth, Captain Black made the deadly mistake of ordering an illegal, unprovoked attack on an unidentified complex on Mars owned by an alien force known as the Mysterons, when he mistook their intentions as hostile. After this reckless action, it proved to be much worse than simply a mistake; it was both in violation of orders from his own superiors not to take any hostile action and the crime of actually having started a war.

The Mysterons responded by making him instrumental in their retaliation against Earth as a punishment, which they commenced to pursue with the intent to destroy all life on the planet. Captain Black has now become their primary agent in their "war of nerves."

Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons[]

History[]

Born in Manchester, United Kingdom on 17 March 2029, Conrad was orphaned at the age of seven months during the atomic war starting from 2028 and finishing at 2034, he was then raised by distant relatives.

After graduating from university, he enlisted in the World Space Patrol. When he became an officer in that service, Turner was nearly killed when he saved a British Air Force base from a terrorist bomb.

In time, his military skills grabbed the attention of a selection committee that was organising the Spectrum Organisation, which gave him the code name "Captain Black," and he became one of the first of Spectrum's top field agents.

Captain Black's known history with Spectrum[]

The known history of Captain Black, according to the sources recognised as canon, says that he was a Spectrum senior officer who was highly respected by his colleagues.

He was responsible for the construction of the organisation's headquarters Cloudbase and also in charge of training new recruits, teaching the other Spectrum agents self-defence as well as lecturing Angel pilot trainees in combat flying techniques, making him the former Executive Officer of Cloudbase, second only to Colonel White, and Major Stone's predecessor as the Commanding Officer and the "Superintentent" of Koala Base.

Former World Army Air Force Special Forces Colonel Paul Metcalfe, whose own code name is Captain Scarlet, is described as Captain Black's star pupil from this period.

Captain Black and the Mysterons[]

In his command of the Zero-X Mission to the planet Mars to locate the source of radio signals that had been monitored at Spectrum, Captain Black had been ordered to make peaceful contact with the originators of those signals.

After much fruitless searching in their Martian Exploration Vehicle, they found a mysterious complex belonging to an unknown alien race known as the Mysterons. The Mysterons were peaceful beings who were happy to have visitors, and they were all set to welcome the space travelers. But when the Mysterons trained their surveillance camera on the MEV, an already nervous Captain Black and his team mistook it for a weapon aimed at them.

Panicking and in fear for the lives of his own two men, he acted in violation of orders he had received from his own superiors and ordered the Zero-X crew to open fire on that complex, using the missiles intended to clear boulders from the path of the MEV, and completely destroy it. After this was done, Captain Black wanted to survey the wreckage, collect some samples of the debris and return to Earth.

However, he was shocked, amazed, and horrified to see the Mysterons employing their knowledge of "reversing matter" to reconstruct the complex with less effort than had originally been needed to destroy it.

While the Mysterons were doing this, they declared a "war of nerves" with this threat:

"Earthmen...we are peaceful beings. And you have tried to destroy us. But you cannot succeed. You and your people will pay for this act of aggression. This is the voice of the Mysterons. We know that you can hear us, Earthmen. Our retaliation will be slow, but nonetheless effective. It will mean the ultimate destruction of life on Earth. It will be useless for you to resist, for we have discovered the secret of reversing matter, as you have just witnessed."

So that they might engage in this retaliation effort, the Mysterons took control of Captain Black as a punishment (whether telepathically or by reversing the matter of his body was not clarified, but fanon presumes the process to be telepathic) and sent him back to Earth. (The exact fate of the other two members of the Zero-X Mission crew was not revealed in that, or any other, instalment.) From then forward, he became their primary agent on Earth.

Captain Black's return to Earth was not actually shown. The Spectrum Organisation also did not know what had happened to him at first; Colonel White mentioned in "The Mysterons" that he had simply disappeared. But in "Manhunt", Colonel White showed members of Spectrum some security footage that showed Captain Black accidentally giving himself away when he attempted to break into the Culver Atomic Centre. At this, Captain Blue remarked, "So he is alive." It also confirmed their suspicions that Captain Black had been an agent of the Mysterons ever since his return from the Zero-X Mission on Mars.

Under Mysteron Control[]

Since he has become a Mysteron agent, Captain Black's face has undergone a dramatic change, becoming more pallid in complexion and marked by heavy razor stubble that emphasises his now-sunken cheeks, and his voice has become deeper; the Mysterons normally employ him for carrying out most of their threats.

In "Winged Assassin" he disables all the electronic equipment on Delta Tango One Niner, which results in the deaths of the entire crew and all the passengers. A likeness of the airliner is then employed for the Mysteron threat to kill the Director General of the United Asian Republic.

With all his human emotion and pity apparently gone, he has also been teleported away from danger, as shown in the instalments "The Heart of New York", "Model Spy" and "Inferno" as well as teleport items to a different place as seen in the installment "Expo 2068". Whether these abilities are his own or strictly of Mysteron origin is unknown, but it is most likely strictly of Mysteron origin, for he does not always use it when facing danger.

In the same way Captain Scarlet has a sixth sense whenever a Mysteron agent is near, Captain Black has a sixth sense that warns him of danger when Spectrum is closing in on him, therefore making him a difficult adversary for the organisation to capture.

Though his human emotions are, at least, suppressed, and though, for the most part, he obeys the Mysterons for the purposes of fighting their war of nerves, there have been rare occasions when he does not obey the Mysterons, and his human emotion stops him from killing, as shown in "Manhunt", this means that he still does have emotion and pity deep inside of him. "The Mysterons also have compassion," he explains to Symphony Angel.

Though Captain Black's past history prior to his becoming a Mysteron agent is rarely shown, there are, on some occasions, such exceptions to this as can be found in "Dangerous Rendezvous", when Colonel White was able to contact the Mysterons by radio. He was then able to tell them something of Captain Black's history; he did not add that Captain Black had received criminal charges of war-monging formally preferred against him and was now under a criminal-arrest warrant. Unfortunately, the Mysterons neither believed Colonel White when he communicated with them nor relented in their vindictiveness or their war of nerves against Earth.

Captain Scarlet and the Return of the Mysterons[]

In a one-off CGI test pattern of a sequel to Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, titled Captain Scarlet and the Return of the Mysterons, the Mysterons revive a deceased Captain Black from his grave, in the middle of a storm, shortly after announcing their resumption of their war of nerves against Earth. He is shown punching the covering of his grave (whilst lightning brings down a branch from a tree), and then climbs up and breaks the fourth wall for a second.

In the next scene, Captain Black arrives back on Cloudbase and arrives on the top deck, where Captain Scarlet and Captain Blue are, prior to a meeting of all Spectrum's top agents. In his normal human voice, he tells them to relax and announces that he is finally free of Mysteron control and back on the force. He also says that he has security clearance and asks Captain Scarlet to check if they do not believe him.

Captain Scarlet radios Spectrum Security to see whether this is true. Security says that Captain Black is indeed cleared. Very happy to see his former comrade, Captain Scarlet has to leave when his epaulettes flash red. Once Captain Scarlet has left, however, Captain Black quickly reverts to his Mysteron-controlled form and punches Captain Blue twice, knocking him to the floor unconscious. He then projects twin green Mysteron rings from his eyes, which burrow into Captain Blue's eyes, mind-controlling and hypnotising him to follow Captain Black's every word.

Captain Black later steals a Spectrum Saloon Car, which he fills with explosives. With Captain Blue driving it and him, he proceeds to drive to the Grantsburg Nuclear Power Plant on a kamikaze mission to destroy it and, in the process, kill Captain Blue and all other Spectrum agents present whilst he himself escapes from it. Captain Scarlet follows in a Spectrum Pursuit Vehicle, but Captain Black throws an explosive canister out the back of his car, destroying the bridge he has just crossed. Firing the SPV's rocket thrusters, Captain Scarlet flies over the wreckage of the bridge, using the SPV as a cross-road roadblock. He ejects and proceeds to fire at the car; it is driven off the road, causing Captain Blue to eject quickly. The car, with both Captain Black and its explosive cargo still inside it, falls over the edge of a cliff, exploding at the foot. Captain Blue then thanks Captain Scarlet--addressing his field partner by his personal name of Paul, which Spectrum discourages from its colour-coded agents when they are on duty--for saving his life as he is now back to normal.

Captain Black, however, also survives this incident, as he is shown scowling (apparently at the home viewer) whilst the smoke clears. It is implied that, like Captain Scarlet, he too has become virtually indestructible.

Gerry Anderson's New Captain Scarlet[]

Captain black's funeral

Captain Black's coffin, complete with his Spectrum cap and photo of Destiny, as featured in Instrument of Destruction (Part 1).

Captain Black, along with the other characters from the original programme, returns for Gerry Anderson's New Captain Scarlet. But Captain Black has undergone several changes; for one, he still has the personal name of "Conrad," but his family name has been changed to "Lefkon." (He was thus renamed after Space Precinct's associate producer, Roger Lefkon.) In this programme, home viewers are given more information about the character: He was sent to Mars with Captain Scarlet to investigate the "red planet," where he, with Captain Scarlet, came across the Mysteron city. This time, Captain Black has more of a reason to attack the Mysteron city, as the Mysteron scanners were shown to be weapons on their space buggy's computer, and he was also shown to be friends with Captain Scarlet. Before landing on the planet, he had saved Captain Scarlet's life when they had faced danger in their ship. But as before, Captain Black quickly became the Mysteron agent who becomes the main enemy of Spectrum.

As a Mysteron Agent[]

This information is applicable solely to the original super-marionation programme.

The criminal charges against him[]

After he became the only member of the Zero-X Mission crew to return to Earth from Mars, Captain Black's sudden disappearance prompted Colonel White to issue a warrant for his arrest on charges of the crimes of war-monging (because he had ordered the unprovoked attack on the Mysteron complex on Mars which had touched off the war), desertion from the Spectrum Organisation (a charge preferred against him because Spectrum is an armed military force), and gross insubordination (since his unprovoked attack was in violation of orders from his own superiors). But after Captain Black was revealed, in the instalment "Manhunt," to have become a Mysteron agent, the extant criminal-arrest warrant on him was amended to include the then newly-preferred charges of sabotage, no fewer than three distinct counts of first-degree murder, unlawful international flight to avoid prosecution, and high treason against the World Government of Earth.

In comparison to other Mysteron agents[]

Unlike other Mysteron agents, all of whom he has killed, or whose deaths he has taken advantage of, to arrange their take-overs at Mysteron hands, Captain Black himself is still very much alive and well, except that he is under Mysteron control. For this reason, he is the target of a series of criminal-arrest warrants, not a series of death warrants. It is the hope of Spectrum that it can bring him back alive and, hopefully, break him free from the Mysterons' control; this has not proven as easy as it sounds, for the Mysterons have guarded Captain Black jealously since making him their primary agent. Fanon explains all this by maintaining that Captain Black himself is NOT retro-metabolic, and that Captain Scarlet's sixth sense can only perceive him (Captain Black) when he is in direct communication with the Mysterons themselves.

His wardrobe[]

Since becoming the primary agent of the Mysterons, Captain Black rarely wears his Spectrum uniform, except during the opening titles, where he is standing in a graveyard listening to the Mysterons' latest threat and presumably intercepting information from his former organisation using his radio-cap. He usually tends instead to wear civilian clothes, all coloured black, though he still wears his Spectrum uniform boots and carries his Spectrum-Issue Pistol; this reveals that he still goes by his colour-codename, especially when he relays instructions to other Mysteron agents.

Also since becoming a Mysteron captive, Captain Black shaves less frequently than he once did, favouring heavy razor stubble ("five o'clock shadow") which emphasises that his cheeks have become sunken and his complexion more pallid than it previously was; this gives him an intimidating appearance even in civilian clothes.

Gallery[]

The Spectrum Organisation
Spectrum Logos

Original Series
Officers
Captain ScarletCaptain BlueColonel WhiteLieutenant GreenCaptain BlackCaptain BrownCaptain GreyCaptain OchreCaptain MagentaCaptain IndigoDoctor Fawn
The Angels
Destiny AngelSymphony AngelRhapsody AngelMelody AngelHarmony Angel
Component Agencies
Spectrum IntelligenceSpectrum Medical ServiceSpectrum PoliceSpectrum Research Centre
Other Personnel
Spectrum Security GuardsSpectrum TechniciansKoala Base OfficersKoala Base Cadets

New Captain Scarlet
Officers
Captain OrangeCaptain YellowDoctor GoldLieutenant Silver

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