Witch Mountain is located in northern California. It has long had stories associated with it about strange inhabitants and phenomena. It has featured in three movies:
Escape to Witch Mountain (1975)
Orphan twins Tony and Tia Malone have strange powers. Tony can move things with the power of his mind and Tia can read minds and see the future to a limited extent. They are trying to find out where they came from, and are being chased by millionaire Aristotle Bolt and his right-hand man Deranian, who are trying to capture them to use their powers for his own ends.
The children meet a widower named Jason O'Day who is traveling the country in his RV and enlist his help in getting them to Witch Mountain, where they believe they can find their Uncle Bene. O'Day is reluctant to help them, but ultimately cannot refuse to help children in need.
It is revealed that Tia and Tony are aliens whose ship crashed at sea and they were lost. [1] Their people established a colony at Witch Mountain. Bolt and Deranian are foiled in their attempts to capture the children, and Tia and Tony rejoin their people.
Return From Witch Mountain (1978)
Tia and Tony visit Los Angeles after spending the last three years at Witch Mountain learning to use their powers. They get separated and Tony is kidnapped by the evil Letha Wedge and the mad scientist Dr. Gannon, who see Tony using his powers. Letha Wedge has been funding Gannon's efforts to build a mind control device. Not only does the device work, but it works on Tony.
Letha wants to use Tony to make money, since she has spent her fortune funding Dr. Gannon, but Gannon sees Tony as his opportunity to take over the world. It's up to Tia, along with a gang of truant kids (the Earthquake Gang) she befriends, and the hapless truant officer Mr. Yokomoto to save Tony and stop Dr. Gannon.
Race to Witch Mountain (2009)
Ex-con Jack Bruno is a taxi driver in Las Vegas during a UFO convention, which he believes is full of lunatics, even if one of the lunatics, Dr. Alex Friedman, also happens to be gorgeous. He finds two teenagers, Seth and Sara, in his cab and they offer to pay him an exorbitant amount to deliver them to a certain destination. Against his better judgment, he accepts the fare.
Jack discovers that Seth and Sara are aliens, and that they were sent to Earth by their parents to retrieve a device that will restore their home planet's polluted atmosphere. Problems arose when their ship crashed and now they need to retrieve their ship, which is being held in a government facility in Witch Mountain. Further complicating matters, they are being pursued by an alien assassin called a Siphon, sent by the military of their home world which is planning to invade Earth and make it their new home and doesn't want the kids to succeed in their mission, as that would eliminate their justification for invading. To make matters worse, Burke, a government alien hunter, and his team have recovered the spaceship and are trying to locate and capture the kids.
Seth and Sara have powers of their own--Seth can alter his density to become intangible or incredibly dense, and Sara can read minds and move objects with a thought--but they still need the help of Jack Bruno and Dr. Friedman to save the day. In the end, the kids return home with a promise to return one day, Jack and Dr. Friedman become a couple and write a popular book about their adventure, and Burke is in trouble with his superiors.
Fitting it into the WW4C
The biggest problem here is that in the first two movies, Witch Mountain is a colony of aliens on Earth, and in the third movie it's a government installation for studying aliens--sort of the difference between Mount Shasta and Cheyenne Mountain (if Stargate SG-1 is to be believed).
Given the choice between including one version or the other, I'd go with the first two movies. I love Dwayne Johnson and Carla Gugino as much as the next person, but I grew up watching Tony and Tia. Fortunately, Race to Witch Mountain has a scene which saves it.
At one point in the movie, Jack and the kids end up in a diner. Their waitress, Tina, seems to have an unusual reaction to the kids, which she explains as noticing how dirty they are. The kids, however, look like they're amazed to see Tina. As she leaves the table, Tina says hello to the local lawman, Sheriff Antony. Tina and Antony later prove crucial in helping Jack and the kids escape from Burke and the alien hunters. "Tina" and "Antony" are also played by Kim Richards and Ike Eisenmann, the original "Tia" and "Tony."
Seriously, watch the scene and look at the way "Tina" and Seth and Sara react to each other. I'm pretty sure we're meant to think that maybe this is Tia, grown up and slinging hash for a living (for some reason). Well, here's my reason:
In the 1980s, the government, in particular its alien-hunting agency SETI [2], moved in on Witch Mountain hoping to find evidence of alien invasion. They didn't, because the inhabitants of Witch Mountain left the planet. Tony and Tia stayed behind, however, becoming "Tina" and "Antony." They may have had superheroic careers in the 1980s and 1990s. Should Seth and Sara return, they will almost certainly have superheroics in their future as well.
[1] Most aliens who end up on Earth in these movies seem to do so by crashing. Earth is like the most dangerous intersection in the galaxy.
[2] I may not get to it for a while, but the alien-hunting organization in My Favorite Martian is SETI. It seemed redundant to have two such organizations. I know that the real SETI is just some underfunded scientists looking for radio signals, but the real Masons aren't a world-spanning conspiracy, and yet there are the National Treasure movies (also from Disney).
Escape to Witch Mountain (1975)
Orphan twins Tony and Tia Malone have strange powers. Tony can move things with the power of his mind and Tia can read minds and see the future to a limited extent. They are trying to find out where they came from, and are being chased by millionaire Aristotle Bolt and his right-hand man Deranian, who are trying to capture them to use their powers for his own ends.
The children meet a widower named Jason O'Day who is traveling the country in his RV and enlist his help in getting them to Witch Mountain, where they believe they can find their Uncle Bene. O'Day is reluctant to help them, but ultimately cannot refuse to help children in need.
It is revealed that Tia and Tony are aliens whose ship crashed at sea and they were lost. [1] Their people established a colony at Witch Mountain. Bolt and Deranian are foiled in their attempts to capture the children, and Tia and Tony rejoin their people.
Return From Witch Mountain (1978)
Tia and Tony visit Los Angeles after spending the last three years at Witch Mountain learning to use their powers. They get separated and Tony is kidnapped by the evil Letha Wedge and the mad scientist Dr. Gannon, who see Tony using his powers. Letha Wedge has been funding Gannon's efforts to build a mind control device. Not only does the device work, but it works on Tony.
Letha wants to use Tony to make money, since she has spent her fortune funding Dr. Gannon, but Gannon sees Tony as his opportunity to take over the world. It's up to Tia, along with a gang of truant kids (the Earthquake Gang) she befriends, and the hapless truant officer Mr. Yokomoto to save Tony and stop Dr. Gannon.
Race to Witch Mountain (2009)
Ex-con Jack Bruno is a taxi driver in Las Vegas during a UFO convention, which he believes is full of lunatics, even if one of the lunatics, Dr. Alex Friedman, also happens to be gorgeous. He finds two teenagers, Seth and Sara, in his cab and they offer to pay him an exorbitant amount to deliver them to a certain destination. Against his better judgment, he accepts the fare.
Jack discovers that Seth and Sara are aliens, and that they were sent to Earth by their parents to retrieve a device that will restore their home planet's polluted atmosphere. Problems arose when their ship crashed and now they need to retrieve their ship, which is being held in a government facility in Witch Mountain. Further complicating matters, they are being pursued by an alien assassin called a Siphon, sent by the military of their home world which is planning to invade Earth and make it their new home and doesn't want the kids to succeed in their mission, as that would eliminate their justification for invading. To make matters worse, Burke, a government alien hunter, and his team have recovered the spaceship and are trying to locate and capture the kids.
Seth and Sara have powers of their own--Seth can alter his density to become intangible or incredibly dense, and Sara can read minds and move objects with a thought--but they still need the help of Jack Bruno and Dr. Friedman to save the day. In the end, the kids return home with a promise to return one day, Jack and Dr. Friedman become a couple and write a popular book about their adventure, and Burke is in trouble with his superiors.
Fitting it into the WW4C
The biggest problem here is that in the first two movies, Witch Mountain is a colony of aliens on Earth, and in the third movie it's a government installation for studying aliens--sort of the difference between Mount Shasta and Cheyenne Mountain (if Stargate SG-1 is to be believed).
Given the choice between including one version or the other, I'd go with the first two movies. I love Dwayne Johnson and Carla Gugino as much as the next person, but I grew up watching Tony and Tia. Fortunately, Race to Witch Mountain has a scene which saves it.
At one point in the movie, Jack and the kids end up in a diner. Their waitress, Tina, seems to have an unusual reaction to the kids, which she explains as noticing how dirty they are. The kids, however, look like they're amazed to see Tina. As she leaves the table, Tina says hello to the local lawman, Sheriff Antony. Tina and Antony later prove crucial in helping Jack and the kids escape from Burke and the alien hunters. "Tina" and "Antony" are also played by Kim Richards and Ike Eisenmann, the original "Tia" and "Tony."
Seriously, watch the scene and look at the way "Tina" and Seth and Sara react to each other. I'm pretty sure we're meant to think that maybe this is Tia, grown up and slinging hash for a living (for some reason). Well, here's my reason:
In the 1980s, the government, in particular its alien-hunting agency SETI [2], moved in on Witch Mountain hoping to find evidence of alien invasion. They didn't, because the inhabitants of Witch Mountain left the planet. Tony and Tia stayed behind, however, becoming "Tina" and "Antony." They may have had superheroic careers in the 1980s and 1990s. Should Seth and Sara return, they will almost certainly have superheroics in their future as well.
[1] Most aliens who end up on Earth in these movies seem to do so by crashing. Earth is like the most dangerous intersection in the galaxy.
[2] I may not get to it for a while, but the alien-hunting organization in My Favorite Martian is SETI. It seemed redundant to have two such organizations. I know that the real SETI is just some underfunded scientists looking for radio signals, but the real Masons aren't a world-spanning conspiracy, and yet there are the National Treasure movies (also from Disney).
I have not seen the newer film, so I did not know JUST how different the Witch Mountains were. Did you ever see the 1990's tv movie version? Closer to teh original, though i think it started out with Tia and Tony not knowing each other (it's been awhile, so i could be wrong).
ReplyDeleteI like and agree with your fix to reconcile them. Tia and Tony perhaps felt more at home on Earth, and didn't want to leave, and took jobs that could keep them aware of, but under the radar of orgs like SETI when they were operating in town.
Plus I like the idea of the two being active in the 70's/80's.
Given the aliens from their home planet have been coming to the WW4C for a while, and they seem human enough (never got picked up on Tia or Tony's physicals, which i assumed they had), could others who were 'lost' have ended up intermarrying with humans, and introduced the alien gene into the population?
This might be another way to have spontaneous powers appear in the world.
Yeah, that's feasible. I haven't done the writeup for Mission to Mars yet (I plan to do it along with My Favorite Martian and make a "Mars" entry), but MTM establishes that life here began out there (or on Mars, at any rate). I imagine the Martians also seeded other planets which explains why the Witch Mountain aliens resemble humans so closely (as well as the alien from "Moon Pilot" which is not available on DVD as far as I know) and why the Cat From Outer Space looks like an Earth cat. Shared genetic origins.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of the Witch Mountain folk is really well done, and I like the idea that Tia & Tony were active during the 70s & 80s, as well. I'm also thinking that it is possible that one of Tony's relatives went on to become the famous "Jetstream" and married Steve Stronghold. Just a thought.
ReplyDeleteThe Wonderful World of Disney also had another movie in the 1980's that told of the further adventures of Tony & Tia. They went out in the world, to look for others like them. They again had the help of Jason O'Day.
ReplyDelete