The Colonists

Niolani (Francine York), a spikey-headed dominatrix representing a world of female warriors forces the Robinson men to prepare the planet for colonisation by her distaff compatriots and their male servants. The 'role-reversal, women on top' premise is a throwback to the straw-feminist space operas of the 1950s, such as 'Queen of Outer Space' (1958), and prefigures the campy British sci-fi TV show 'Star Maidens' (1976). In her shiny leather-look outfit, cape, and off-beat headpiece, the smug and supercilious Niolani resembles Nyah, the 'Devil Girl from Mars' (1954), another bossy extra-terrestrial woman who enjoys lording it (ladying it?) over men. Most of Niolani's lines are cliches and York's delivery is subtilty-free and stagy, but the episode is reasonably entertaining (and pleasingly doesn't end with the female autocrat realising that she just can't live without male company). As Dr. Smith, Jonathon Harris gets to wear silly outfits and, in the end, his character is a bit less self-centered than usual (but comparisons to 'Bridge on the River Kwai' (1958) are a bit of a stretch). Fun in a silly way and an amusing example of what passed for portraying 'feminism' on network TV in the 1960s (although Maureen, Judy, and Penny never threaten to burn their bras).

We all know the influence that the Batman series had at that time in many series, here we have a clear example with a villain directly copied from Batman's Catwoman. The leader of a civilization of warrior women arrives on the planet with the purpose of preparing her colonization, she takes the men of the group prisoner and turns them into her slaves, as always Dr. Smith manages to become a faithful assistant to the invader to the detriment of their fellow earthlings. Without being an amazing episode, it is still entertaining and has the attraction of having one of the few female villains who went through this series.

The villain alien warrior Niolani (Francine York) looks like the famous alien Nyah (Patricia Laffan) wearing a menacing black leather outfit on the movie "Devil Girl from Mars", here Irwin Allen imposes the same character with a small changing at head only, ours friends are trapped on a space field aiming for they ought built a deck to landing a upcoming spacecraft with first wave of female colonist on the planet of family Robinson is stranded, thus the feminist Niolani who utterly disregards the male ones as simple servants forcing them work with a bare hands on everlasting slaving.

As expected Dr. Smith mourning the hard work, according him his body is too sensitive for tough job, then he offers himself to embellish the deck at own way posing as French painting type in order to draw attention of Niolani that later finds him an interesting male fostering Dr. Smith at highest position of her consort, a bit faltering about sudden change, hereinafter he also is in charge of the deck's construction thus nagging Major West on labor and all Jupiter's male crew on a Roman's outfit, meanwhile Bill and the Robot settle a bold plan to explode the deck to avoid the landing the spacecraft from the planet Kondor about to come.

A clever and funny episode where the power trio Smith, Robot and Will are the core of whole store, even the Alien guest star Francine York in a fabulous performance as feminism and bossy behavior, just the silver-tongued Smith could misleading her as usually he did with others invaders, neither the Robot escape from Niolani due he presents himself as a male Robot even being a computerized machine is busted back as male one.

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Resume: First watch: 2023 / Source: DVD / How many: 1 / Rating: 7.5.