Kolchak Logo 'Primal Scream'
(a.k.a. 'The Humanoids')


by Bill S. Ballinger
and David Chase
Carl Kolchak

Returning from a World Ecology Summit, Doctor Jules Kopeneck heads for his laboratory at the O.I.O. oil company, only to be attacked and killed by a savage creature. Later, Kolchak attends the press conference held at the lab and comes into conflict with police Captain Maurice Molnar; he also notices that a walk-in freezer has broken down, and that something has broken out of it. The reporter visits O.I.O.’s PR offices, but finds the company representative, Thomas Kitzmiller, to be evasive concerning the recent death, although he does reveal that Kopeneck had been examining core samples sent back from their drilling operation in the Artic. Learning that Kopeneck’s assistant, Doctor Helen Lynch, is recovering in hospital after a car accident, Kolchak visits her and discovers that she and Kopeneck had been working on one-million-year-old cell samples which returned to life when exposed to heat. Meanwhile, a man is attacked in his home while watching a horror movie, but his ape-like attacker easily escapes the police; the primordial creature then attacks a man at a meat market. Kolchak’s investigations cause him to clash once more with Captain Molnar, who wants the story suppressed. Later, Kolchak sneaks into the hospital and overhears a conversation between Helen and Kitzmiller, which confirms his suspicions: when the freezer broke down the frozen cells from the core samples were warmed up by the air-conditioning; they came to life and now a primeval caveman is on the loose in the city. Kolchak realises that the creature will be hiding in the equivalent of a cave, and so he heads for the Chicago Stadium, whose sealed corridors once housed the Manhattan Project. Searching the darkened passageways Kolchak finds himself face to face with this savage, primal creature…

Darren McGavin (Carl Kolchak), Simon Oakland (Tony Vincenzo), Jack Grinnage (Ron Updyke), Ruth Mc Devitt (Emily Cowles), Pat Harrington, Jr. (Thomas Kitzmiller), John Marley (Captain Maurice Molnar), Lindsay Workman (Doctor Fisk), Katherine Woodville (Doctor Helen Lynch), Jamie Farr (Jack Burton), Byron Morrow (Doctor Cowan), Regis J. Cordic (Doctor Peel), Al Checco (Nils), Sandra Gould (Landlady), Barbara Rhodes (Secretary), Vince Howard (Policeman), Jeanie Bell (Rosetta)
Directed by Robert Scheerer

TX (US): 17th January, 1975

Notes:
*Featuring Carl Kolchak and Tony Vincenzo