The Wireless Theatre Company’s alternate history drama Red Moon, has entered its third episode with the release of Phase 3: Syzygy. For the non-astronomers among you, syzygy is (usually) straight-line configuration of three or more celestial bodies in the same system. Think eclipse or opposition if that helps. In the alternate London where ex-MI5 agent Sloper (Bulcock) is trying to make sense of an intrigue concerning the American Moonbase (and Russia were there first in 1968), the celestial bodies seem to be Sloper, the Americans and now in Syzygy, a Russian spy named Luchnik (Critchlow).

In this updated Cold War drama, Sloper is trying to make sense of events while also being manipulated by an as-yet unidentified party. His former MI5 colleagues want him to go away and forget everything, particularly Quirke (Riley) and somebody might be trying to kill him. All bread and butter stuff to the average spy, perhaps, but in this world, it gives a vehicle for writer Robert Valentine to convey his vision of alternate history, and the details are all, for example, an updated Greenham Common-esque Women’s camp protesting against American weaponisation of the Moon. It’s all very grim, and there are  growing worries things may not end well for either Sloper or the human race.

While the story is building, Syzygy is one of those episodes that build without revealing, though there’s plenty of action, threats, mysterious messages and the ever-present sense others have invited Sloper to a game without telling him the rules or whose side he is on.

In this third part, the intrigue is building nicely and while we learn little about what is going on, the plot is progressing well, and the only complaint is the episodes are too short. Roll on Phase 4!

RED MOON PHASE 3: SYZYGY / AUTHOR: ROBERT VALENTINE / PUBLISHER: WIRELESS THEATRE COMPANY / STARRING: PHILIP BULCOCK, STEPHEN CRITCHLOW, YASMINE HOLNESS-DOVE, JOE RILEY / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW