Somme, 1916 / Germany, 1916 - The Trenches of Hell
The Battle of the Somme was one of the bloodiest events during the First World War, with nearly one million soldiers wounded or killed. Indy has been left in charge of the 9th Belgian Infantry after the commanding officer was killed in an unseen adventure. Indy suspects his fellow soldier Jacques of murder. Placed under the command of French lieutenant Alain Moreau, rivalry between the Allied troops and within the unit seem to be a bigger threat than the Germans, until the horrors of trench warfare are revealed.Facing artillery and machine gun fire, gas attacks and flamethrowers, any advance the Allies make is quickly lost again. Haunting themes from musical score help to set the tone of the episode, with tense confrontations, bloody battles, and the terror of attackers emerging out of the clouds of smoke and gas. This is one of the few Young Indiana Jones episodes not scored by Laurence Rosenthal or Joel McNeely. Instead, the score was composed by Frédéric Talgorn, a well known French film score composer best known for his genre works such as Delta Force 2, Fortress, Robot Jox, and Heavy Metal 2000.Talgorn also composed music for the second half of this two part adventure, which starts after a victory in battle at the Somme quickly turns to defeat and Indy's capture by German forces. Participating in a foiled escape attempt, Indy - who has assumed yet another identity - is sent to a maximum security prison at Dusterstadt. There, he meets an international assemblage of fellow captives with a variety of schemes in mind for escaping the escape-proof jail, including a young but intensely thoughtful Charles de Gaulle, who later become the leader of France. Everyone wants Indy's help to break out, but failing means learning some painful lessons.Talgorn's score captures the tone of the episodes perfectly - bone chilling themes played during the battlefield attack with gas and fire, and suspenseful queues while infiltrating the German tunnels, and later during Indy and de Gaulle's escape attempt. Working from notes by Joel McNeely, Talgorn also composed a score to the episode Paris, 1908, but the score was not used.