Dave (Martin Shaw) owns and operates a porn theater. He and his wanna be sidekick, Jimmy (Stuart McGugan) are looking at an abandoned aquarium that used to house a dolphin show. Dave is looking for a place he can turn into a big porn cinema. A “classy” one. Currently he’s not impressed by the building. The aquarium, or dolphinarium, is owned by a man named Hubbard (Wolfe Morris). He tells Dave that the building was a cinema before he refitted it as the dolphinarium and it would be easy to convert it back.
Hubbard is a squirrelly, but a pushy, little man who is not happy to be in the derelict building, even to show it to prospective buyers. Dave can smell desperation a mile away. He pushes the owner for more information on the place. Hubbard talks about dolphins and the tricks they are trained to do. His star dolphin was called Buddyboy. Hubbard believed that Buddyboy was extremely intelligent and took over the show. Hubbard became afraid of Buddyboy. When Buddyboy died the other dolphins began to also die, one at a time. Dave thinks there may be more to the story than Hubbard is letting on.
Downstairs, near the bottom of the tank, Dave finds a waiflike girl who seems to be squatting. She says her name is Lucy (Pamela Moiseiwitsch) and she used to work at the dolphinarium. She says she and Buddyboy became friends. After bullying the simple-minded girl for a while, Lucy eventually tells Dave that she believes Hubbard murdered Buddyboy. From Hubbard’s and Lucy’s reaction to the dolphinarium he comes to understand that they believe the spirit of Buddyboy haunts the building.
Of the six stories in “Beasts” this one was the least interesting. I watched it for a long time before I realized it’s not going to get any better. I’m not sure what I was expecting but the story wasn’t really a horror story. The dolphin ghost aspect was more suggestive than actual, and a little silly. The main theme of the story was Dave’s exploitation of Hubbard and Lucy. He doesn’t believe the building is haunted by a dolphin, but they do. He uses their fear to get what he wants. His callousness is evident not only by how he uses and bullies everyone in his sphere but by how easily he tosses aside his friend, Jimmy.
The surprising thing about this story is the fact that, although brief, there is nudity in it. Well, surprising for this American, but for British TV the first frontal nudity on the small screen was in 1973 when Anna Fitzgerald was nude in Granada Television’s drama “Shabby Tiger”.