#TBT: 'The Colbys' Ends With an Alien Abduction

Sure, she was the daughter of Dynasty grand diva Alexis, the woman so dramatic she loved nothing more than a good pond fight, but even by Alexis’s standards, Fallon Carrington Colby led a soapy life.

She survived a business-motivated marriage, divorce, falling for a man who turned out to be her long-lost brother, affairs, and being run over by a car and being left temporarily paralyzed, only to be killed off (allegedly) at the end of Season 4. But then she popped up in the Dynasty spinoff The Colbys, where she suffered from amnesia, married her ex-husband’s cousin, had a child, and continued to suffer headaches and seizures sparked by the paralyzing car accident (kudos to the writers for a plot point that would pay off across two separate series), before helping that show end its two-season run with one of the more notorious series finales in primetime history:

Fallon — then played by General Hospital star Emma Samms, who had replaced original Fallon Pamela Sue Martin — was driving down a desert road. Her car broke down down, and while using her (so 1980s) car phone to call for help, she saw a mysterious light appear in the sky.

Yep, UFO.

Which landed, lowered its door, and revealed a figure who beckoned Fallon to join him (it?) on the ship. She unquestioningly walked the plank to meet the welcoming hand of alien dude, and the ship closed up and zoomed away into the sky, with The Colbys and Fallon never to be seen again.

Right?

Well, that was the end of The Colbys, but just as her Dynasty death couldn’t stop Fallon, neither could a little old thing like being abducted by aliens. The Colbys finale aired on March 26, 1987, but by the next fall, Fallon was back in Denver for Season 8 of Dynasty.

And how was her mysterious return from outer space explained? Did she reappear in the shower one morning and reveal that her entire stint on The Colbys was a dream? Nope — wrong network, wrong primetime soap.

Fallon’s UFO vacay instead became yet another unbelievable storyline, as she had few detailed memories of her time away, yet insisted to skeptical husband Jeff (who had found her along the roadside, miles from her car, the day after the UFO landing) that she had been abducted. She even attended a support group for people who’d been swept away by the otherworldy, one of the many nails in the coffin of her second marriage to Jeff.

Dynasty — the mothership, in Fallon-friendly terms — was canceled at the end of its ninth season, and the Fallon character, who was by now technically Fallon Carrington Colby Colby, also returned for the 1991 TV movie Dynasty: The Reunion, which found her — yet again — ensconced with Jeff’s cousin Miles, and — yet again — ultimately reuniting with Jeff. (Fallon Carrington Colby Colby Colby…?)

In any case, let this be a lesson to the inevitable group of Mad Men fans who will have issues with that show’s upcoming series finale… whatever happens in our last moments with Don Draper and the gang, it could have been worse. So, so much worse.

The Colbys: The Complete Series DVD box set is now available from Shout! Factory.