Category Archives: Television

Prophets of Science Fiction

16 Thursday Feb 2012

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I’ve discovered a new TV series that got my interest up very quickly. THE PROPHETS OF SCIENCE FICTION airs at 10:00 p.m. Eastern time Wednesday nights on The Science Channel. I missed the first four episodes that aired back in November, but before the new show debuted last night, featuring Isaac Asimov, they ran three of the four previously shown episodes: Philip K. Dick, H. G. Wells, and Arthur C. Clarke. They left off the pilot, Mary Shelley. Ridley Scott is the host.

That Mary Shelley show came under a lot of criticism as it attempted to link her novel, FRANKENSTEIN, to modern day developments such as organ transplants, supercomputers, and DNA research. This one wasn’t shown as mentioned earlier and I got this from Wikipedia, so take it for what it’s worth.

I recorded the four they showed and have only watched the Dick episode. The format seems to cover some of his better known works and introduce modern developments that mirror some of his predictions. DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP? showed developments in android technology, with brief bits by scientists working in the field covering everything from the supple skin technology to the mechanical works inside the body. They even had a Dick android, though only the head seemed to have any movement and, man, did it look real. The prediction was that in twenty years, with new A.I. brains, we would have those androids so human-like that one could not tell talking or looking at them.

The movie TOTAL RECALL, and the short story it was based on, WE CAN REMEMBER IT FOR YOU WHOLESALE, discussed today’s world of computer games and the intoxicating effect they have on kids today. And not just kids. I have a relative that will play these games for hours on end.

MINORITY REPORT talks about software that can predict crime based on past events in areas under concern.

Also during the show, they talked about Dick’s life and the twin sister that died after six weeks, though through his active imagination he talked to her most of his life. I don’t know enough about Dick to know how much of that was fanciful and how much was true. His paranoia and experiments with drugs was covered. They have some reenactments of incidents as well(and the gut playing the Young Dick might well be a relative; just kidding).

Kin Stanley Robinson and David Brin spoke of Dick, as well as one of his his biographers and everyone from theoretical physicists to experts on the mind.

I enjoyed this and look forward to seeing the other episodes I have recorded. Next week, they have a show on Jules Verne, with Heinlein, and -George Lucas?- the following two weeks. Their website is HERE.

Below is the trailer:

and below is that Mary Shelley episode from YouTube:

Roy Rogers(1911-1998)

05 Saturday Nov 2011

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Today is Roy Rogers’ birthday. he would have been a hundred years old. He was one of my boyhood heroes and who really cared that they weren’t “real” westerns in the traditional sense. I never was a huge singing cowboy fan, but Roy was different somehow. That Roy could ride Trigger, guns on his hips, alongside Pat Brady and his jeep Nellybelle made no difference at all.

I was a bit young to remember his partnership in the movies with Gabby Hayes. I’ve seen some of the movies since then. It was the television version with Pat Brady as his sidekick that was my meat and potatoes.

Overlooked TV: The Lone Wolf(1954)

04 Tuesday Oct 2011

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THE LONE WOLF was a syndicated TV series in the 1954-55 season that ran for thirty-nine episodes. It ‘s based on the Joseph Louis Vance character that appeared in a series of novels that began in 1914, eight books with another by Carl W. Smith in 1947. They were quite popular in their time, some say The Lone Wolf was the inspiration for The Saint, and inspired a couple of dozen movies as well as this series. Not to mention a modern day, female version from Moonstone Books.

In this series, he functions as a private investigator and in the episodes I’ve seen no mention is made of any criminal past. But not exactly as your common, garden variety P.I. I’ve never seen any sort of office in any of the shows. He flies in and out of the country quite frequently, spending more time on the continent and in Mexico than in the States.

But he dresses the part of a P.I. of the era, wearing tench coats and snap brim hats, smoking heavily(four times in the half hour story linked below). He seems to get hit on the head a lot as well and, of course, he’s always ready to help the downtrodden with never a thought of any recompense.

In one episode, THE WEREWOLF STORY, Lanyard is asked by a law firm to check on a client, a very wealthy, slightly dotty, old lady that has bought a castle in The Balkans and intends to live the rest of her days as the queen she imagined as a young girl. He meets her in France where she announces they are leaving for the castle. The Balkan prince, and his daughter, that sold her the castle are there also. A sinister looking pair, they are not happy to see him. He learns why when the old woman shows him a paper she has to sign that says she can never sell the castle and, upon her death, it reverts back to the Prince.

Lanyard smells a rat.

Michael Lanyard is played by Louis (Charles) Hayward, an actor born in South Africa in 1909. Educated in England and the continent, during WWII, he joined the U.S. Marine Corps and commanded a photographic unit that filmed the Battle of Tarawa for a documentary that won the 1945 Academy Award for best documentary(short subject). He managed a night club for a period until he displayed some acting skill and playwright Noel Coward became his patron. He starred as Simon Templar in three films in 1938, 1940, and 1953. He also starred in the 1938 THE MAN IN THE IRON MASK.

Youtube seems to have only one episode available:

The Las Vegas Story (both DeForest Kelley and Jerry Paris appeared)

A lot of well known actors, maybe not back then, appeared on the show. Barbara Billingsley(Leave It To Beaver), Harry Morgan(Dragnet and M*A*S*H), Ernest Borgnine(McHale’s Navy), Jean Byron(Patty Duke Show), Beverly Garland, Marjorie Lord(The Danny Thomas Show), DeForest Kelley(Star Trek of course), Kenneth Tobey(quite a few of my favorite monster movies from the fifties), and Jerry Paris(Dick Van Dyke show) were some of them.

A final note. Of the thirty-nine episodes, thirty-one were similarly titled as THE something STORY.

For more overlooked goodness, check out Todd Mason\'s SWEET FREEDOM.

Vintage Television: Mike Hammer(1958-59)

26 Tuesday Apr 2011

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MICKEY SPILLANE’S MIKE HAMMER ran for two seasons on CBS and starred Darren McGavin as Hammer. It seemed to be viewed as a terrible show, critics decrying the violence. McGavin said it was instantly successful. Whatever, it only lasted seventy-eight half hour episodes filmed in black and white.

Some of the writers working the show were Frank Kane, who wrote about a third of the episodes, Steven Thornley fourteen, and Evan Hunter(as Curt Cannon) even furnished two story lines, one for which Kane wrote the script. Boris Sagal was the main director, twenty-five episodes, Richard Irving the next with eleven. Some of the actors that appeared in shows were those faces that you know but can’t connect with a name. Others were Angie Dickinson, Vitto Scotti, Lorne Greene, Steve Ihnat, Anthony Caruso, H. M. Wynant, Ruta Lee, Robert Fuller, DeForest Kelly, and Len Lesser(who would have been one of those faces if he hadn’t gained some notoriety as Uncle Leo on Seinfeld), most of them in two or more roles.

The two episodes Evan Hunter provided were early in the first season, SO THAT’S WHO IT WAS and DEAD MEN DON’T DREAM. In the first, Mike had finished a long case in Chinatown and was headed home when he’s accosted by a junkie, Gus Peters, that had gave him some tips begging for money. He gives him five bucks and goes on his way. A week later he gets a call from Gus needing help, something he can’t talk about over the phone, and Mike heads back to Chinatown to see him, arriving to late as Gus had been shot to death in an alley. Worried that the police won’t care about a junkie’s death, he decides to find the killer. He learns that a prominent Chinese businessman had been knifed to death in that very same alley a couple of days before Gus was killed. He knows they have to be connected.

In DEAD MEN DON”T DREAM, Mike returns to the old neighborhood fore the funeral of a childhood friend found in front of his store with his throat cut. In questioning some of his old friends, they all seem nervous and evasive. In another store from his childhood, Pop’s, he happens to be there when a couple of hoods come in demanding the weekly fee. The old protection racket! Mike runs them out, only to find Pop dead the next day. It’s then that Mike gets serious about finding out who’s behind it all.

I haven’t watched all episodes yet, just the first six of each season and a few spotted around, but the quality seems pretty good so far. I picked the set up from classicradioandtv.com at a fairly reasonable price. What I have is the collector’s edition. While I don’t wish to be too critical, I found numerous mistakes in the packaging. Misspellings in the titles, Mere Maid becomes Metre Maid, Just Around The Coroner became Just Arounj The Corner(not my J), Scar and Garter became Scar and Gaerter(correct on the DVD, wrong on the outside packaging), and the most glaring error of them all, Darren is spelled with an I(notice in the picture) . These are just the ones I’ve caught. There may be more.

Still I think it’s worth the price.

McGavin captures the spirit of Hammer fairly well, attracted to every good looking female he meets, obstinate about keeping details to himself, violent when he needs to be. One thing I missed though was his hardware. Betsy, his M1911 army Colt is not in evidence. Not a gun expert myself, he carries a snub-nosed revolver, probably a .38(not sure though), in his shoulder holster.

I’ve enjoyed them so far.

The Night Stalker

23 Saturday Apr 2011

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This post concerns just the prose books I have.

THE NIGHT STALKER was a 1972 telefilm written by Richard Matheson from an, at the time, unpublished novel by Jeff Rice titled The Kolchak Papers. The novel debuted about the same time as the movie, which for a time, and may still be for all I know, the highest rated TV movie of all time. That caused a sequel, THE NIGHT STRANGLER, in 1973 and eventually led to the series. Rice did the novelization of that one.

The TV series lasted only one season(not sure about the reasons here as it seemed to be a hit) where Darren McGavin, in his straw boater, seersucker suit, and tennis shoes discovered and defeated a succession of monsters of all types. Naturally no one ever believed him and relegated him to “National Enquirer” status.

The show, and McGavin’s character went on to cult status, survived in the fans’ minds for years. Then in 1994, GRAVE SECRETS by Mark Dawidziak appeared, supposedly the first of a new series(Grand Inquisitor was announced in the back as coming soon, but never made it). Dawidziak had already penned NIGHTSTALKING: A TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY KOLCHAK COMPANION and the earlier THE COLUMBO PHILE: A CASEBOOK.

That’s how things stood until Moonstone books started doing Kolchak comics and graphic novels(I have none of those). They eventually did a couple of anthologies of short stories, recruiting some of the best writers working to contribute.
Some of the authors represented here include Max Allan Collins, Peter David, James Reasoner, Mark Dawidziak, Stuart Kaminsky, Mike W. Barr, Richard Dean Starr, and others we might be familiar with. I’m working from memory here as I can’t lay my hands on the book(packed away somewhere in the house). It was successful and inspired a second set of tales of our favorite monster hunter.

Some of the writers featured here include P. N. Elrod(who has her own vampire novels), Starr again, Christopher Golden, and Elaine Bergstrom. Once again working from memory.

I kept wondering during that time whether they might do an original novel or two as well as the short stories and graphic novels. I know they teamed, somehow, Kolchak and Sherlock Holmes in a graphic series and I heard rumors of a novel version. If it’s appeared I missed that one. But finally, a new novel by C’ J. Henderson, A BLACK & EVIL TRUTH, showed up.

Moonstone books finally released Jeff Rice’s two novels in an omnibus volume,THE KOLCHAK PAPERS,which leads me to wonder if the previously mentioned “forthcoming” novel GRAND INQUISITOR was ever written. If so, One might like to see that one. Maybe an omnibus with GRAVE SECRETS?

I’d certainly be interested in more collections of stories or novels. Always had a soft spot for old Carl. Darren McGavin created one of those spot-on characters that would be hard for anyone else to pull off(witness that abominable, thankfully short-lived update).

Doctor Who Comes To America

20 Wednesday Apr 2011

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The new season of Doctor Who begins this weekend and he comes to America in all senses. For only the second time, that I recall, the TARDIS lands on our shores in the storyline. The previous time was the one movie starring Paul McGann in the role as the eighth Doctor.

Our friend Gary Dobbs has a small role, which he says he can’t talk about yet, in an episode.

The New Trailer

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