Monday, December 17, 2007

1985-Otherworld


This was a cool sci-fi show on Friday nights for about two months in early 1985. The Sterling family were touring Egypt and were inside the Pyramid of Giza during a rare planetary alignment. When they emerged, they were in a parallel earth populated by humans but with a completely different culture and history than our earth. There were no familiar countries, only zones, each with it's own culture and laws. Travel between zones was forbidden and therefore there were no maps of the zones.
Episodes had them running from one zone to another in search of a way home, pursued of course by the requisite bad guy.
Only 8 episodes were aired, but it was rumored that 13 were actually produced; which would make sense because it was a mid-season replacement and the network would have likely ordered 13 episodes. Although highly unlikely, it would be great if they got this out on DVD.

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

1978-Sword Of Justice


70s TV star Dack Rambo starred as Jack Cole, a rich playboy by day and a kind of mercenary at night...Imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit, he learns the ways of criminals while behind bars.
Jack's trademark is a playing card, the three of spades, to represent the three years he spent in prison, and it had written on it "The spade is the sword of justice -- its rapier marks the end."

Friday, December 7, 2007

1975-The Ghost Busters


A Norm Prescott/Lou Scheimer production from 1975, The Ghost Busters was a Saturday morning show that featured Spencer, Kong, and Tracy the gorilla as they would go on missions to find ghosts to use their Ghost Dematerializer on. (Spencer Tracy and Kong. Get it? Groan.) They ended up always going to the same spooky house on the edge of town and they would go all Three Stooges while chasing down the ghost.
It's a shock it didn't last more than 15 episodes. This show was remade as a cartoon in the 80s after the success of the movie Ghostbusters, which shared a remarkable resemblance to the name and plot elements of this show, don't you think?