Well, I mean, Laserblast was no Flash Gordon, or even Battle Beyond The Stars, but I always found it entertaining. And I loved the stop motion aliens.Originally Posted by 3LockBox
As for a dumb story, I dunno. I don't think it was any dumber than The Godfather.
My recollection is that it was cities that didn't have an NBC (or later, CBS) affiliate, at all. Or at least that's what TV Guide reported once, in the early 90's. The one I remember was in Scottsdale, Arizona. The "home office" was in Scottsdale for a long time, as I recall. Then at some point, someone writes in a letter saying they were going to be visiting Scottsdale on other business, and wanted to know if it was possible to tour the "home office". Dave informed that unfortunately, the home office had moved to some place in Nebraska I think it was.
Doesn't sound far fetched at all. Remember, in the South, they lost their minds when...I think it was Harry Belafonte who put his hand on the shoulder of, I think, Dusty Springfield, while they sang a duet. It was the slightest of gestures, but people still went ape down there below the Mason Dixon Line. And it was also the South that made NBC queazy about the Kirk/Uhura kiss.
Yeah you're right. Just looked it up.
The show producers were also uneasy about the kiss, so they shot a less risque second take of the scene. William Shatner intentionally looked directly into the camera so they'd be forced to use the first take.
"Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?"--Dalai Lama
Actually, it was NBC who ordered them to go back and shoot a new version of the scene where they don't kiss. But in every take, they either hammed it up, or Shatner did stuff like crossing his eyes deliberately, etc. It was such that the network finally said "To hell with it" and went with the original version.
Oh and it was Petula Clarke touching Harry Belafonte's shoulder that everyone went ape over.
Watched four Mannix episodes today. Lots of interesting guests:
First episode had Tim Thomerson playing a syndicate henchman. Yeah, I know, you're thinking, "Who the frell is Tim Thomerson?!". During the 80's, he became familiar to genre fans when he starred in the Trancers series (Helen Hunt, who wasn't quite yet famous was also in the first couple). This was also at least the third episode where we meet one of Mannix's Korean War "buddies" who collaborated with the North Koreans.
Second episode I saw had Erik Estrada. Yes, that's right Francis Llewellyn Poncharello was a junkie/hitman who tries to kill the private investigator who taught Joe everything he knows about being a PI. Hal Needham, who would later direct Smokey And The Bandit and Cannonball Run, also appears, as a syndicate henchman. Hal was actually a stunt man before he was a director, so I suspect he probably worked regularly on the show in that capacity, he may ahve been in charge of choreographing those fights that always seemed to end with Mannix getting sapped in the back.
Third episode featured Berlinda Tolbert, who later became famous playing Jenny on The Jeffersons, as Peggy's cousin, whose husband is murdered by a deserter who had served in the same company as the husband in Vietnam. Felton Perry plays the murderer, he was also Harry Callahan's new partner in Magnum Force, and a made for TV movie I always liked called Hunters Of The Reef. Another actor in this episode, Geoffrey Deuel, had a small role in an episode of The Monkees, also.
Fourth episode had James A. Watson Jr, who played Dunn in Airplane II: The Sequel (you may recall him and Kent McCord getting sucked out of the shuttle when they try to shut down the computer), as well as three, (count 'em! THREE) episodes of The Love Boat. Also in this episode is a clean shaven Gerald McRaney (still a few years away from Simon & Simon) and Joshua Bryant. You've probably never heard of Joshua Bryant, but he was a good made for TV movie I liked called Trapped Beneath The Sea.
In case you have $5 that's burning a hole in your pocket...
https://www.nightflightplus.com/
I watched this regularly back in the old days. I first encountered Kate Bush when they broadcast the video of her 1979 Hammersmith Odeon concert, which knocked me out. It was one of the most unique shows I'd seen and made me a fan for life. I may take a flyer on this for a month.
Even in recent years, that Cheerios commercial with the white mom, black dad and bi-racial daughter caused some people to lose their s***.
"Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?"--Dalai Lama
There is a dating commercial in Canada with 2 man kissing. This didn't even cause a stir.
What can this strange device be? When I touch it, it brings forth a sound (2112)
That's one ad I don't remember, but then I don't think they show cereal commercials too often during the programming I typically watch (lately, it's been that damn Medicare Benefits thing, with Jimmy "My career ended when Good Times ended" Walker, or the one with Joe "My career ended even earlier Jimmy's" Namath).
Because it's Canada. There's stuff that you guys just sort of shrug and go "meh" at up there, that some people down here on the other side of the longest undefended international border in the world, where people just go ape over. But we better stop there, this is might be getting "too hot" for this forum. As David Letterman once said, "This is neither the time, nor the place, Harvey!"There is a dating commercial in Canada with 2 man kissing. This didn't even cause a stir.
This Saturday night on Cozi TV it's the first two Columbo episodes from season 4 1974. In An Exercise in Fatality it's Robert Conrad as a fitness guru who kills a business associate. Also in the cast are Pat Harrington and Gretchen Corbett. Columbo is caught off when he knocks on a door to a house and Corbett's character opens the door wearing a bikini.
Then it's Negative Reaction with Dick Van Dyke as a photographer who murders his wife. Vito Scotti and Joyce Van Patten make brief but memorable appearances.
Two good episodes that end on a high note with great final clues.
It's everywhere and seems like the default casting is now bi-racial couples. The racists have to be shitting themselves over this. Personally, I love it.
I see a HIV drug commercial just about every night showing two men kissing on a rooftop.
"The White Zone is for loading and unloading only. If you got to load or unload go to the White Zone!"
You all still watch commercials? I record everything and fast forward through the commercials. Even the few sporting events I watch.
So today's Mannix notes:
In the past couple days, I've seen three episodes, at least, directed by Bill Bixby, one of which he actually appears in. I thought he didn't start directing until much later, during or after The Incredible Hulk. The episode Bixby is in, also has an uncredited Red West (of Memphis Mafia quasi fame), making the fourth of five appearances on the show (IMDB tells me he's also in the last episode of the series, which is showing on Saturday). You'd have thought Red made a lot of appearances in Elvis movies, and you'd be right, but he also did a lot of other acting work, going back to 1958 and going right up until just a couple years before his death in 2017.
One other actor in this episode is one Eddie Donno, I couldn't figure out where I recognize him from. I've probably seen him in a lot of other stuff, but probably where I really know him from is The Blues Brothers! He's the SWAT commander who talks to the guard at Dealy Plaza:
Donno: Did two guys come in here, wearing sunglasses, one of them carrying a breifcase?
Guard: Yeah, I sent them down there (points)
I love that "I sent them down here" translates to "I sent them up to the 11th floor", and also that when the lynch mob (which is essentially what it is) gets to the elevators, one of them actually pushes the button, as if they were all going to cram into the elevator together, or were they going to send them up in shifts, "OK, is everyone here? Right! They're not leaving the tax accessor's office as free men! Let's get in there and TAKE EM!"
OK, back to Mannix:
So, the other two episodes I watched today had some good guest stars also. One had Dabney "9 To 5" Coleman and Howard "Dr. Johnny Fever" Hesseman in it. Also i nthis one was Allan Oppenheimer, who played Dr. Rudy Wells on the first two seasons of The Six Million Dollar Man (before he got replaced by Martin E. Brooks) and also regularly appeard as Gene Kinsella, the head of CBS, on Murphy Brown. Diana Hyland is in this one too, she was the mother on Eight Is Enough for the first few episodes, before she passed away in 1977.
The third episode I watched today had Thalmus Rasulala, an actor who appeared in a number of blaxploitation movies in the 70's, most notably in the classic Blacula. Of course, the lead in that movie was played by William Marshall, another Mannix vet. And you know what else they have in common? They're both Star Trek escapees! Rasulala appeared in the TNG episode Contagion. Rasulala was also in Friday Foster, along with fellow Mannix escapees Scatman Crothers, Ed Cambridge, and Yaphet Kotto (oh yeah, and Pam Grier was in that movie too).
Our TV service offers COZI, but we don't have it on our package, and since I'm not charge of such things in this house, that means I don't get to watch.
Cozi, Antenna, MeTV and a few others are all rerun brand networks that are available in most markets free over the air (aka OTA) with your basic TV antenna (there's no such thing as a digital or 4K antenna).
Unfortunately, due to my current living situation, that's not an option.
I live in a part of the Phoenix area where using an 80mile antenna, I can pull in the Tucson PBS station for even more programming. Not carried by the Phoenix PBS station.
"Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?"--Dalai Lama
Watching a Star Trek OG episode called "Plato's Stepchildren " whilst under the influence. Hilarious. Spock is doing this tapatillo, flamenco dance......
And Kirk kisses Uhura. There was some chemistry going on there.
I cannot let this go uncorrected.Watching a Star Trek OG episode called "Plato's Stepchildren " whilst under the influence. Hilarious. Spock is doing this tapatillo, flamenco dance......
The only "OG" episode was "A Piece of the Action".
The thing that got me about that episode was, from one book, an extraterrestrial culture was able to emulate 1920's Chicago, right down to the telephones, the pool tables, the look of the buildings. All of that from one book! And all of it in the space of about 100 years.The only "OG" episode was "A Piece of the Action".
When they were prepping for the 30th anniversary of Trek, the producers of DS9 were toying with different ways of paying homage. One of them was the idea of having Captain Sisko and company visit Sigma Iotia II and instead of cosplaying 1920's Chicago gangsters, everyone's cosplaying Kirk and Spock, as a satire on the Trekkie phenomenon. But they instead did Trials And Tribble-ations, the second sequel to The Trouble With Tribbles.
^^^ Only the second if you count "More Tribbles, More Troubles." I believe the animated series is not considered "canon."
(I loved that episode when it aired. Giant tribbles!)
Cobra handling and cocaine use are a bad mix.
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