Since I was able to crank out a piece a day all week long, I took a little break today to enjoy some old sci-fi classics. In addition to my quest to watch every Doctor Who ever made, all of Torchwood and all of the current Being Human episodes that BBC has put out, I've been on a vintage sci-fi kick lately too. Actually I have watched all of Torchwood and Being Human now, and I'm bummed out that it's going to be a while yet before more Being Human episodes will air.
Space 1999 is one of the lessor known 70s TV series starting Martin Landau, and Barbara Bain. Very cool stuff indeed, it's too bad it never made it beyond 2 seasons. I always thought that the Eagle space-craft were nifty as a kid, and the 2nd season shape shifter Maya used to scare the crap out of me, because she turned into scary alien creatures, in addition to cuddly animals.
It was also a more serious, and dark, or just plain more adult-like sci-fi TV show of the mid-70s. I also learned that it was actually spearheaded by none other than Gerry & Sylvia Anderson of the Thunderbirds marionette fame (ThunderBirds are Go!). Many popular British actors appears as guest stars during the two seasons like Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Joan Collins, Ian Mcshane, even Doctor Who's 2nd Doctor Patrick Troughton, just to name a few.
YouTube it and check it out for yourself. I also learned that Gerry Anderson was also responsible for another live-action show called UFO, which I think I'll dig up over the weekend as well to see what it was all about.
It seams to me that the classic sci-fi stuff, is just more sci-fi than most of the stuff they shovel us these days, aside from the shows the BBC is doing at present. It's also a fact that the BBC is putting out the very best stuff I've seen on TV overall probably in decades with Doctor Who, Torchwood, Being Human, and there's a few other shows that just seam more interesting than anything on North American Television.
Why are we in the US more consumed with crap like LOST, Survivor, has-beens learning to ballroom dance, idiotic crap like metro-sexuals from New Jersey, some snotty rich wives in California and New York, and what those skanky Kardashian girls are doing, more than putting together some programs that our kids will want to dig up and watch 20 years from now, like the BBC is doing today?
I think US TV stuidos need to take an in-depth look at the BBC, and start to rethink their strategies. The stuff that's on TV in North America is utter crap anymore, and I can't believe people watch this nonsense.