Monthly Archives: November 2023

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Monsters 1.8 “Sleeping Dragons”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire show is streaming on Tubi.

This week, the lizard are leaping!

Episode 1.8 “Sleeping Dragon”

(Dir by Mark Rezyka, originally aired on December 10th, 1988)

Outside of Reno, Nevada, a stone capsule is found.  Professor Merrick (Kin Shriner) believes that the capsule is from the prehistoric era and that it might prove his theory that there was a highly-developed society on Earth before the rise of human beings.  Merrick brings the capsule to a lab that is located high in the mountains.

While a snow storm rages outside, Merrick and his colleagues, Jeffrey (Russell Johnson) and Jeffrey’s daughter Lisa (Beth Toussaint), examine the capsule.  Jeffrey is skeptical of Merrick’s theories while Lisa thinks that the rock could actually be some sort of time capsule that was buried centuries ago.  When the three of them leave the lab to get a Geiger counter and some more tools to try to pry the capsule open, a humanoid lizard (Wayne Toth) emerges from the stone.

The Lizard is not a friendly visitor and soon, he’s attacking anyone foolish enough to get close to him.  The surviving humans know that he have to find a way to stop the lizard but how do you stop something that you can’t understand?  With the blizzard raging outside, no one is leaving the lab until the battle between lizard and human is resolved.

This episode of Monsters had potential but it suffered because of its short runtime.  If the episode had a bit more time to emphasis the claustrophobia of the lab and to also allow a bit more suspense as the Lizard tracked down the scientists, it would have been far more effective.  As it is, the whole thing felt a bit rushed.

There are two things that I did like about this episode.

First off, it’s a huge plot point that the lab’s phone is dead, which means that the scientists can’t call for help.  The scientists assume that the phone is dead either because of the blizzard or because of the Lizard but, in reality, the phone isn’t dead at all.  It’s just that Lisa, while stumbling around the office, accidentally unplugged the phone and no one noticed until they actually tried to make a call.  That felt like a realistic mistake that one might make while under pressure and it also encouraged the viewer to question whether or not the humans were actually smart enough to survive their lizard encounter.

The second thing that worked about this episode is that lizard man really was frightening.  It helped that he stayed in the shadows for most of the episode and, when he did appeared, he moved quickly enough that you really didn’t notice that he was essentially a guy in a rubber suit.  He was an effective monster and, in the end, that’s what really matters when it comes to a show like this.

Next week, we’ve got another vampire story!

Retro Television Reviews: The Love Boat 3.17 “April’s Love/We Three/Happy Ending”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986!  The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

This week, a special guest returns!

Episode 3.17 “April’s Love/We Three/Happy Ending”

(Dir by George Tyne, originally aired on January 12th, 1980)

Let’s see.  This week’s episode is entitled April’s Love/We Three/Happy Ending and….

Wait?

Whose love?

April?

Oh no (or oh yes, depending on how you view things), it’s a Charo episode!

Charo was hardly the only celebrity to frequently appear on The Love Boat but she was the only one to always play the same character.  April first boarded the ship as a stowaway and then she returned as an entertainer.  She appeared at least once in almost every season.  In many ways, Charo was the perfect fit for The Love Boat.  She was loud, flamboyant, and shameless.  She was sexy but innocent.  She was the epitome of The Love Boat aesthetic.  At the same time, a little Charo went a long way and, whenever she boarded the ship, you knew the episode was pretty much going to be 75% Charo.

That’s the case here, in which the crew makes such a big deal over April that you have to wonder if they’re aware that there are other passengers on board.  April boards the ship with her manager and fiancé, Honest Tex (Forrest Tucker).  The crew doesn’t trust Honest Tex, especially when they find out that he was a used car salesman before he met April.  When Honest Tex hears Julie playing her flute and offers to get her a recording contract, the crew assumes that he wants to cheat on April!

(Side note: Since when did Julie start playing the flute?)

Fortunately, Honest Tex turns out to be sincere and he really does have a heart as big as Texas.  After April tells him what the crew has been saying about him, Honest Tex admits that he has been lying about something.  He was actually born in New Jersey.  April sings a song, the crew apologizes, and April and Honest Tex leave the boat a happy couple.

While this is going on, William and Betty Robinson (Don Adams and Juliet Mills) board the boat so they can get some work done.  They are married screenwriters but they are on the verge of divorce.  Once they finish their current script, they can split up.  The only problem is that William doesn’t want to split up with her.  Isaac suggests that William just never finish the script.  William hides the script in his nightstand and then, saying that it’s been lost, he works with Betty to write a new script in which a couple stays together.  Betty and William realize that they still love each other.  Betty discovers that William hid the script but she then confesses that she had another copy of the original script the whole time.  Awwwwwww!  This was a cute story.  Don Adams was a lot more likable here than he is on Check It Out! and Juliet Mills is a lot less annoying than her sister Hayley.

(Admittedly, I really only know Hayley from her time as Miss Bliss on those weird episodes of Saved By The Bell.  But seriously, Miss Bliss was the worst!)

Finally, Tom Thornton (Ross Martin) boards the boat and is surprised to see his ex-girlfriend, Martha (Marjorie Lord), and Martha’s adopted daughter, Laura Rogers (Laurie Walters).  Laura happens to be Tom’s daughter!  Tom isn’t sure whether or not he should reveal he is Laura’s father but meeting Vicki and hearing about how happy Vicki was when she discover Captain Stubing was her father leads to Tom telling Laura the truth.  Laura is happy to have a father and Martha is happy to reunite with Tom.  This was another sweet story, featuring sincere performances from both Ross Martin and Marjorie Lord.  (Plus, Vicki finally did something to justify breaking all of the labor laws that are undoubtedly being violated by having a 12 year-old working on a cruise ship.)

This episode featured two sweet and sincerely-acted stories but both of them are overshadowed by April and Honest Tex.  Personally, I think April is an amusing character and, as I said, Charo was the epitome of the ideal Love Boat celebrity guest.  But it’s still hard not to feel that the other passengers deserved just as much attention as Charo received in this episode.  That said, this was still an enjoyable cruise.  A good time was had by all.  I know Charo will return in future episodes but I have a feeling we’ll never hear from Honest Tex again.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Baywatch Nights 1.2 “Bad Blades”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing Baywatch Nights, an detective show that ran in Syndication from 1995 to 1997.  The entire show is currently streaming on Youtube!

This week, David Hasselhoff battles John O’Hurley on Baywatch Nights!

Episode 1.2 “Bad Blades”

(Dir by George Fenady, originally aired on October 7th, 1995)

Cosmetics mogul Frances Sandreen (Lois Nettleton) has hired Mitch, Garner, and Ryan to help her track down her wayward son, Todd (Jason Hervey).  Like a lot of rich and spoiled kids, Todd has had his problems with the law.  He’s a wanderer, someone who has spent most of his short life pursuing extreme sports and who dropped out of college after just a semester or two.  Mitch and Garner think that the kid sounds like a spoiled brat but they need the money so they take the case.

(Why is Mitch so poor?  He never seemed to be struggling financially on Baywatch.)

Unfortunately, Todd has fallen in with an even worse crowd than his old prep school friends.  He’s joined a group of roller-skating burglars who rob apartments and delivery vans and then skate away into the darkness.  One reason why they’re so good at their job is because they spend hours every day practicing.  If you’ve ever wanted to spend 20 minutes of your life watching footage of people skating off of ramps in slow motion, this episode should be right up your alley.

Leading this gang of thieves is the impeccably-dressed Kemp.  Kemp is played by John O’Hurley of Dancing With Stars, Family Feud, and Seinfeld fame.  (O’Hurley also appeared in a few episodes of Baywatch, always playing a different character.)  With his perfect haircut and his resonant voice, O’Hurley makes for an entertaining villain.  There’s nothing about O’Hurley’s performance that suggests that he is in any way taking the role of Kemp particularly seriously.  O’Hurley plays him like a comic book villain and that is definitely to the episode’s benefit.

As entertaining as O’Hurley and the skating scenes are, this episode reveals a huge problem with the first season of Baywatch Nights.  Other than the fact that Hasselhoff is wearing a shirt for the entire runtime, there’s nothing about this episode to really distinguish it from a typical episode of Baywatch.  Baywatch has its share of episodes about spoiled rich kids and their worried parents.  Baywatch was always looking for an excuse to pad out an episode with some extreme sports footage.  Even the scene where Garner and Mitch chase the thieves across the Los Angeles river felt like it was lifted from Baywatch or any other Los Angeles-based crime show for that matter.

As well, it’s impossible not to notice that, for an a show called Baywatch Nights, most of the action takes place during the day.  I thought being a private eye was only supposed to be Mitch’s night job.  Who is watching the beach while Mitch is investigating crimes?  It really does seem like Mitch is violating some sort of lifeguard code here.

Next week: Mitch searches for the only witness to a murder!

Retro Television Reviews: Fantasy Island 4.1 “The Devil and Mandy Breem/The Millionaire”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1986.  Almost the entire show is currently streaming is on Youtube, Daily Motion, and a few other sites.

This week, season 4 begins with …. THE DEVIL!

Episode 4.1 “The Devil and Mandy Breem/The Millionaire”

(Dir by Vince Edwards, originally aired on October 25th, 1980)

The fourth season of Fantasy Island opens with Mr. Roarke and Tattoo once again upset with each other.

When a man named Fred Catlett (Arte Johnson) wrote to Mr. Roarke and said that his fantasy was to become an instant millionaire, Roarke turned down his fantasy for …. reasons, I guess.  Seriously, becoming an instant millionaire sounds like a typical fantasy and I seem to remember that it’s one that Roarke has granted for other guests on the series.  I’m not sure why Roarke decided that poor, meek Fred Catlett was somehow unworthy of his fantasy.

For whatever reason, though, Roarke does turn down the fantasy.  So, imagine his surprise when Fred shows up on the island!  Tattoo explains that he decided to give Fred his fantasy.  Roarke tells Tattoo that he’ll receive no help and no money from him.  Tattoo is shocked and I’m wondering if this means that Fred will get a refund.  I mean, Fantasy Island is not cheap.  Actually, if Fred already had enough money to come to Fantasy Island, that does make his fantasy seem a little bit weird.  It seems like you have to be a millionaire to get your fantasy in the first place.

Roarke, I should add, is a hypocrite because he totally suspends the rules for this week’s other guest.  Mandy Breem (Carol Lynley) has come to the Island with her fantasy being that she wants the Island to save her life.  However, Mandy refused to explain all of the details of her fantasy until she came to the Island.  Roarke allows her to come, despite not knowing what she wants.  If Tattoo did something like that, Roarke would never let him hear the end of it.

So, what is Mandy’s fantasy?  A year ago, Mandy’s husband (Adam West) underwent a surgery.  Fearful of his life, Mandy made a deal with …. THE DEVIL!  She agreed that, if he saved her husband’s life, she would give up her soul in a year’s time.  Well, that year is coming to a close and Mandy has come to Fantasy Island, hoping that she can somehow get out of the deal.  The Devil (played by a dapper Roddy McDowall) has followed her and soon, Roarke must confront the Lord of Darkness for the sake of Mandy’s soul.

This is a really fun story, largely because the performance of Roddy McDowall as the devil.  Wearing a black suit and a white tie and delivering all of his lines with just the right mix of menace, sarcasm, and camp McDowall is the ideal trickster.  The smoky confrontation between Roarke and the Devil is the highlight of the episode, with both Montalban and McDowall both seeming to relish they drama of the moment.  Ricardo Montalban once said that, while the show’s producers wanted to keep Roarke as enigmatic as possible, he always envisioned Roarke as being a fallen angel who was doing his penance on Fantasy Island.  And, indeed, there is a hint of that in his confrontation with the Devil, with the show suggesting that this is neither the first nor the final time that the two shall meet.

As for the other fantasy, Tattoo’s solution is to steal a magic lamp and give it to Mike.  Mike rubs the lamp and wishes for a million dollars.  A briefcase full of money flies through the sky and lands in front of him.  Mike is convinced the magic worked but actually the briefcase was tossed out of a moving car and now, three thieves (Arlene Golonka, Ross Martin, and Joe Turkel) want their money back!  It all works out in the end.  Despite Roarke’s earlier refusal to grant Fred his wish, this was ultimately a typical Fantasy Island fantasy.  While it really couldn’t compete with Mr. Roarke facing off against the Devil, it did, at least, give Tattoo something to do.  One gets the feeling that this episode was specifically conceived so that both Ricardo Montalban and Herve Villechaize could get their chance in the spotlight without having to actually interact with each other.  And it works out wonderfully, with Tattoo’s silly antics providing a nice balance to the more dramatic stuff involving Mr. Roarke.

All in all, even if it’s obvious that Ricardo Montalban and Herve Villechaize were still not getting along behind the scene, this was a fantastic start for season 4!