Monthly Archives: April 2024

Late Night Retro Television Review: Monsters 2.4 “Rerun”

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 series is streaming on YouTube.

This week, we learn about the dark side of celebrity.

Episode 2.4 “Rerun”

(Dir by John Auerbach, originally aired October 22nd, 1989)

Allison (Rachel Jones) and Max (Mitchell Whitfield) are anthropology students and roommates.  Max would like to be even more but Allison is hopelessly in love with a man who she has not only never met but who is dead!

Tony Sterling (Max Nassar) was an actor who starred on a show where he drove a motorcycle across America.  Tony recently died but Allison keeps a big poster of him hanging in her bedroom.  Allison says she isn’t worried about studying for her upcoming exam because she’s been praying to the poster.  Uhmm …. okay …. I mean, I had a huge crush on James Franco back in the day but I never prayed to him….

Suddenly, Tony appears in the bedroom and declares his love for Allison.  Allison is so overjoyed that she doesn’t care that he’s dead and that he keeps biting her neck.  Max, however, is a bit more concerned so he goes to see Tony’s agent (Kaye Ballard), who explains that Tony was a Satanist who couldn’t even ride a motorcycle!  In fact, Tony couldn’t even talk to people.  He had to have his small talk written out for him by a crack team of publicists.

Max returns to the apartment to confront Tony with proof that he’s both a talentless hack and a lamprey-in-human-form.  (Earlier, Max talked about a tribe that believed that everyone’s soul was an animal.  Apparently, Tony has the soul of a lamprey.)  Realizing the truth about Tony, Allison rejects him.  Tony attacks Max.  Can Allison flush a ring that Tony gave her down a toilet quickly enough to send Tony’s soul back to Hell?

Fear not — she can!  This is one of the few episodes of Monsters to have a straight-up happy ending and I’m glad that I did.  Allison and Max were a cute couple and it would have been unbearably cruel to not allow them to be together or to have one of them turn out to be a demon.  You want them to get together and if it takes dealing with an incubus for them to come together, so be it.

Actually, this episode is probably more relevant today than it was when it was first release.  There’s not much difference between Allison praying to her poster of Tony and the people who spend all day searching social media for any heretics who fail to worship at the altar of their favorite performers.  If this episode were made today, Allison would be praying to Timothee Chalamet and Taylor Swift.  That’s not to say that Timothee and Taylor are lampreys, of course.  It’s just that people have always worshipped those who have accomplished some sort of celebrity.  Anyone who is anyway famous has at least a few people who have devoted their lives to them.  It’s creepy but it’s the way of the world.

Retro Television Review: The Love Boat 4.12 “Doc’s Dismissal/A Frugal Pair/The Girl Next Door”

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, Doc’s in trouble!

Episode 4.12 “Doc’s Dismissal/A Frugal Pair/The Girl Next Door”

(Dir by Richard Kinon, originally aired on January 3rd, 1981)

Carl (Lew Ayres) and his wife, Violet (Janet Gaynor), board the boat in a good mood.  Carl has just retired from the post office and they’re about to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary.  Awwwww!  Carl and Violet are the sweetest couple ever, frequently referring to each other by pet names.  They’re also very frugal.  Violet brings her own tea bag on board.  Carl turns down a bottle of champagne.  They are a nice old couple who know the value of pinching a penny.

But, on the morning of their anniversary, Violet tells Carl a secret and everything changes.  It turns out that Violet has been buying stock for years.  She based her purchases on whatever pet name Carl used for her that day.  If the name started with a G, she bought General Motors.  If it started with an S, she bought Standard Oil.  Once, Carl used a name that started with a “Z,” and she bought stock in Xerox.  She explains that she didn’t know how Xerox was spelled at the time.  (So, how did she buy the stock?)  Anyway, the important thing is that Carl and Violet are rich and they have been for several decades.

Carl is upset by this news.  If he had known he was rich, he wouldn’t have spent years at the post office!  I see his point though, to be honest, they’re not that rich.  The total stock portfolio is only worth $200,000.  Still, Carl and Violet stop speaking to each other.  Julie, Isaac, and Gopher jump into action and throw them an anniversary party, which causes Carl and Violet to remember how much they love each other.

Meanwhile, Charley Cole (Sal Viscuso) tells Pam Madison (Lynda Goodfriend) that he’s with the CIA so that she’ll let him stay in her cabin so that he can spy on his girlfriend (Denise DuBarry) and the guy (Stephen Shortridge) with whom she is cheating.  Got all that?  This storyline was incredibly dumb but it was saved by the frantic performance of Sal Viscuso, who managed to make even the lamest of lines seem funny.

Finally, Sally (Jessica Walter) boards the ship with her lout of a husband, Hank (Alex Cord).  Hank is the type of jerk who looks at other women while his wife is sitting right next to him.  Complaining of a headache, Sally goes to Doc Bricker’s cabin for some aspirin.  Doc, who has witnessed Hank’s bad behavior, is sympathetic to Sally.  Later, Sally tries to make Hank jealous by saying that Doc hit on her when she went to see him.

Angered, Hank calls the captain and accuses Doc of sexually harassing his wife.  The Captain is forced to suspend Doc from his duties until an investigation can be launched.  The crew is shocked.  Doc would never hit on a patient, they all say.  Except, of course, Doc does exactly that every single episode!  Seriously, Doc is a walking HR nightmare.  (Fortunately, for Doc, he was played by the always likable Bernie Kopell.)  When the captain makes it clear that Doc could be fired and lose his medical license, Sally admits that he never hit on her.  Doc keeps his job and somehow, all of this fixes Sally and Hank’s marriage.  Later, Gopher and Isaac joke about how Doc got in trouble for the one time he “didn’t hit on a passenger.”  Gopher and Isaac aren’t blind to what’s happening.

This was a surprisingly effective episode.  Lew Ayres and Janet Gaynor were adorable and Jessica Walter’s intense, method performance as a desperately unhappy wife provided a good change-of-pace from all of the usual Love Boat goofiness.  Even with all of the CIA nonsense, this was an entertaining cruise.

Music Video of the Day: Lose You Now by Lindsey Stirling and Mako (2021, dir by Lindsey Stirling and Stephen Wayne Mallett)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Today’s music video of the days comes from one of my favorite musical artists, the great Lindsey Stirling.  This otherworldly video has a wonderfully dream-like feel to it.  Lindsey has said that the video is meant to serve as a tribute to the memory of her father.

Enjoy!

Late Night Retro Television Review: Baywatch Nights 1.22 “Heat Rays”

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, a detective show that ran in Syndication from 1995 to 1997.  The entire show is currently streaming on You tube!

This week, season one comes to a close.

Episode 1.22 “Heat Rays”

(Dir by Peter Roger Hunt, originally aired on May 18th, 1996)

The first season wraps up with an episode that doesn’t really add up too much.

As was typical of the latter half of this show’s first season, this episode actually tells two separate stories.  In the first one, Donna is stopped while driving at night by three panicked people on a bridge.  They say that their friend is in the water below.  Donna jumps into the ocean, just to discover that it was all a trick to steal her car.

Donna floats around for a while.  She passes the time by talking to herself.  To be honest, she holds up surprisingly well for someone who is stranded in the middle of the ocean.  Eventually, a boat stops to help her.  Unfortunately, the two men on the boat are drug dealers and, when they’re both shot by a bunch of guys on a bigger boat, it’s up to Donna to save them and get them to dry land.

That may sound like an intriguing storyline but, oddly enough, it gets abandoned fairly quickly.  I kept waiting for Donna’s storyline to somehow intersect with the other storyline but it never did.  No one even thought to say, “Hey, where’s Donna?”  If I was Donna, I would be pretty mad about that.

As for the other storyline, it features Mitch, Garner, and Ryan investigating a series of murders and attempted murders that all involve the members of an old surf band called The Heat Rays.  It ultimately turns out that they’re being targeted by the daughter (Christa Sauls) of a woman (played by Judy Geeson) who was raped by several members of the band.

Again, that may sound like a storyline that has the potential to be intriguing.  And there is an interesting subtext to the story, as Mitch and Garner are forced to admit that their favorite band wasn’t as innocent and wholesome as they chose to remember.  But, in typical Baywatch Nights fashion, the story was a bit too predictable to really work.  It was easy to figure out who the murderer was because there was really only one suspect from the start.

This episode had a violent streak just felt out of place.  Baywatch Nights, in both its first season and its supernatural-themed second season, was essentially a goofy detective show starring David Hasselhoff.  Having multiple people die over the course of one episode just didn’t feel right for such a lightweight show.  Some shows are meant to be violent.  Some shows are at their best when they embrace their inherent silliness.  Baywatch Nights is the latter type of show.

So much for the first season.  Unfortunately, the show never really found a consistent identity or style during the first season.  However, that would change with the second season.

We’ll find out how next week!

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 4.21 “Basin Street/The Devil’s Triangle”

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 1984.  Almost the entire show is currently streaming on Daily Motion.

This week is a bit uneven.  Let’s dive into it!

Episode 4.21 “Basin Street/The Devil’s Triangle”

(Dir by George W. Brooks, originally aired on May 2nd, 1981)

Pilot Clay Garrett (Joe Namath — yes, the goofy football player) and cameraman Tom Spencer (Christopher Connelly) have come to Fantasy Island with Kerry Dawson (Trish Stewart).  Kerry is the host of a show where she explores isolated locations of the world.  Clay flies her where she’s going.  Tom films her.  Throughout the episode, it is suggested that — much like the characters at the center of Cannibal Holocaust — they’ve occasionally been guilty of staging the footage that has made them famous.

Kerry wants to search for the remains of an airplane that disappeared over 40 years ago.  The plane was flown by the famed aviatrix Wilma Deitrich.  Why they don’t just admit that Wilma is a stand-in for Amelia Earhart, I have no idea.  Mr. Roarke warns Kerry that the fantasy could be dangerous but he does not stop Clay, Tom, and Kerry from boarding a plane and then flying out across the ocean.

The plane ends up in the Devil’s Triangle, which I guess is this show’s version of the Bermuda Triangle.  The plane crashes on an uncharted island.  Kerry gets bitten by a snake and Clay sucks out the poison before he and Tom set off to look for the remains of Wilma’s plane.  Clay and Tom, incidentally, are both in love with Wilma.  Will Wilma select the boring cameraman or the boring pilot who sucked snake venom out of her body?

It’s a question that would perhaps be more compelling if Kerry had the slightest bit of chemistry with either man.  But she doesn’t.  Joe Namath is as stiff here as he was in C.C. and Company.  Christopher Connelly looks bored.  Kerry does eventually pick Clay so hopefully, they’ll be happy together.

(And yes, they do get off the island.  They find the wreckage of Wilma’s plane and use it to repair their own plane.  Amazingly, Wilma’s plan is still full of operational parts despite having spent over 40 years sitting on a deserted island.)

As for the other fantasy, Charlie Raines (Cleavon Little) wants to go to turn of the century New Orleans and meet his hero, jazzman Camptown Dodd (Raymond St. Jacques).  Roarke and Tattoo give him a magic clarinet and send him to New Orleans, where he immediately finds himself auditioning for Camptown.  Camptown wants Charlie to not only join his band but also lead it after his death.

DEATH!?

Yes, death.  Camptown refuses to sell Opium in his club and, as a result, he has been targeted for assassination by a corrupt police officer.  Charlie is so upset about this that Roarke himself steps into the fantasy to let Charlie know that he can’t change the past.

Okay, so Charlie can’t save Camptown but surely, he can bring Billie Joe (Berlinda Tolbert) into the present with him, right?  Afterall, Charlie has fallen in love with her.  No, Roarke says, that’s not how it works.

Fear not, though!  Once he’s in the present, Charlie discovers that Billie Joe was actually a guest at the Island and that Roarke combined two fantasies into one.  Yay!

The jazz fantasy was predictable but it was still better than the other fantasy.  Cleavon Little, Raymond St. Jacques, and Berlinda Tolbert all actually seemed to be invested in their characters, which made them a lot more fun to watch than the stiffs on the deserted island.

This week’s trip to the Island was a bit uneven.  The jazz fantasy was occasionally entertaining.  The other fantasy was forgettable.  I don’t hold that against, Mr. Roarke.  That’s just the way it goes sometimes.

Music Video of the Day: You Know My Name by Courtney Love (2014, dir by Maximilla Lukacs)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Yesterday, I saw that Courtney Love was trending on the site formerly known as Twitter.  Assuming that the news would be bad, I clicked to find out why.

It turned out that the news was not bad at all.  Courtney gave an interview in which she said that she personally didn’t care for Beyonce’s music and that she thought Taylor Swift was boring.  Needless to say, the fandoms are in an uproar over someone daring to have a different opinion.  Personally, regardless of my feelings about any of the singers that she mentioned, I applaud Courtney Love for reminding us that we are not required to all feel the same way about every artist.  There’s nothing wrong with having your own tastes.

A lot of Swifties responded to the interview by tweeting, “Who is Courtney Love?”

She’s been around for a while.  Maybe today’s music video of the day will help.

Enjoy!