Gary Collins, RIP

Gary Collins was one of those  actors like Monty Markham and Laurence Luckinbill, who were handsome leading-men types, but despite starring in several series, never had a hit. This would doom him to guest-star parts in "The Love Boat," or "Murder She Wrote."

I remember him from "The Sixth Sense" TV series. In the early 70s a big ESP fad was sweeping the country. I can imagine an ABC executive seeing an ESP story on the cover of Time, and getting a producer on the phone, "Get me a ESP detective show!"

So Collins played a psychic university professor who used his psychic abilities to solve psychic crimes. The character is a wonderful necessity of paranormal and science fiction movies. There's always a pipe-smoking professor who has some scientific explanation for the fantastic plot, and though the explanation would never stand up to any scrutiny, it's a way of giving the viewer permission to go along for the ride.

Tokyo newspaper reporter: 

Doctor Suzuki, a 90-foot sea monster just rose from the sea.

Dr. Suzuki (stroking his beard):

 Yes, recent nuclear testing in that area could have released a 90-foot sea monster lying dormant for 65 million years.

Audience: 

Good enough for me! Let's see the monster stomp through Tokyo!


This time though, instead of being an extraneous character, the professor was the star.

A typical episode would be Collins being called to some Gothic mansion in a small town, where a damsel has been having horrible, violent visions. Collins would show up, and he too would suffer from these visions. And, as it turns out, the damsel is first in line for a big inheritance, and her uncle, who was next in line for the money was using his psychic powers to drive his niece mad by projecting these visions.

And by typical episode, I mean every episode.

This show was a victim of the early 70s Universal television practice of super padding. Collins and the damsel would have a psychic episode and that would include the camera zooming in on Collins' eyes, the camera zooming in on the damsel's eyes, psychedelic scenes of fire, the camera spinning round and round, negative images of everything I just said, all repeated again and again, interminably.

The series would be chopped up and repackaged into "Night Gallery" syndicated reruns. And the psychic segments were still too long.

To its credit, it was the first paranormal investigation show. "Kolchak: The Night Stalker" would come along a little later and though not a hit either, it was a much better show. It had a more interesting leading character, a different monster every week, a lot of cynicism, and...a sense of humor.

This would lead to "The X-Files," which was "Kolchak" with money and time to develop the characters and its own mythology.

Review: Hotel Transylvania

Adam Sandler spends the whole movie playing Dracula with an Eastern European accent which is unfortunate because it's this constant reminder of Steve Carell's accent in the much better, much funnier "Despicable Me."

You sit there and start analyzing. Why was "Despicable Me" so much better? Better jokes, better characters, better plot, better pacing? Pretty much all of the above. It's distracting, you stop paying attention to the film and keep recalling better-done scenes in "Despicable Me."

I saw it with my 5-year-old son and we both sat there for 90 minutes waiting for the movie to start getting funny, and with the exception of a few chortles, it never takes off. Granted it was a Wednesday night, the theater was empty. But the jokes and pacing were leaden.

The film is a mash-up of Rankin-Bass' "Mad Monster Party," and those '60s movies about uptight dads who can't stand the thought of their daughters growing up ("The Impossible Years," with David Niven, "Take Her She's Mine," with Jimmy Stewart. Also the 70s "Super Dad," with Bob Crane, and Tony Danza's "She's Out of Control" from the 80s.).

(These movies are funny because the dad doesn't want his daughter dating hippies, and the guys she's hanging out with are squeaky clean Kurt Russell, Bruno Kirby types).

And I kept thinking about the monster jokes from "Mad Monster Party." They're pretty much the same jokes.

And if you can sum up all the many cliches in this movie in one line it would be: "He's in love and he must get to the airport!"

More actresses who deserved better

In an earlier post I wrote about TV actresses who got the thankless job of being the girlfriend of Little Joe, Capt. Kirk, Dr. Richard Kimble, and after a quick courtship and sometimes marriage, get killed by rustlers/Klingons/whatever.

Here's some more, but as we moved into the 70s the actresses sometimes got better parts later on.

France Nguyen (above) was one of Capt. Kirk's girlfriends who didn't get killed, but some 20 years later played a doctor on St. Elsewhere. My point is, whereas most Capt. Kirk girlfriend types continued to play girlfriends and secretaries, a few got roles as professionals. It took 20 years, but it happened.

Bonnie Bedelia, all in one episode of Bonanza, met Little Joe, fell in love with him, married him, then was killed by rustlers (I think). She would later get the thankless roles as wife of Bruce Willis/Harrison Ford. Whereas most of Harrison Ford's movie wives were hostages, Bedelia actually had a strong role in "Presumed Innocent." She was Willis' hostage wife in Die Hard and Die Hard 2.

She got rave reviews as Shirley Muldowney in "Heart Like a Wheel," which makes the hostage wife roles more tragic. She did play a precinct commander on "The District."

Anne Archer was the thankless wife in "Fatal Attraction," and one of Harrison Ford's hostage wives in "Patriot Games."

Meg Foster was a perpetual guest star through the 70s-90s. She had a strong role in Sam Pekinpah's "The Osterman Weekend," and was half of "Cagney & Lacey" for a few episodes before getting booted from the show for whatever reason. Once again, an actress who deserved better.

Bugs Bunny news

The story is Warner Bros. is going to make another Bugs Bunny live action/CGI film and Jenny Slate is going to write it.

The Jenny Slate thing doesn't bother me, afterall, she was the best thing about the last Alvin and the Chipmunks film.

The CGI thing doesn't bother me, this is the future, there's no turning back.

What bothers me is the live action part. Why why why must they do this? Why can't it be *all* cartoon? Roger Rabbit ruined full-length character-revival cartoons for everyone. Think about it, every time a classic cartoon has been revived it had to be done part live action:

Rocky and Bullwinkle, The Chipmunk films, Casper, the last two Loony Tunes films, the Smurfs! And what did they all have in common? Mostly all of them sucked! (I'm giving a pass to "Loony Tunes Back in Action," because though it did suck, Joe Dante's heart was in the right place, and there were a million funny ideas, but the whole film just didn't come together (The Louvre sequence came closest to bringing Chuck Jones back to life))

I don't see Pixar teaming the Incredibles up with Justin Beiber, nor have they teamed up Nemo with Tyler Perry. There's a reason Pixar doesn't put live-action actors in its movies: Because Pixar doesn't want to make movies that blow!

Bugs Bunny doesn't need Brendan Fraser, Bugs Bunny doesn't need Jenna Elfman, and as God as my witness, Bugs Bunny doesn't need Michael Jordan (worst idea for movie ever).

I'll tell you who else Bugs Bunny didn't need: Clark Gable. Think of those Loony Tunes when they slipped in movie stars from the 1940s. Children from all over the world watch these cartoons today and say, "I don't get it." Putting real people in these movies dates them...immediately... and you might get a chuckle the year the film comes out, but after that, you get a movie that blows.

Give me a movie with all the Loony Tunes characters on a 90-minute adventure with lots of subversive humor.

Adventure Comics 395

So back on Krypton they had these triceratop creatures who had giant flat-screen TVs on their heads that showed the viewer the animal's intentions, which for the most part were eating the viewer. In fact I think this was the only channel on triceratop TV, the triceratop eating you.

Let's look at some practical implications. If that animal is charging you, do you really need to read its mind to know what it wants to do?

Second, apparently, DC Comics invented the flat-screen TV.

Seriously though...

This was not the Kryptonian Thought Beast's first appearance in DC Comics, I know he appeared before but I couldn't tell you when or where. It might have been one of those Mort Weisinger stories of Superman going back in time to Krypton where he, Lois or Lana were always screwing around with Kryptonian history.

I read this when I was 7. I didn't buy it though, one of my brothers or sisters might have brought it in the house. Either way I remember staring at the vivid colors on the Swan-Anderson cover and falling in love with Supergirl.

The book disappeared (I suspect mom threw it out), this was before I was buying/collecting, so years later I tracked down the issue and snapped it up. (Pre-eBay, no easy feat). Upon revisiting the book I was surprised that the cover image represented the back-up story! And the art inside was by Kurt Shaffenberger, and as good as he was, he wasn't as good as Swanderson.

All in all, a lot of fun for 15 cents, and then 10 years later for $5.

Review: "How to Murder Your Wife"

I just caught this Jack Lemmon comedy on TCM (again). If I turn on the TV and it's on, I have to sit through the whole thing.

First of all, it's a relic! An anachronism! A Mad Men, first couple seasons of Bewitched look at how men regarded woman in the early 60s. Single women were for sex and ogling, and wives were smothering/mothering annoying obstacles to freedom! And, it was a man's world, what MST3K would describe as "when doughy white men walked the earth." Lots of martinis and palling with the boys, and suits and ties.

The creators had no idea they were making a timepiece

If you ignore some of the unsavory implications (at one point, Lemmon slips his wife a "goofball."), it's actually very funny. And the last scene between Lemmon and his wife (Virna Lisi, filmed to look even more beautiful than she really is) is actually very sweet.

R.I.P. Joe Kubert

His career spanned 70 years! He was always 10 years ahead of most other artists. It's an amazing body of work.