BABYLON BERLIN. Sky 1, a German-language entertainment channel broadcast by Sky Deutschland, premiering on 13 October 2017. The first broadcast consisted of a continuous run of sixteen episodes, with the first eight officially known as Season 1, and the second eight known as Season 2. Volker Bruch, Liv Lisa Fries, Peter Kurth, Matthais Brandt. Teleplays by Henk Handolegten, Tom Tykwer, Achim Von Borries (series creators also directors of all sixteen episodes), and author Volker Kutscher.
Currently there seems to be a taste in Europe for noirish gritty cop dramas, and few of them are grittier or darker than Babylon Berlin (available on Netflix) set in a handsomely rendered Weimar Berlin circa 1929 as the leftover guilt and humiliation of the Great War, the rise of National Socialism, the decadence that inspired the Christopher Isherwood’s Goodbye Berlin and the musicalCabaret, and good and bad people caught up in events they can’t control combine with the inevitability of history.
Gereon Rath (Volker Bruch) is a policeman from Cologne, a troubled veteran of the war with PTSD (called here the trembles) and repressed memories. He has been assigned to Berlin on a mission to find a pornographic film the mayor of Cologne is being blackmailed over and assigned to Vice with fat, corrupt, but effective cop Chief Inspector Wolter (Peter Kurth).
The plot of this sixteen part series that ran two seasons spirals out from that basic situation. A train traveling from the Soviet Union is hijacked by Troskeyites smuggling a car carrying gold to Istanbul to be used against Stalin unaware the train also carries illegal phosgene gas the Soviets have sold to a secretive right wing military group (who Wolter, among others, belongs to) hoping to restore the Kaiser by bringing down the democratic government.
Meanwhile there is unrest between the police and communists in Berlin threatening to end in violence, Rath and Wolter are closing in on the pornography ring, and a powerful gangster the Armenian (Meisel Mateicvic) tied to the porn ring runs a decadent night club where the chief performer is a crossdressing singer Sevetlana (Severijia Janusauskaite) playing her Trotskeyite lover, the Soviets, and the industrialist importing the poison gas who is also her lover all against each other so she can get the gold.
Did I mention the May Day riots that kill two hundred communist protesters that the police are trying to cover up, or that Rath is having an affair with the wife of his brother missing since the war whose disappearance is tied to Rath’s illness, the Soviet Secret police, an assassination plot meant to trigger the overthrow of the Weimar government, or the mysterious scarred doctor (Jens Harzer) who has ties to the gangster and an unnatural interest in Rath including substituting his own drugs for the one Rath secretly takes?
There is also Charlotte Ritter (Fries), living in a hovel with her dying mother, two sisters, evil brother in law, and senile grandfather. Lotte is a party girl, dancing her nights away madly in the club owned by the Armenian and working part time as a prostitute in the basement while by day working for the police as a piece work secretary to keep a roof over her family. Lotte develops a crush on Rath and an ambition to become an assistant investigator under him even when Wolter blackmails her into spying on Rath.
Also involved in Commissioner Brenda (Brandt), a moral Jewish policeman who represents the best of Rath’s ambitions as the world around him and his own morality become ever more difficult to balance against the pressures of a city and nation in turmoil, both moral and political.
The cast is uniformly fine, playing believable wounded individuals whose innocence can be as damning as their sins. No one emerges unsullied by the world collapsing around them, and even victories are tinged with the viewers knowledge that history is going to test them far beyond the corruption of their modern Babylon.
Scenarist Volker Kutscher wrote a novel based on the series and since has written several novels based on the further adventures of Gereon Rath though whether any of them will be dramatized is uncertain. Babylon Berlin is an involving mystery, complex as a Chandler plot, morally questionable as Hammett’s world, and handsomely realized, perfectly designed for binging. For all its darkness it is a highly satisfying excursion into modern European noir.
TV IN 2019: PART ONE – STREAMING SERVICES
by Michael Shonk
The entertainment called television has escaped the boundaries of the TV set and now can be found almost anywhere. So where are all those shows hiding?
During the last few years the total of original scripted TV series has approached nearly five hundred every year. With the upcoming explosion of new major media players joining the streaming wars the number of scripted original shows should increase like bunny rabbits.
The business of television is in chaos as even the major broadcast networks are now minor players left playing a role for their business masters or they are struggling to find a way to stay relevant. But more about that in Part Two, in which broadcast networks and cable will be covered.
Many of you have probably sampled or subscribed to at least one streaming service. The main ones have been NETFLIX, Amazon Prime and Hulu. Soon some of the world’s largest media conglomerates – Disney, AT&T (WarnerMedia), Comcast, and Apple will debut their streaming services, all with their own original programs.
CBS has fought off media conglomerate Viacom and started its own streaming service with original programs. However due to the fall of CBS mogul Les Moonves, and Viacom slow but steady recovery, few would be surprised if Viacom and CBS rejoin together. Viacom recently bought streaming service Pluto to use to streaming all of its cable networks once it’s ready.
Many other networks – broadcast and cable – have an online site where you can catch up on their programs you might have missed.
A streaming service – usually for a fee – allows you to watch TV shows and movies on your computer or other devices via the Internet. There are smart TVs such as Roku, over the top box such as Apple TV and devices such as Amazon’s Fire stick that connects your TV to the streaming world.
Netflix remains one of the most successful and powerful studios in the World. As it continues to develop original programming faster than any viewer could possible watch, Netflix has also created a film studio and plans to become a major player in movies as well as television.
One update from the clip, BLACK MIRROR is playing on Netflix now. I would add to the list of shows worth checking out – THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY, SANTA CLARITA DIET, and DARK CRYSTAL: AGE OF RESISTANCE (coming in August).
Netflix has also rescued two network series from recent cancellation – LUCIFER (FOX) and DESIGNATED SURVIVIOR (ABC). It has been announced LUCIFER has been renewed for another season after its current – it will be the fifth and last.
DISNEY is now the top media giant in the business. It owns the rights to Mickey Mouse, Marvel, The Simpsons and Star Wars. It currently runs two streaming services –ESPN+ and Hulu.
Hulu has been around for some time and was owned by Disney, Fox, Comcast and WB. Disney now has full control over Hulu and plans to continue its focus on TV series, especially network and cable TV series. Hulu is not best known for its originals but THE HANDMAID’S TALE, CHANCE and CATCH 22 are worth checking out.
Disney+ will be the company’s third streaming service and the one that will get most of the attention. This is the one Netflix needs to fear. It will be available this year and one of its first original series will be STAR WARS MANDALORIAN
This year will also see AT&T join in the TV streaming fun. Its recent purchase of Time Warner gave the phone company a strong presence in the cable world. Reportedly the new service will be called WarnerMedia. They are still working on what kind of service will they offer. Will it be one service uniting HBO, Cinemax and all of WarnerMedia to cost $16-$17 a month or will it be a three tier – basic, HBO and premium? WarnerMedia has announced its first original program. TOYKO VICE will star Ansel Elgort and is based on the non-fiction book by Jake Adelstein.
Warners have not had much success in the streaming business. Warner Archive with its over priced small library of old movies and TV series was a failure. DC UNIVERSE has had two minor success with DOOM PATROL and TITANS, but the service just cancelled SWAMP THING after one episode. Boomerang is an offshoot of the cable Cartoon Network spin-off network Boomerang. It focuses on post 50s to today era of classic cartoons such as Bugs Bunny, Yogi Bear, Scooby Doo, and 90s favorite KIDS NEXT DOOR.
Premium channels have their own streaming service that can also be found at Apple TV and Amazon Prime (for the price of subscription). These channels also offer apps that allow you to subscribe to the streaming service and watch it without needing cable.
WarnerMedia has the most successful of the pay networks HBO. There is a question about what HBO will replace the epic hit GAMES OF THRONES with. At the moment only one series, THE LONG NIGHT will come from the world of GAMES. However THE LONG NIGHT will take place in Westero a thousand years before the GAMES timeline. Of course HBO does have some other shows to watch.
Cinemax has grown up from its days as a soft porn cable network. Today it does some wonderful action series such as C.B. STRIKE, RELLIK, WARRIOR and JETT.
CBS owns premium channel SHOWTIME and streaming CBS ALL ACCESS.
SHOWTIME has always stood in the pay TV shadow of HBO and now it has even more competition. Perhaps its highlight of 2019 will be CITY ON A HILL.
CBS ALL ACCESS is best known for the CBS classic TV series and originals STAR TREK DISCOVERY, THE TWILIGHT ZONE (with host Jordan Peele) and THE GOOD FIGHT (sequel to THE GOOD WIFE). Currently in season three, the critic favorite GOOD FIGHT will air season one this summer on CBS.
STARZ has increased its original programming over the last few years featuring high production values in such series as BLACK SAILS, WHITE PRINCESS and my favorite COUNTERPART (that ended recently after two seasons),
I recently reduced my cable to just basic and had to live without my favorite network EPIX. I discovered EPIX app and for $5.99 I am again watching series such as BERLIN STATION, GET SHORTY, DEEP STATE, and PERPETUAL GRACE LTD on my Roku TV and without cable.
COMCAST owns NBC Universal and all the cable stations that go with it. It has plans for a free ad supported streaming service this year but has fallen behind its fellow growing media giants.
Apple TV is a box that connects your TV to streaming services. Apple TV+ debuts sometime this year as a streaming service specializing in Apple’s original programs
Did you notice AMAZING STORIES is coming back with new stories and produced by Stephen Spielberg? Below is a promo for FOR ALL MANKIND, a TV series set in an alternative history where the Russians were first to the Moon.
Of course I have not forgotten Amazon Prime. Prime exists to promote free shipping at a retail online store. There are many services offered to Prime members and the video streaming is just one of them and because of that it can get lost and forgotten.
Prime, like Netflix and Hulu, has save broadcast and cable TV from cancellation. After three seasons of THE EXPANSE SyFy could no longer afford to make the series. Fortunately, Prime will air the original fourth season of TV’s best science fiction series THE EXPANSE. I recommend you watch the first three seasons now on Prime.
There are a nice variety of original programs hiding on Prime worth watching such as BOSCH, PATROIT, GOLIATH, FLEABAG, SNEAKY PETE, and MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE.
There seems to be a streaming service for every taste, genre and need. A good place to find the small service for you is to search through Amazon Prime Channels.
Fans of British TV should start at BRITBOX, a streaming service from the BBC and ITV. Most of the best of British TV can be found there including every classic DOCTOR WHO episode in existence. My one complaint is there is not enough 60s series, especially not enough from ITV.
Acorn is a service that airs series from Britain, but also Australia and New Zealand. New Zealand’s BROKENWOOD MYSTERIES remains high on my favorites list. Currently Acorn has five seasons and a six is on its way.
Small streaming services such as Acorn can offer you first glimpse of quality TV before mainstream television finds it. In Acorn’s case it was the first to show MISS FISHER’S MURDER MYSTERIES in America. Since MISS FISHER ended with season 3, Acorn has the Australian sequel called MS FISHER’S MODERN MYSTERIES – Miss Fisher’s niece joins the Adventuress Club to solve mysteries in the groovy 1960s.
If you don’t mind subtitles there is the online only streaming service MHz Choice that has some of Europe’s best TV series. There is the French version of Maigret, the Italian version of Nero Wolfe, Detective Montalbano, Irene Huss, Donna Leon’s Bronetti Mysteries, Baantjer Mysteries, and so many more.
Anime can be found at each of the major streaming services. Netflix tends to focus on original anime. Hulu and Amazon Prime have older shows. Free service Crackle offers some great dubbed choices including TRIGUN and DEATH PARADE.
There are also streaming services just for the animated genre such as Crunchyroll or Funimation. I have been watching a lot of anime this year and appreciate the genre’s ability to world build completely different times, places and its own realities. My favorites include ACCA: 13-TERRITORY INSPECTION DEPARTMENT, BUNGO STRAY DOGS, 18IF, BLACK LAGOON and STEINS;GATE.
PBS MASTERPIECE has added FRANKIE DRAKE MYSTERIES. Now here is a series that illustrates how hard it is to find some of these shows. FRANKIE began at CBC (Canada) and done by the people behind MURDOCH MYSTERIES. Frankie and her fellow female PI have adventures and solve mysteries in the 1920s. It has been on Ovation under the title THE ARTFUL DETECTIVE and also on Alibi, but now on PBS streaming it finally gets a chance at a decent size audience.
SHOUT FACTORY is more into cult TV and movies.
There are many free streaming services most with ads. Here is a list suggesting some free sites you might sample.
Sony’s CRACKLE is by far the best of the free streaming services with better than average network TV series, movies and anime. It also has a growing selection of original TV series include ART OF MORE, THE OATH, and START-UP.
There are hundreds of streaming channels available from DOGTV a channel for your dogs to watch while you are away to POKERGO that offers live access to over 100 poker tournaments a year.
More and more live TV is available through streaming. MLB.com offers you the ability to watch every major league baseball game played (subject to local blackouts) as does NHL and hockey. Amazon Prime, Hulu, Yahoo, YouTube, Playstation Vue and others let you watch live events and sports on your devices beyond your TV screen.
Streaming offers the TV Viewer several advantages over broadcast and cable television. You can watch TV from around the world not just the US and a few imports. No longer is the TV viewer chained to the TV set, instead TV is available to watch wherever the viewer is. Streaming has no time periods or schedules, the days of scheduling your life around your favorite TV show are over, now your favorites wait for you.
In my next post I will examine the broadcast and cable networks, their future, their search for an identity that will set them apart from the crowd and survive the current chaos that is the business of television.
20/20. ABC. [I believe the anchors were Barbara Walters and Hugh Downs.] I watched only the opening segment, concerning a scientific explanation of UFO’s. Well, at least it’s a possible one. It has to do with seismic activity, and a form of luminous electricity generated by quartz-containing material under extreme pressure.
It’s still a theory, of course, but it does seem to fit a surprising number of cases. It sure makes a lot more sense than visitations by extraterrestrial creatures overcome by fascination for swamps, deserted highways, and isolated mountaintops. I mean, coming all that way and not even stopping off at Times Square?
***
NERO WOLFE. “Might as Well Be Dead.” NBC, 60m. Season 1, Episode 5. Cast: William Conrad as Nero Wolfe, Lee Horsley as Archie Goodwin, George Voskovec as Fritz Brenner, Robert Coote as Theodore Horstmann, George Wyner as Saul Panzer, Allan Miller as Inspector Cramer. Guest Cast: Gail Youngs, Bruce Gray, A.C. Weary, Michael Currie, Lana Wood, Stephen Elliott. Teleplay: Seeleg Lester, based on Rex Stout’s book of the same title. Director: George McCowan.
According to tonight’s paper, it looks as though we’re not going to have this show to kick around much longer. Last week it came in 62nd in the ratings. Out of 64 shows. “Friday night’s a bad night,” Judy said. “Yeah,” I replied, “and look what it’s on opposite. Dukes of Hazzard. I don’t know what the attraction is.”
Seriously, though, if this show flops, justly or not, it’s going to prove all those publishers right who say that detective fiction just doesn’t sell any more.
Tonight was TV’s version of “Might s Well Be Dead.” When Wolfe discovers the son his client wants found right on the front page of his newspaper, the subject of “synchronicity” comes up. That’s the science of fortuitous coincidence, as you may not have already known. I’ll have to look into it.
(I have to say it, but I completely failed to recognize Lana Wood when she appeared in a small part in this particular episode. I’m amazed. I don’t believe it.)
***
Want to know what kind of joke makes me laugh? Jim Stafford was on Merv Griffin’s show earlier this afternoon, and the TV set happened to be on. He told the story of how, when he was a kid, when all the other kids were out playing football, he was busy practicing with is guitar. Practice, practice, practice. “But it all paid off,” he said, picking up his guitar and displaying it proudly. “I can kick this sucker sixty yards.”
DEPARTMENT Q – THE KEEPER OF LOST CAUSES. Denmark, 2013, as Kvinden i buret. Nickolaj Lie Kaas, Fares Fare, Per Sheel Krüger, Sonja Richter Teleplay Nicolaj Arcel, Jussi Adler-Olsen (his novel). Directed by Mikkel Nørgard. [The first film in the “Department Q” series, followed by The Absent One (2014), and A Conspiracy of Faith (2016).]
Another fine example of Scandinavian Noir, based on Jussi Adler-Olsen’s novels of Department Q, the closed case section of the Copenhagen police headed by damaged and difficult Chief detective Carl Mørck (Nicolaj Lie Kaas), an arrogant and sullen cop whose last two partners were killed and crippled in a case that left Mørck wounded and unable to work Homicide, the first of a series of made for television movies that are dark, violent, complex, and intelligent.
In The Keeper of Lost Causes Mørck returns to work to find himself assigned to Department Q, in the basement, to work cold cases, basically spend two days on them and close them. His assistant is Detective Assad (Fares Fare), a Muslim, who like Carl has nowhere to go in the department.
Carl hasn’t much hope for the new job until he discovers one of cases involves the disappearance of Merette Lyndgard (Sonja Richter) five years earlier. Merette, a government official, went aboard the ferry with her mentally disabled brother and at some point apparently committed suicide by jumping overboard.
Carl wanted the case five years earlier when it was assigned to Bak, a detective he considers a moron. It never made sense to Carl that Merette would take her mentally unstable brother on the ferry with her if she planned to commit suicide.
The bulk of the drama involves Carl and Assad probing deeper into the case bungled by their predecessor, their battles with superiors who don’t really want cold cases solved, just stored away, and flashbacks to what actually happened to Merette, all while Carl and Assad gradually become a trusting partnership. All while building an impressive line of suspense more reminiscent of a movie than something made for television.
When Assad is able to get close to Merette’s mentally closed off brother Uffe, the two discover Merette’s suicide may have been something else entirely, and begin to put together a case that leads to a second murder in Sweden and a motive for incredible revenge that dates back to Merette’s childhood and the tragic accident that left her brother mentally crippled.
If you hate subtitles, you may not care for these, but all three are dark and well written, pitting Carl and Assad (well played by Kaas and Fares) against dangerous killers who prey on the weak and the innocent. Each one is deeper, trickier, and more powerful than the last, without ever being exploitative or routine. Victims, police, and even the killers are wounded humans struggling to survive, twisted by and saved by their mere humanity.
I will grant you that you would think Carl would learn to wait for backup, but it is established at the beginning of The Keeper of Lost Causes that isn’t his strong point, and satisfying as it is, they probably need to end one film without Assad beating the crap out of the bad guy after rescuing Carl, but this isn’t weekly television, and normally you probably would not watch them as close together as I did (and in all honesty Assad beating the crap out of these bad guys is a needed cathartic release by the time you get to the down to the wire endings).
All in all this is superior police drama with a touch of the great detective in its lead, and plots you won’t lightly shrug off and that have a touch of Ross Macdonald to them in their portraits of wounded people doomed by sins of the past, with just a hint of Hannibal Lector in their truly frightening killers.
Note: The films are available currently on Hulu with English subtitles.
THE GANGSTER CHRONICLES. NBC, 13 episode mini-series. Episode 1. “An American Story.” Michael Nouri (Charles ‘Lucky’ Luciano), Joe Penny (Benjamin ‘Bugsy’ Siegel), Brian Benben, Kathleen Lloyd, Madeleine Stowe, Chad Redding, Markie Post. Director: Richard C. Sarafian.
Ten minutes after turning this on I found myself asking “Why am I watching this?” I couldn’t come up with any kind of answer, so I turned it off.
Tonight’s show was both enhanced and handicapped by flashbacks to Pearl Harbor Day. (I assume you know that the show takes place in Hawaii.) Magnum’s client ts a judge who’s been nominated to the US Supreme Court, but he was once married to a Honolulu hooker, and he’s afraid of blackmail. He hires Magnum to find her.
And without the advantages of instant replay, I still don’t know how Magnum spotted the killer — the only person to know that both parties in their ill-fated romance were still alive. How’d he know. (Either one of them.)
The regular characters are solidly done. I especially like John Hillerman as Higgins, whose self-appointed job it is to keep Magnum in line. (Hillerma it also was, of course, who played the irrepressible Simon Brimmer in TV’s most recent version of Ellery Queen.)
This is getting too long. I just wanted to add that I had a crush on June Lockhart, back 25 years ago when she played Jon Provost’s mommy on Lassie. My, but aren’t men fickle. Ah, Miss Lockhart, but don’t you have a lovely daughter!
SPENSER: PALE KINGS AND PRINCES. Made for TV movie. Lifetime, 02 January 1994. Robert Urich (Spenser), Barbara Williams (Susan Silverman), Avery Brooks (Hawk), Sonja Smits, Ken James, Maurice Dean Wint, Alex Carter. Screenplay: Robert B. Parker and
Joan H. Parker, based on the former’s book of the same title. Director: Vic Sarin.
The plot is a little thin in this one, but if you like the Spenser books, as I do in general, but as I know some of you don’t, this is about as close to one of the stories that a filmed version is going to get. I say that not because I’ve read the book as well as seen the movie. The truth is, I read the book so long ago I’m simply not able to compare the two.
No, the reason for saying this is that Robert B. Parker and his wife Joan are the screenwriters, and she was one of several co-producers. If that doesn’t give you some sort of say in how a movie comes out, it’s difficult to say what does.
One difference that I seem to remember from the book is that when Spenser makes a trip into the mid-central section of Massachusetts — a small hamlet named Wheaton, which probably doesn’t really exist — to look into the death of a investigate reporter who was killed there, in the movie Susan comes with him. In the book, she only commutes back and forth between Wheaton ad Boston. In the the movie, her motivation for staying close on the scene is that the reporter was one of her clients in psychotherapy.
What this change does, though, is allow the two of them to work on the investigation together while staying in the same small motel room and eating together in the same dingy diner. This gives the a lot more time to indulge in witty banter together, and to give Susan the opportunity to see her man in action, up close and personal.
And what action means to Spenser, of course, is barging right in, asking questions, and making a general nuisance of himself — and no small number of enemies, a term that applies to the local police force as well as possible local drug lords. Wheaton has a population that has been substantially bolstered in recent years by a influx of refugee Colombians, and when they have been unable to find work, they have turned to dope peddling, or so it has been rumored. This may be the reason behind the reporter’s death — or it may be his non-stop womanizing ways — or perhaps an even more deadly combo of the two.
Hawk shows up to help the two of them out when things get a little too tight for them on their own. I can’t think of a better actor to play the part than Avery Brooks, but Robert Urich and Barbara Williams have quite a bit of chemistry together as well. I enjoyed this one.
Echo Four Two was a 1961 British TV series spin-off from No Hiding Place in which Harry Baxter is promoted to Detective Inspector of the Q Car Squad of E Division. Thirteen episodes were planned, but the final three were cancelled due to an actor’s strike. A second season was discussed, but not commissioned, freeing Det. Insp. Baxter to return to No Hiding Place.
I kind of doubt whether any viewable episodes exist, but here’s the theme song. Turn this one up. Way up!
Officially, broadcast network TV began in 1946, meaning we are in the seventy-third year of network TV. That is a lot of TV shows.
Below I pick one series from each decade of TV starting with the 1950s. I will describe it and you can try to guess what TV series I am describing or just skip to the YouTube clip, theme or episode from the mystery series. Since YouTube videos are rarely immortal I will add the answers to the comments.
We begin in the 1950s. A famous movie actor played a Town Marshal in this Western that aired on NBC during the 1959-60 season. One more clue – one of the Marshal’s Deputies was played by the movie star’s son.
In 1967 CBS aired this hour-long series starring John Mills. Mills played a traveling lawyer in the Old West. Sean Garrison played his younger partner and protector. The series lasted thirteen episodes.
This ABC TV series from 1970s was part of all three networks run to create TV shows for young viewers. Set during the American Revolution, it featured five young people attempting to aid the patriots against the British. The series lasted fifteen episodes.
This series was the first TV adaptation of a story that has been a best-selling book, an iconic film, failed film sequel, and is now a critically acclaimed TV version currently in production for its third season. This 1980 CBS series starred Jim McMullan, James Wainwright and Connie Sellecca.
Angie Harmon has starred in several TV series but she played a PI in only one TV series, can you name it? The series aired in 1995- 97 with the style noticeably different in each season. Our YouTube answer is the complete opening episode of the series with one of TV’s oddest introductions to a TV series I have ever seen.
This fall Fox will have a new TV series about the son of a serial killer solving murders. The idea is not original, even Fox has done it before. In 2005, this series also aired on Fox and starred Johnny Messner as Detective Jack Hale, a member of the Deviant Crime Unit. No one would work with Jack because he did not get along with others and had a Daddy who was a serial killer.
Name this NBC techno-thriller series that aired ten episodes last year (May 2018 – August 2018). In this era of nearly five hundred original scripted TV series a year, you no longer have to be old to be forgotten or never seen.
The low rated series was set at a high-tech business that had invented a virtual reality machine that offered people a chance to relive their happiest memory. A problem develops when the people refuse to return to reality. Sarah Shahi played an ex-hostage negotiator hired to enter the virtual reality and convince the people to return to their depressing real lives.
While spending a few minutes of idle time I found I had today, I came across this video on YouTube. I don’t know who put it together — he or she is identified only as RwDt09 — but I found it fascinating. How many of these do you remember?
CONCRETE COWBOYS. “Pilot.” CBS, 60m. Season 1, Episode 1. Jerry Reed, Geoffrey Scott. Guest Cast: Billy Barty, Michael Fox, Phil Harris, Belinda Montgomery.
This is the replacement series for Secrets of Midland Heights, and a greater contrast between two shows is hard to imagine. Stars: Jerry Reed, with Geoffrey Scott, who takes the place of Tom Selleck (now of Magnum, P.I.), who had the part in the made-for-TV movie/pilot for the series.
If you’ve seen Jerry Reed act before, as in Smoky and the Bandit, the example that comes to mind right away, you know what to expect. He and Scott are a couple of happy-go-lucky guitar-pickin’ good-ol-boys (forgive the hyphens) out on the road, looking for a good time, and good con.
Phil (“That’s What I Like About the South”) Harris plays an old buddy of Jerry Reed’s, and he has 15 minutes in this opening episode before someone Reed has taken $4000 from in a poker game bumps him off. Why isn’t [it] Reed who is killed is hard to say, except of course it Phil Harris is not the star of the series.
Part two of our two buddies’ revenge will play next week, but as for me, I’m going to miss Jordan Christopher as the poor little rich girl’s evil Uncle Guy in Midland Heights. Now there was somebody you could really hate!
[UPDATE.] The series was broadcast on CBS from February 7 to March 21, 1981 and cancelled after seven episodes.
