Other '60s SF besides TOS?

[Warped9]

I'm sitting here trying to remember: what other SF was on television during Star Trek's era?

I recall Lost In Space, Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea, Time Tunnel, Land Of The Giants, The Invaders, Dr. Who, UFO and reruns of the '50s The Adventures Of Superman.

What am I overlooking?

 

[Christopher]

Do you mean just from 1966-69? Let's see, that would exclude The Addams Family, The Munsters, and My Favorite Martian, which all ended a few months before TOS began, but they were no doubt on in syndicated reruns at the time. Looking over Wikipedia's category list of 1960s American TV series, and counting both SF and fantasy shows that aired contemporaneously with TOS, there's also:

Batman
Bewitched
Captain Nice
Dark Shadows
The Ghost and Mrs. Muir
The Green Hornet
I Dream of Jeannie
It's About Time
Mister Terrific
Tarzan (maybe -- I don't know how genre-heavy it was)

I'd also make a case for Gilligan's Island, which often had SF/fantasy elements, and maybe for downright surreal sitcoms such as Green Acres and The Monkees (the latter of which featured aliens in its final episode). Most of the shows listed above are sitcoms; Captain Nice and Mister Terrific were short-lived superhero comedies knocking off the Batman craze, and It's About Time was about astronauts who went back to prehistory, though midway through its lone season, it was retooled with the astronaut and caveman characters coming to the present.

There were also animated shows like Filmation's various DC-superhero cartoons, Fantastic Voyage, and Journey to the Center of the Earth, and Terrytoons' The Mighty Heroes. And then there were the spy shows that often had SF elements, like The Avengers, Get Smart, The Man from UNCLE, The Girl From UNCLE, Mission: Impossible, and especially The Wild Wild West.

Looking at the list of 1960s British TV series turns up a few more:

DoDo, The Kid from Outer Space (animated)
Haunted (short-lived supernatural series)
The Prisoner (of course)
Witch Hunt (another short-lived supernatural series)

And of course Gerry Anderson's Thunderbirds, Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, and Joe 90.

 

[ToddPence]

A fairly thorough list:

MAN INTO SPACE (1959-60)
THE TWILIGHT ZONE (1959-64)
THE NIGHT OF THE BIG HEAT (1960)
PATHFINDERS IN SPACE (1960)
A FOR ANDROMEDA (1961)
THE ANDROMEDA BREAKTHROUGH (1962)
THE AVENGERS (1962-69)
THE BIG PULL (1962)
FIREBALL XL-5 (1962-63)
OUT OF THIS WORLD (1962)
WHEN THE KISSING HAD TO STOP (1962)
DOCTOR WHO (1963-89)
MY FAVORITE MARTIAN (1963-66)
THE OUTER LIMITS (1963-65)
THE CAVES OF STEEL (1964)
THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. (1964-68)
MY LIVING DOLL (1964-65)
THE OTHER MAN (1964)
STINGRAY (1964-65)
VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA (1964-68)
LOST IN SPACE (1965-68)
OUT OF THE UNKNOWN (1965-69)
THUNDERBIRDS (1965-66)
THE WILD, WILD WEST (1965-69)
ADAM ADAMANT LIVES! (1966-67)
APE AND ESSENCE (1966)
BATMAN (1966-68)
DAYS TO COME (1966)
THE MASTER (1966)
STAR TREK (1966-69)
THE TIME TUNNEL (1966-67)
THE INVADERS (1967-68)
THE PRISONER (1967-68)
LAND OF THE GIANTS (1968-70)
THE YEAR OF THE SEX OLYMPICS (1968)
COUNTERSTRIKE (1969)

 

[RandyS]

I don't see how "Batman" could be considered to have elements of science fiction. Yes, there was that one episode in the third season "Joker's Flying Saucer", but that was clearly a hoax, as opposed to actual aliens landing on Earth.

Is there another episode I'm not remembering?

 

[Christopher]

I don't see how "Batman" could be considered to have elements of science fiction. Yes, there was that one episode in the third season "Joker's Flying Saucer", but that was clearly a hoax, as opposed to actual aliens landing on Earth.

Science fiction isn't just about aliens and spaceships. It's about anything speculative and beyond existing reality that isn't specifically magical or supernatural. The very idea of a world inhabited by costumed superheroes and supervillains is speculative fiction, particularly when the heroes are duly deputized officers of the law.

Besides, Batman featured a ton of sci-fi technology. The atomic reactor, crime computer, and other gadgets in the Batcave, the jet-powered Batmobile with laser weapons, the Penguin's flying umbrellas, the dehydration ray from the movie, the countless weird, high-tech death traps that the villains wielded against the Dynamic Duo, etc. Then there's Mr. Freeze, a character who could only exist in a supercold environment -- hardly a realistic premise.

 

[ToddPence]

UFO

UFO was filmed mostly in 1969, but didn't premiere on TV until 1970. Unusually, the airing of the pilot came just after production had finished on the last of the twenty-six episodes.

 

[Noname Given]

I don't see how "Batman" could be considered to have elements of science fiction. Yes, there was that one episode in the third season "Joker's Flying Saucer", but that was clearly a hoax, as opposed to actual aliens landing on Earth.

Is there another episode I'm not remembering?

Well, you have to remeber 'batman' was a HUGE hit at the time (the 1966 Batman motion picture was made in th hiatus between Seasons 1 and 2 because there was such a phenomenon); and it's syuccess had a large inpact on Star Trek, the Irwin Allen shows of the era, The Wild Wild West, etc.
^^^
For example I think the style changes in TOS season 3 were influnced by 'what was popular' (ie Batman); and it's one reason they didn't have an issue with the more campy aspects of a lot od Sreason 3; as it was scene as 'popular' by the TV industry of the time.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

What about H.R. Pufnstuf, which debuted in 1969? If we cover the whole sixties, then not to mention The Jetsons, and also The Flintstones with the Great Gazoo.

 

[ToddPence]

Of course, there were many TV shows of the '60s whose format may have been mainstream, but who had one or two episodes which treated SF/fantasy elements as being grounded in reality.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I don't see how "Batman" could be considered to have elements of science fiction. Yes, there was that one episode in the third season "Joker's Flying Saucer", but that was clearly a hoax, as opposed to actual aliens landing on Earth.

Is there another episode I'm not remembering?

The entire Batcave and everything in it on the TV show is science fiction.

 

[Andrew_Kearley]

No one's mentioned Roberta Leigh's "Space Patrol"! Extraordinary stuff.

 

[Potemkin_Prod]

What about H.R. Pufnstuf, which debuted in 1969? If we cover the whole sixties, then not to mention The Jetsons, and also The Flintstones with the Great Gazoo.

If you're going to mention cartoons, then you've got hundreds to choose from.

I'm disappointed no one mentioned ULTRAMAN...

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I'm disappointed no one mentioned ULTRAMAN...

You did! Ultraman left a mark on me for its weirdness.

 

[Christopher]

(the 1966 Batman motion picture was made in th hiatus between Seasons 1 and 2 because there was such a phenomenon)

Actually the original plan was to make the movie first as a pilot for the show, and as a way to take advantage of the feature-film budget to build vehicles, sets, etc. that would then be reused in the show. But ABC was having a bad season, so they moved up the premiere date for Batman so they'd have something to replace their bombing shows with as soon as possible, and thus the movie had to be postponed until after the first season (which is why the Batcopter and Batboat, built for the movie, didn't begin appearing on the show until season 2, and then only in stock footage from the movie). So it's not correct to say that the movie was made as a result of the show's success. They were going to make it anyway.

Which is not to discount the fact that Batman was indeed a huge cultural phenomenon for a couple of years.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Tarzan was straight action/adventure. I dont recall any Lost Civilizations or any of the other fantastic elements of the novels or movies appearing.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

What about H.R. Pufnstuf, which debuted in 1969? If we cover the whole sixties, then not to mention The Jetsons, and also The Flintstones with the Great Gazoo.

If you're going to mention cartoons, then you've got hundreds to choose from.

Like Jonny Quest, and so on.

What's distinctive about The Jetsons and The Flintstones is that, in their first run, they both aired in prime time, and were considered family shows.

I don't know why I mentioned H.R. Pufnstuf, except maybe that it was live action. And bizarre. Perhaps I strayed.

 

[Warped9]

Wow! Many of those mentioned I don't remember.

The Year Of The Sex Olympics??? I've certainly never heard of that one.

 

[jayrath]

Science fiction isn't just about aliens and spaceships. It's about anything speculative and beyond existing reality that isn't specifically magical or supernatural.

That's a pretty loose definition. Science fiction could then include Westerns, detective novels, Sesame Street, Captain Kangaroo, professional wrestling and, I would argue, Fox News.

 

[Christopher]

Tarzan was straight action/adventure. I dont recall any Lost Civilizations or any of the other fantastic elements of the novels or movies appearing.

Thanks for clarifying. I wasn't sure, since Wikipedia's list of episode titles included things like "Track of the Dinosaur" and "Mountains of the Moon."

Science fiction isn't just about aliens and spaceships. It's about anything speculative and beyond existing reality that isn't specifically magical or supernatural.

That's a pretty loose definition. Science fiction could then include Westerns, detective novels, Sesame Street, Captain Kangaroo, professional wrestling and, I would argue, Fox News.

Okay, maybe I spoke a bit loosely. I should've said that science fiction is about any speculative scientific or technological advance or any non-magical alternate world/society. The point is that it's an astonishingly narrow definition to say that something like Batman can't be science fiction unless it has spaceships or aliens in it. That's like saying that something can't be a murder mystery unless it has poisonings in it, or that something can't be fantasy unless it has unicorns in it. Plenty of science fiction is about scientific, technological, or cultural advances that have nothing to do with aliens or space travel. Look at the first great science fiction film, Fritz Lang's Metropolis, for example.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

The point is that it's an astonishingly narrow definition to say that something like Batman can't be science fiction unless it has spaceships or aliens in it.

I remember years ago the SF/F mods said The Smurfs didn't qualify as fantasy.