The Classic/Retro Pop Culture Thread
- Thread starter The Old Mixer
- Start date
That just sort of proves the point I was getting at when I put myself out there by saying that I hadn't watched the film...it's so ingrained in our popular culture that I've absorbed elements of it via osmosis.
^^ Nobody has. 
Yeah, you'll find quite a few moments like that when you watch it.
I can already roll off a handful of (potential mis-)quotes from the film that I'd assume everybody knows...
"Of all the gin joints in all the something something, she had to walk into mine."
"Play it again, Sam."
"You played it for him, now you've got to play it for me."
"This is gonna be the beginning of a beautiful friendship."
Of course, if you really wanted to hook me, you should have mentioned that it was just passing its 75th anniversary. I'm like Pavlov's dog now when it comes to that shit. (And you see, I know that reference, and I never actually met the dog.)
"Of all the gin joints in all the something something, she had to walk into mine."
"Play it again, Sam."
"You played it for him, now you've got to play it for me."
"This is gonna be the beginning of a beautiful friendship."
Of course, if you really wanted to hook me, you should have mentioned that it was just passing its 75th anniversary. I'm like Pavlov's dog now when it comes to that shit. (And you see, I know that reference, and I never actually met the dog.)
Yes, those are some of the usual suspects.
I didn't even think of that. I should check for an anniversary DVD. Those usually have extra goodies.
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50th Anniversary Viewing
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The Ed Sullivan Show
Season 20, episode 20
Originally aired January 21, 1968
As represented in The Best of the Ed Sullivan Show
From a Best of episode consisting of material from multiple dates, we have one item from tonight's original broadcast. Johnny Mathis has a nice voice, but he's a little too trad pop for me to take much interest in his material beyond his Christmas songs. "At the Crossroads," which doesn't appear to have been a charting single, is no exception. It's a pleasant enough performance, but that's it.
For once, it doesn't look like the rest of the original episode has much of a story to tell....
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Mission: Impossible
"The Emerald"
Originally aired January 21, 1968
Our two main guests are both TOS alumni past or future: William Smithers as Tomar, the arms dealer, and Michael Strong as Petrosian, the enemy agent; Strong's accent here is pretty bad.
This weeks complicated bit of gadgetry consists of a table top that reads cards, sending the info to an electronic board monitored by Barney, who transmits the info back to Jim via a receiver built into a pair of horn-rimmed glasses.
Jim's playing an obnoxious American businessman, so this time his bad accent is closer to home. At first I thought he was going for Midwestern, but it sporadically transformed into something vaguely Texan.
More omniscient planning is on display, with the IMF anticipating that Petrosian will be interested in trying to get the emerald via poker...once Cinnamon plays a con game to give Tomar a motivation to wager the emerald.
Rollin puts his disguise skills to novel use by making an unconscious Petrosian look like Rollin so that Petrosian's underling will kill Petrosian.
Overall, a decent installment.
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Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In
Season 1, episode 1
Originally aired January 22, 1968
The opening monologue introduces the new series, mentioning the pilot special "last September."
Popular culture-wise we get name-drops of I Spy, Mission: Impossible, and TMFU; in politics, a name-drop of Hubert Humphrey; an odd parody sketch of LBJ and family in bed with various visitors, including Bobby Kennedy; and News from 1984 involving President Robert Kennedy.
In the party sketch, Leo G. Carroll does an in-character cameo as Waverly, in a nod to the timeslot's previous occupant.
Note that this is a few months before Tiny Tim's album and the subsequent single of "Tip-Toe Thru' the Tulips with Me."
Did we get "sock it to me" in the pilot? It's here now!
In one skit, Flip Wilson pretends to be an Irish blackface singer--"How do I get this stuff off?" Another bit involving Flip gives us a brief scene from a sequel to Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.
We actually get a look at Morgul the Friendly Drelb right here in the first episode...he's pink and shaggy. A quick Google indicates that this bit bombing led to the familiar running gag of Gary Owens name-dropping Morgul in his opening announcements.
Dick delivers the news by way of a Johnny Carson impersonation...I think I've seen him do that in other episodes as well.
Judy Carne and Pamela Austin get the painted dancer bit going...I believe Goldie Hawn joins the cast in a few episodes.
And last but not least, the Joke Wall is in...giving Tiny Tim an opportunity to pop up one last time.
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Batman
"Penguin's Clean Sweep"
Originally aired January 25, 1968
On that last part: The hell you say!
Uncredited TOS guest: Charles Dierkop as Dustbag.
It was nice to get some old-fashioned Seasons 1 & 2 touches like the opening at Wayne Manor, driving to Gotham, and using the stock footage of the Dynamic Duo running up the steps.
The All-Purpose Bat-Swatter and accompanying Bat-Tweezers were good gadget gags.
I doubt that everyone would just throw their money out in the street if it were infected...and wouldn't it be safer to leave it in your wallet than to take it out by hand?
In the Me thread discussion of the episode, there was a bit of debate when I likened the Penguin's scheme to Goldfinger's. The part in which the Terrific Trio, Gordon, and O'Hara play possum, pretending to be affected by the virus, is also reminiscent of that film.
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"Call of the Wild"
Originally aired January 25, 1968
This one starts off pretty funny, with the director, Hayworth, giving Ann a slew of backhanded compliments about her unthreatening nature.
There's a cute and kind of spicy bit of Ann doing a striptease in front of a mirror when her father walks in.
Of course, I have to wonder if Ann and Donald would be having conversations about whether or not he has "animal passion" for her if they weren't so obviously saving themselves for marriage. I guess this is the baby step between Mary Tyler Moore sleeping in a separate bed from her husband and Mary Tyler Moore returning to her apartment at daybreak.
The denouement of the situation comes when the director who started Ann's crisis of confidence takes her back to her apartment and starts coming on to her. Oh, Donald to the rescue! Then Mr. Marie walks in on Donald trying to help Ann repair the dress strap that the director (accidentally, FWIW) broke, and gets the wrong idea about that!
Overall, a pretty good sign o' the times episode for how everyone oh-so-respectfully dances around the subject of sex appeal.
"Oh, Donald" count: 4
"Oh, Daddy" count: 0
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The Prisoner
"Once Upon a Time"
Originally aired January 25, 1968 (UK)
The beginning of the episode really plays up Leo McKern's return as Number Two. Nice bit with Rover occupying his chair. The returning Two brings himself up to speed by watching a little clip show.
It seems odd that a Villager would have an issue with divulging his number...normally the numbers are on full display.
The execution of Degree Absolute certainly is bizarre and surreal, with entire scenes carried by strange dialogue and play-acting through various scenarios. But it does give us some cute bits, like Two and Six on a seesaw. Throughout it all, Six makes a point of avoiding uttering the number six.
The "steel door" wobbles a bit while Two is boasting of its impregnability.
I didn't get why Two died when the clock ran out.
The episode ended on a bit too much of an underwhelming tease. It might have been nice to leave us hanging with a revelation that required explanation. But we'll see where it all goes next week.
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Tarzan
"The King of the Dwsari"
Originally aired January 26, 1968
Guesting Morgan Woodward as little more than an extra--one of a couple of lackeys who pop up late in the story...not much of a role for someone of his scenery-chewing talents.
There's some uncharacteristically funky music during a fight scene, and a jazzy little bit at the end. Nelson Riddle was the composer, but it looks like he was a regular on the show who'd already done many episodes prior to that.
Brown, the episode's antagonist, is stir crazy ruling over the tribe, so he attempts to keep Tarzan around for "civilized" companionship. This includes forcing the Lord of the Jungle into a game of dice in which Jai, suspended over a lion cage, serves as the stakes. Tarzan puts this situation to his advantage by freeing the lion.
Brown's hold over the tribespeople is a camera...they think he's holding their souls hostage. When the chief and some of his warriors get their pictures back, they eat them to reclaim their souls. In the end, Brown's sentence is to replace all of the gold that he's dug up...leaving him effectively a prisoner of the tribe for years (shades of Cyrano Jones).
This one suffered a bit from the main tribal characters, the deposed chief and his daughter, not having enough agency in the story.
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Get Smart
"The Little Black Book: Part 1"
Originally aired January 27, 1968
This story makes use of the security gadgets in Max's apartment, including the ever-reliable Invisible Wall gag. It's too bad that Max doesn't keep his window closed. For most of the episode, Sid thinks Max is crazy because of all of Max's odd, spy-oriented behavior. But even though he's not a spy, Sid knows the fundamental move of TV Fu.
Rickles does a pretty good Don Adams impersonation for the phone call (I'm pretty sure it wasn't just dubbed).
In the climax, Sid talks to the president on the Chief's hotline. But as I've noticed in other shows of the era, this one struggles with finding good gags that the audience will identify with LBJ...
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50th Anniversary Viewing
_______
The Ed Sullivan Show
Season 20, episode 20
Originally aired January 21, 1968
As represented in The Best of the Ed Sullivan Show
From a Best of episode consisting of material from multiple dates, we have one item from tonight's original broadcast. Johnny Mathis has a nice voice, but he's a little too trad pop for me to take much interest in his material beyond his Christmas songs. "At the Crossroads," which doesn't appear to have been a charting single, is no exception. It's a pleasant enough performance, but that's it.
For once, it doesn't look like the rest of the original episode has much of a story to tell....
tv.com said:
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Mission: Impossible
"The Emerald"
Originally aired January 21, 1968
Wiki said:
"This tape will self-destruct in ten seconds" sounded distinctly different than the rest of the recording, like it was spliced in.The reused reel-to-reel tape in a photo booth said:
Our two main guests are both TOS alumni past or future: William Smithers as Tomar, the arms dealer, and Michael Strong as Petrosian, the enemy agent; Strong's accent here is pretty bad.
This weeks complicated bit of gadgetry consists of a table top that reads cards, sending the info to an electronic board monitored by Barney, who transmits the info back to Jim via a receiver built into a pair of horn-rimmed glasses.
Jim's playing an obnoxious American businessman, so this time his bad accent is closer to home. At first I thought he was going for Midwestern, but it sporadically transformed into something vaguely Texan.
More omniscient planning is on display, with the IMF anticipating that Petrosian will be interested in trying to get the emerald via poker...once Cinnamon plays a con game to give Tomar a motivation to wager the emerald.
Rollin puts his disguise skills to novel use by making an unconscious Petrosian look like Rollin so that Petrosian's underling will kill Petrosian.
Overall, a decent installment.
_______
Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In
Season 1, episode 1
Originally aired January 22, 1968
The Wiki list of guest appearances said:
The opening monologue introduces the new series, mentioning the pilot special "last September."
Popular culture-wise we get name-drops of I Spy, Mission: Impossible, and TMFU; in politics, a name-drop of Hubert Humphrey; an odd parody sketch of LBJ and family in bed with various visitors, including Bobby Kennedy; and News from 1984 involving President Robert Kennedy.
In the party sketch, Leo G. Carroll does an in-character cameo as Waverly, in a nod to the timeslot's previous occupant.
Dan Rowan said:
After that bit, mentioning the possibility of bringing Tiny Tim back out became a recurring joke throughout the remainder of the episode. But evidently Decades cut one of those threats coming true...!Dan Rowan said:
Note that this is a few months before Tiny Tim's album and the subsequent single of "Tip-Toe Thru' the Tulips with Me."
Did we get "sock it to me" in the pilot? It's here now!
In one skit, Flip Wilson pretends to be an Irish blackface singer--"How do I get this stuff off?" Another bit involving Flip gives us a brief scene from a sequel to Guess Who's Coming to Dinner.
We actually get a look at Morgul the Friendly Drelb right here in the first episode...he's pink and shaggy. A quick Google indicates that this bit bombing led to the familiar running gag of Gary Owens name-dropping Morgul in his opening announcements.
Dick delivers the news by way of a Johnny Carson impersonation...I think I've seen him do that in other episodes as well.
Yep, that's a video of their then-current single, "Tomorrow," which was at #29 and climbing that week.Dan Rowan said:
Judy Carne and Pamela Austin get the painted dancer bit going...I believe Goldie Hawn joins the cast in a few episodes.
And last but not least, the Joke Wall is in...giving Tiny Tim an opportunity to pop up one last time.
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Batman
"Penguin's Clean Sweep"
Originally aired January 25, 1968
H&I said:
On that last part: The hell you say!
Uncredited TOS guest: Charles Dierkop as Dustbag.
It was nice to get some old-fashioned Seasons 1 & 2 touches like the opening at Wayne Manor, driving to Gotham, and using the stock footage of the Dynamic Duo running up the steps.
The All-Purpose Bat-Swatter and accompanying Bat-Tweezers were good gadget gags.
I doubt that everyone would just throw their money out in the street if it were infected...and wouldn't it be safer to leave it in your wallet than to take it out by hand?
In the Me thread discussion of the episode, there was a bit of debate when I likened the Penguin's scheme to Goldfinger's. The part in which the Terrific Trio, Gordon, and O'Hara play possum, pretending to be affected by the virus, is also reminiscent of that film.
_______
"Call of the Wild"
Originally aired January 25, 1968
Wiki said:
This one starts off pretty funny, with the director, Hayworth, giving Ann a slew of backhanded compliments about her unthreatening nature.
Heyworth said:
There's a cute and kind of spicy bit of Ann doing a striptease in front of a mirror when her father walks in.
Of course, I have to wonder if Ann and Donald would be having conversations about whether or not he has "animal passion" for her if they weren't so obviously saving themselves for marriage. I guess this is the baby step between Mary Tyler Moore sleeping in a separate bed from her husband and Mary Tyler Moore returning to her apartment at daybreak.
The denouement of the situation comes when the director who started Ann's crisis of confidence takes her back to her apartment and starts coming on to her. Oh, Donald to the rescue! Then Mr. Marie walks in on Donald trying to help Ann repair the dress strap that the director (accidentally, FWIW) broke, and gets the wrong idea about that!
Overall, a pretty good sign o' the times episode for how everyone oh-so-respectfully dances around the subject of sex appeal.
"Oh, Donald" count: 4
"Oh, Daddy" count: 0
_______
The Prisoner
"Once Upon a Time"
Originally aired January 25, 1968 (UK)
Wiki said:
The beginning of the episode really plays up Leo McKern's return as Number Two. Nice bit with Rover occupying his chair. The returning Two brings himself up to speed by watching a little clip show.
It seems odd that a Villager would have an issue with divulging his number...normally the numbers are on full display.
The execution of Degree Absolute certainly is bizarre and surreal, with entire scenes carried by strange dialogue and play-acting through various scenarios. But it does give us some cute bits, like Two and Six on a seesaw. Throughout it all, Six makes a point of avoiding uttering the number six.
Number Two said:
The "steel door" wobbles a bit while Two is boasting of its impregnability.
I didn't get why Two died when the clock ran out.
The episode ended on a bit too much of an underwhelming tease. It might have been nice to leave us hanging with a revelation that required explanation. But we'll see where it all goes next week.
_______
Tarzan
"The King of the Dwsari"
Originally aired January 26, 1968
H&I said:
Guesting Morgan Woodward as little more than an extra--one of a couple of lackeys who pop up late in the story...not much of a role for someone of his scenery-chewing talents.
There's some uncharacteristically funky music during a fight scene, and a jazzy little bit at the end. Nelson Riddle was the composer, but it looks like he was a regular on the show who'd already done many episodes prior to that.
Brown, the episode's antagonist, is stir crazy ruling over the tribe, so he attempts to keep Tarzan around for "civilized" companionship. This includes forcing the Lord of the Jungle into a game of dice in which Jai, suspended over a lion cage, serves as the stakes. Tarzan puts this situation to his advantage by freeing the lion.
Brown's hold over the tribespeople is a camera...they think he's holding their souls hostage. When the chief and some of his warriors get their pictures back, they eat them to reclaim their souls. In the end, Brown's sentence is to replace all of the gold that he's dug up...leaving him effectively a prisoner of the tribe for years (shades of Cyrano Jones).
This one suffered a bit from the main tribal characters, the deposed chief and his daughter, not having enough agency in the story.
_______
Get Smart
"The Little Black Book: Part 1"
Originally aired January 27, 1968
Wiki said:
This story makes use of the security gadgets in Max's apartment, including the ever-reliable Invisible Wall gag. It's too bad that Max doesn't keep his window closed. For most of the episode, Sid thinks Max is crazy because of all of Max's odd, spy-oriented behavior. But even though he's not a spy, Sid knows the fundamental move of TV Fu.
Rickles does a pretty good Don Adams impersonation for the phone call (I'm pretty sure it wasn't just dubbed).
Max said:
In the climax, Sid talks to the president on the Chief's hotline. But as I've noticed in other shows of the era, this one struggles with finding good gags that the audience will identify with LBJ...
Sid said:
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^ There ya go--learned something new about the era!
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50 Years Ago This Week
Selections from Billboard's Hot 100 for the week:
Leaving the chart:
New on the chart:
"Walk Away Renee," Four Tops
(#14 US; #15 R&B; #3 UK; originally a #5 hit for the Left Banke in 1966)
"Everything That Touches You," The Association
(#10 US; #22 AC)
"La-La Means I Love You," The Delfonics
(#4 US; #2 R&B)
And new on the boob tube:
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50 Years Ago This Week
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Execution_of_Nguyễn_Văn_Lém
Selections from Billboard's Hot 100 for the week:
Leaving the chart:
- "Nothing That We've Been Tracking," Nobody That We've Been Following
New on the chart:
"Walk Away Renee," Four Tops
(#14 US; #15 R&B; #3 UK; originally a #5 hit for the Left Banke in 1966)
"Everything That Touches You," The Association
(#10 US; #22 AC)
"La-La Means I Love You," The Delfonics
(#4 US; #2 R&B)
And new on the boob tube:
- The Ed Sullivan Show, Season 20, episode 21, featuring The 5th Dimension
- Mission: Impossible, "The Condemned"
- The Monkees, "The Monkee's Paw" *
- Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, Season 1, episode 2
- Batman, "The Great Escape"
- Ironside, "The Lonely Hostage"
- That Girl, "The Other Woman"
- The Prisoner, "Fall Out" (series finale)
- Tarzan, "A Gun for Jai"
- Star Trek, "A Private Little War"
- Get Smart, "The Little Black Book: Part 2"
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The News of the Future segments have taken on entirely new meanings.and News from 1984 involving President Robert Kennedy.
Imagine how Morgul must feel: Tiny Tim got to come back, but he didn't.
Laugh-In was a bit of a pioneer in the music video thing, which would become a major fad about thirteen years later with MTV. During the height of the music video days, there was a syndicated show that used old videos like this-- sort of an Oldies alternative to MTV. I can't think of the name, but it will come to me....
I don't think I knew he was on Trek. He's best known (at least by me) as one half of Royster and Styles, who were the best part of Police Woman.
Hmm....
More like a sign of the show, and kind of a sign of TV. As cutting edge as some programs, like Laugh-In and Love, American Style, were, they were still pretty conservative compared to real life. Mom and Dad were watching!
Yep, here's where it really gets freaky deaky.
We will indeed.
That can't be good for you.
Yeah, LBJ was a hot mess. This is why it's a good idea to keep that one-heartbeat-away-from-the-presidency thing in mind when choosing a VP.
Not a great song, but pleasant enough, and certainly the best of the three for this week.
This certainly has that familiar Association sound, but meh.
This is where I'd check to see what's on the other station.
So was The Monkees, though that was building on A Hard Day's Night. And it was Mike Nesmith's 1981 Elephant Parts video that basically launched the modern era of music videos and prompted the creation of MTV.
When you put it that way...!
Eh, really...Tiny Tim is more entertaining. He's starting to grow on me.
It didn't get very naughty, but while she was enjoying it--before being caught--it was certainly suggestive.
Which all equates to being a sign o' the times to me. What people were watching on TV...what was considered appropriate for family consumption...that all says something.
You mean the last one gets even weirder...? Guess I'll see soon enough.
My knowledge of LBJ is fairly casual, but I doubt he could have survived another term, considering he died right about when that term would have been ending, and that was without being subjected to the pressures of the office for those years.
Am I correctly inferring that you feel the same of the Left Banke original? I'd consider it a major classic, and so does the Rolling Stone list: #220. As for the Four Tops version...it's a perfectly good version in its own right, but can't help falling into the category of "unnecessary covers of songs that already had their definitive versions".
Definitely falls in the category of "OK, but not one of their best." This will also be their swan song for our purposes. They have no more Top 20 singles ahead of them, and their next single is the only one that even (barely) manages to make it into the Top 40.
This was this week's standout for me, but YMOV.That's begging for a major fact check. I'd never heard of Elephant Parts, but a quick look-up tells me that it was released in July 1981. MTV launched in August 1981. You can't seriously believe that an entire cable network was launched virtually overnight because of a Mike Nesmith film. The fact that MTV had anything to play at all (and ended up being so successful) is testament to something I already knew from my own experience...music videos were out there prior to the launch of MTV, very commonly being played on various TV shows...and more commonly made by British artists, hence MTV sparking the "Second British Invasion" because they put then-obscure British acts in the spotlight. Nesmith's film was much more likely symptomatic of that phenomenon...it certainly wouldn't have been the cause.
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That's what Wikipedia says.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant_Parts
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PopClips
Don't believe everything you read on Wiki. The Elephant Parts Wiki page contradicts the one for PopClips regarding the timeline.
MTV's own Wiki page offers a wider perspective that includes PopClips:
MTV's own Wiki page offers a wider perspective that includes PopClips:
Well, I've been hearing for decades that Elephant Parts was a forerunner of MTV. I don't want to split hairs about the exact details; I'm just saying that Nesmith and the Monkees are part of the early evolution of the music video as an entertainment format.
Format-breaking again, as this episode as framed by Pat Paulsen's "news report" of alien invasion, so it making it a bit more "real" by referring to the real Micky, mixed with the idea of the group living together in a beach house, essentially living as they do on the show.
He was.
This episode began production one day after the release of The Monkees' Headquarters.
Wrong direction? The entire season was a wrong direction, with the "sassy", non-fist fighting (or martial arts-using), "women's intuition-spouting Batgirl being a creation that tossed the series back to the portrayals of women on American TV in the 1950s.
Two scenes that are often referred to as being nails in the series' coffin.
Popular culture-wise we get name-drops of I Spy, Mission: Impossible, and TMFU; in politics, a name-drop of Hubert Humphrey; an odd parody sketch of LBJ and family in bed with various visitors, including Bobby Kennedy; and News from 1984 involving President Robert Kennedy.
They simply had no idea, while painting the future they desired.
This episode is only noteworthy as being Burgess Meredith's final appearance as the Penguin.
More reasons the series was so deservedly slashed in assessments while still on ABC, and in the syndication years to follow,
No, Elephant Parts did not "invent" MTV. That is an utterly false belief unsupported by history. The concept of an music channel was several years old at the time, and more importantly, what was then called "music promotional videos" (or films) were well over 20 years in use at the time. As you point out, they were played on various TV series, from Don Kirshner's Rock Concert, The Midnight Special, Hullabaloo, Ready, Steady, Go, American Bandstand, The Ed Sullivan Show, Top of the Pops, and other series. The only difference is that the format would be the channel, rather than segments during the 1 hour to 90 minute format of most music series of the 60s & 70s.
While Nesmith certainly used his production experience in an influential manner seen in the cheaper videos cranked out in the early 80s, his Monkees series was a greater influence in actually applying story to the musical visuals, even in ways A Hard Day's Night or Help! did not attempt.
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Selections from Billboard's Hot 100 for 55 years ago last week:
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12 O'Clock High
"Storm at Twilight"
Originally aired November 22, 1965
Ah, so now they're giving Frank Overton his own episode...I think I see what was going on with his recent absences. He's effectively the episode's de facto guest star--This episode is unusual in that the only guest star actually listed is Andrew Duggan, who's pretty much a regular.
At the beginning of the episode Gallagher's on leave. Subbing for him...I don't feel like looking the name up, let's call him Lt. Col. Baxter:
The episode plays up Stovall's age (said to be 44; Overton was about 47 at the time--and wow, he died in 1967, shortly after the series ended and his appearance on Trek.) It doesn't, however, take the opportunity to reinforce the first episode's assertion that he's supposed to be a grandfather. The son who goes MIA is treated as if he were Harvey's only child, and no wife or children are mentioned. Another continuity hiccup: In an attempt to justify familiarity between the characters, Komansky says that he's known Stovall for a long time. Didn't he just join the cast as a new addition to the 918th a couple of months ago...?
From the description, I was afraid that this episode was going to be some cockamamie BS about Stovall conducting a rescue mission, but it was nothing of the sort. It's just about his son's likely death spurring him to want to go back to active flight duty. In one scene, we see him resorting to memorizing an eye chart (the character routinely wears reading glasses).
One striking bit of business: When indoctrinating new additions to the bomber crews, Gallagher tells them to consider themselves dead men.
In Act IV, Harvey's ready to throw in the towel, but a major mission comes up and Gallagher, who's been trying the whole episode to change Harvey's mind, won't let him off the hook at the last minute. So Stovall gets his chance to prove himself under fire before returning to his desk job.
And to the episode's credit, we don't get a feel-good epilog revelation that Stovall's son has been found. He remains missing and presumed dead.
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I'm ready to concede by this point that combat-wise, Batgirl's consistently portrayed as being useless solo...she only seems to be any good in a Batfight as a member of the Terrific Trio. However, her research/investigative skills are impressive and her courage and dedication to crimefighting is commendable.
And there were other examples that I vaguely remember seeing in the early '80s either before MTV existed or before I'd ever seen it. In hindsight, music videos were definitely something looking for a dedicated outlet by the time MTV came along. Yet the concept of an entire network dedicated to only showing them was still out-of-the-box to the point of being mind-blowing at the time...music being played 24/7 was what radio was for!
The first video played on MTV was two years old when they played it:
Selections from Billboard's Hot 100 for 55 years ago last week:
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12 O'Clock High
"Storm at Twilight"
Originally aired November 22, 1965
Xfinity said:
Ah, so now they're giving Frank Overton his own episode...I think I see what was going on with his recent absences. He's effectively the episode's de facto guest star--This episode is unusual in that the only guest star actually listed is Andrew Duggan, who's pretty much a regular.
At the beginning of the episode Gallagher's on leave. Subbing for him...I don't feel like looking the name up, let's call him Lt. Col. Baxter:
The episode plays up Stovall's age (said to be 44; Overton was about 47 at the time--and wow, he died in 1967, shortly after the series ended and his appearance on Trek.) It doesn't, however, take the opportunity to reinforce the first episode's assertion that he's supposed to be a grandfather. The son who goes MIA is treated as if he were Harvey's only child, and no wife or children are mentioned. Another continuity hiccup: In an attempt to justify familiarity between the characters, Komansky says that he's known Stovall for a long time. Didn't he just join the cast as a new addition to the 918th a couple of months ago...?
From the description, I was afraid that this episode was going to be some cockamamie BS about Stovall conducting a rescue mission, but it was nothing of the sort. It's just about his son's likely death spurring him to want to go back to active flight duty. In one scene, we see him resorting to memorizing an eye chart (the character routinely wears reading glasses).
One striking bit of business: When indoctrinating new additions to the bomber crews, Gallagher tells them to consider themselves dead men.
In Act IV, Harvey's ready to throw in the towel, but a major mission comes up and Gallagher, who's been trying the whole episode to change Harvey's mind, won't let him off the hook at the last minute. So Stovall gets his chance to prove himself under fire before returning to his desk job.
And to the episode's credit, we don't get a feel-good epilog revelation that Stovall's son has been found. He remains missing and presumed dead.
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Way to disagree with me agreeing with you!
I'm ready to concede by this point that combat-wise, Batgirl's consistently portrayed as being useless solo...she only seems to be any good in a Batfight as a member of the Terrific Trio. However, her research/investigative skills are impressive and her courage and dedication to crimefighting is commendable.The first conceptual (non-performance) music video that I distinctly recall having been exposed to in such a context was the Bee Gees' "Stayin' Alive" video, when the song was current ca. '77-'78. It was shown on a daytime talk show that the Bee Gees were appearing on...I want to say it was Merv Griffin.
And there were other examples that I vaguely remember seeing in the early '80s either before MTV existed or before I'd ever seen it. In hindsight, music videos were definitely something looking for a dedicated outlet by the time MTV came along. Yet the concept of an entire network dedicated to only showing them was still out-of-the-box to the point of being mind-blowing at the time...music being played 24/7 was what radio was for!
The first video played on MTV was two years old when they played it:
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^So basically they're Jem'Hadar?
I was thinking that, but haven't watched those seasons of DS9 for so long that I thought I might be misremembering.
I should get around to catching that film sometime...probably sometime after I've gotten through the series at H&I's leisurely pace. There are also episodes that H&I skipped for whatever reason that I could go back and visit via YouTube.
I should get around to catching that film sometime...probably sometime after I've gotten through the series at H&I's leisurely pace. There are also episodes that H&I skipped for whatever reason that I could go back and visit via YouTube.