Thursday, March 2, 2006

Continuing with our Darren McGavin marathon, watching the episodes of the TV series The Night Stalker.

Mr. R.I.N.G.
A self-aware, sentient robot. Hardly novel, except that this is 1974, long before ST:TNG’s Data. But we have a SERIOUS problem here. A government guy that’s tailing McGavin is driving the Death Trap Ford Pinto. I don’t think so.

Ohhh, nice question, Carl! Talk about tossing out the philosophical bombs. This is as good as asking a computer to tell you the last digit of Pi. Carl asks the robot “What is the difference between right and wrong?” and then “Who has the greater right to life?” That will blow the capacitors of almost any conceived AI.

Primal Scream
Jamie Farr! And not in a dress! Ohhh, and the old, swap cars while waiting for the tow truck trick. Sometimes Carl can be just evil! I love it!
Which is good, because this is a pretty weak story. I mean, who’s this oil company that has as much pull as the Federal government? Okay, so maybe today that might be true, but I don’t think we had descended to that level yet in 1975.

The Trevi Collection
Terror in the fashion world. YAWN. I kept wondering if this episode was going anywhere. And finally, in the last 15 minutes, it does. But it’s too late. I’d lost interest ages ago.

Chopper
A headless motorcycler. That’s not too novel. Ahhh, the freeze frame on the death face is back. Someone likes that. Hey, there’s Jim Baccus! A nice small role to Mr. Magoo/ Thurston Howell III. And there’s Larry Linville, M.A.S.H.’s Major Frank Burns. This is a part of the joy of watching this series. Spotting all the famous actors. Unfortunately, many of these folks are now passed. Again, not the least of which is Darren himself.

Demon in Lace
The stench is a nice touch. This is a little better story than the last two. There is more development of characters, and the elements are more original. Oh, and nice camera move there towards the end. That was interesting. Don’t see that kind of swing around to behind and over the shoulder in TV back in the 70’s.