This being Thursday, it's time for another edition of "Thursday Movie Picks", the blogathon run by Wandering Through the Shelves. This being the last Thursday of the month, it's time for another TV edition, and this month's TV theme is time travel. Eh, it's not a topic I'm that well versed on, but I've got three shows that kinda sorta qualify.
A Piece of the Action (1968 episode of Star Trek). Kirk and company wind up on a planet that somehow learned all it knows from 1920s gangsters, led by Vic Tayback. Actually, this is a theme the Star Trek franchise used a lot. There was literal time travel in a few episodes, both back to earth and one other society that was about to go supernova; episodes that techincally weren't time travel included visits to a Roman-era planet (they couldn't figure out why Romans worshipped the sun) and a Nazi planet. And The Next Generation did an episode based on a planet that learned everything they knew about earth from one pulp novel.
Otherworld (1985). Technically, this is interdimensional travel, not time travel. A middle-class American family visits the Pyramids in Egypt and wind up going through a portal to another dimension and in the Otherworld find a place that has a bunch of provinces based on different periods, such as the 1950s but with the gender roles reversed. The poor family was always being chased as they tried to get to the portal back to the Earth they know and love. This one lasted all of eight episodes, which was a shame since it's an interesting premise and I liked it as a 12-year-old.
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2 comments:
So happy to see Star Trek get some love. That episode, in particular, is a lot of fun. I wasn't the biggest Rocky and Bullwinkle fan, but I watched it on occasion. I also saw the Mr. Peabody and Sherman movie. It was meh.
I'm sure at some point I saw that Star Trek episode though when I think of time travel and that particular show I think of the famous Joan Collins episode "The City on the Edge of Forever". I've never heard of Otherworld but considering how briefly it ran I guess that's not surprising. I got such a kick out of Mr. Peabody and his pet boy Sherman when I was young. They were simplistic but Mr. Peabody was so cool in every situation.
I went with two that I watched as a youngster and one from a few years ago.
Atlantis (2013-2015)-When marine scientist Jason (Jack Donnelly) is mysteriously transported from present day England to the legendary land of Atlantis via a deep sea accident he discovers a world of legend and myth ruled by King Minos and his scheming Queen, Pasiphae. At first he blunders about but shortly is befriended by Hercules (Mark Addy)-not yet the strong man of legend and Pythagoras a brilliant but poor youth. As time passes Jason encounters monsters and gods as well as the mysterious Oracle (Juliet Stevenson) who has expected Jason’s arrival and holds the secrets to his destiny and the fate of his father who vanished when Jack was young. A little silly and too contemporary at times but a fun show with an excellent cast.
The Time Tunnel (1966)-“Two American scientists are lost in the swirling maze of past and future ages in their first experiments on America’s greatest and most secret project…”The Time Tunnel”! Tony Newman (James Darren) and Doug Phillips (Robert Colbert) now tumble helplessly towards a new fantastic adventure somewhere along the infinite corridors of time!”
So began this short lived series of adventures through time where each week the pair landed to witness another piece of history (the sinking of the Titanic, the signing of the Magna Carta, etc.) overseen by a team scientists and military able to shift them through time periods but unable to return them to the present. Created by master of disaster Irwin Allen.
It’s About Time (1966-1967)-Goofy comedy created by Brady Brunch mastermind Sherwood Schwartz concerning two astronauts traveling faster than the speed of light who end up in prehistoric times that is best described by its theme song sung in rhyme:
“It’s about time, it’s about space,
About two men in the strangest place.
It’s about time, it’s about flight.
Traveling faster than the speed of light.
Here is their tale, of the brave crew.
As through the barrier of time they flew.
Past the fighting Minute Men.
Past an armored knight.
Past a Roman warrior.
To this ancient site.
It’s about caves, cavemen too.
About a time when the Earth was new.
Wait’ll they see what is in sight.
Is it good luck or is it good night?
It’s about two astronauts.
It’s about their fate.
It’s about a woman,
And her prehistoric mate.
And now, It’s About Time!”
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