Classic TV Flashback: Cliffhangers (1979)

Cliffhangers
Debut: February 27, 1958

Created by Kenneth Johnson
Starring: Susan Anton, Ray Ralston, Michael Swan, Geoffrey Scott, Carlene Watkins, Tiger Willaims, Michael Nouri, Carol Baxter, Stephen Johnson
Synopsis: Three serialized tales of adventure are presented each week: the mystery/adventure of Stop Susan Williams, the Weird Western of The Secret Empire, and the horror of The Curse of Dracula.

Trey: Cliffhangers is an unusual NBC series that aired from February to September 1979. In each installment, you got a chapter of 3 serialized stories, resembling the matinee serials of the past. One of them, The Secret Empire, was based on the old Gene Autry serial, The Phantom Empire, in fact.

On paper, this idea had a lot going for it. You were essentially running three 3 series in one hour, so if one failed to find an audience, it could be switched out for something else. However, running 3 productions meant the cost of 3 productions. It was an expensive show. It also aired opposite the powerhouses of Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley. Plus, at the end of the day, it really just isn't that good.

Jason: Well, it was an experience! Nostalgia for the entertainments of yesteryear, in this case the action-oriented serials of the 30's and 40's (and televised for Baby Boomer audiences in the 50's and 60's, was in the air in the 1970's. The Star Wars phenomena that preceded this show and Indiana Jones following a year or so after Cliffhangers bit the dust are both obvious examples of successfully updating serial tropes. 

Conceptually more interesting than entertaining, Cliffhangers was a challenging watch, at least in part due to the dreadful scan available on YouTube, which would have looked much better on a smaller screen that I used. I managed to suppress the urge to change the channel (which, if this show was on in my childhood home, likely occurred), and dutifully stayed the course, buoyed by the hope that the next segment would be better.

Trey: You're right about than YouTube upload. It was like watching through gauze, but perhaps that made the experience more authentic given the vagaries of TV and reception back in the day? Are there positives here we could accentuate?

Jason: Mercifully, it actually did seem to get better from segment to segment. 

The Perils of Pauline-inspired Stop Susan Williams ticked off the genre boxes but felt dreary to me. The only real updating I detected was in Susan Anton's wardrobe. 

The Secret Empire gave us an elevator from the Old West to an alien underground city, which is always welcome. The city itself appeared to have been shot in an abandoned shopping mall. It was difficult to tell if anything interesting would follow in subsequent episodes that Gene Autry hadn't already dealt with in the 30's incarnation. 

Trey: There is precedent for Modern public buildings as futuristic cities. See Logan's Run. In any case, the few episodes I saw of this as a kid (I don't recall how many or if I sat through an hour. I didn't remember Susan Williams at all.) it was The Secret Empire I was most interested in. I had seen some of Phantom Empire on PBS as a kid. Like with Phantom Empire, I was not of an age where it's parsimony with the sci-fi allowed it to hold my interest.

Jason: Of the three stories we watched partially unfold in this episode, my favorite was the disco-age adventures of professional academic Dracula. If only we could have been treated to Dracula's lecture in its entirety instead of pesky Van Helsing intrigue already-in-progress! I'll sign up for Dracula's TED talk any day. 

Trey: Yeah, while not great, that segment works the best here. It eventually got edited into a TV movie. Circling back to the Secret Empire, one more thing I noticed there: the hero breaks out a bullwhip for one scene. You would swear it was a ripoff of Indiana Jones except of course this show predates Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Jason: It's perhaps a shame it wasn't riding those coattails. It might have given them pointers on updating the material for the modern audience.

Classic TV Flashback: Peter Gunn (1958)

Peter Gunn
Debut: September 22, 1958

Created by Blake Edwards
Starring: Craig Stevens, Lola Albright, Herschel Bernardi, Hope Emerson, Byron Kane
Synopsis: Peter Gunn is a suave, well-dressed private investigator with a love of cool jazz and a knack for finding trouble.

Trey: Peter Gunn is a 1958-1961 series that aired first on NBC and then ABC. It has some similarities to Mr. Lucky, another Blake Edwards series we watched.  Cary Grant was an inspiration for the style of the main character and it has a score by Henry Mancini. In fact, it's theme is probably one of the most recognizable pieces of music of the later half of the 20th Century.

Jason: After this recent re-exposure, that theme song is hounding my mind on a constant involuntary mental replay. Not only is it endlessly catchy, but it has spawned a multitude of derivative offspring in a variety of genres. I love the B-52s take on "Planet Claire," to name one example. 

Trey: Indeed! We watched the second episode, "Streetcar Jones" where a jazz club band leader wants to prove one of his musician friends is innocent of a murder, but the musician's lawyer high-priced lawyer suspiciously doesn't want his assistance. The whole series is available on Freevee.

Peter Gunn has a sort of sophisticated style and hints wry humor of Mr. Lucky. It doesn't quite charm me the way the episodes of that series did. The lack of the sidekick is part of it, but I don't think the character of Gunn (or possibly the portrayal) has quite the charm of the titular Mr. Lucky. Of course, watching only one episode of a series always presents the risk that you don't really have a good sample to judge it by.

Jason: It seemed to me to have an incrementally more "serious" tone than Mr. Lucky, and I agree about the diminished charm. In this episode at least, Craig Stevens' portrayal of Gunn feels icy cold, an utterly unflappable fellow who only turns on the charm at pressing need. He takes a heck of ass-whooping without a single complaint, though his natural beauty remains (stylishly) marred by (dashing) bruises for the rest of the episode. 

I must also agree on Gunn's sidekick-less condition. His Crockett could use a Tubbs.

Trey: Back to Mancini for the moment, his musical cues here are perhaps even better than the ones in Mr. Lucky. 

Jason: I wonder if the music was tailor-made for this especially Jazz-centric episode?

Trey: Jazz-centric, it was. Hearing the hep jazz cat patter here, I wonder if TV of the late 50s represented the jazz subculture any more accurately that 80s TV would do with rock of its era? I did like Carlo Fiore's almost Zen master portrayal of Streetcar Jones. A decade later, such a loopy character would be portrayed as being on drugs, but here, there's no indication he's high on anything but jazz.

Jason: Great Neal Cassady's ghost! The jailhouse discussion of the distinction between "getting it" and "digging it" was almost hilarious in its earnest examination of the ineffable. I have to think you are correct in your suspicions, and I too imagined fully qualified hepcats of the era cringing at the portrayal of their patois.

I really felt the director's hand in this episode, and he's swinging for the fences. The opening sequence features a transition from the Big Eye club's sign (a big eye) to the business end of a saxophone jamming away inside, letting us know right out of the box that someone cares about making this show look as cool as possible. Again, I am reminded of Miami Vice.

Trey: It's a stylized world in some ways. Half-hour episodes don't leave time to worry about gritty realism.

Jason: My verdict: It didn't knock me out the way Mr. Lucky did, but Blake Edwards is doing fine TV work if this episode is any indication. 

Trey: Just the thing for viewing after dinner at the supper club with a martini in your hand.

Classic TV Flashback: Blake's 7 (1978)

Blake's 7
Debut: January 2, 1978

Created by Terry Nation
Starring: Gareth Thomas, Sally Knyvette, Michael Keating, Steven Pacey, Paul Darrow, David Jackson, Peter Tuddenham, Jan Chappell, Jacqueline Pearce, Stephen Greif, Brian Croucher, Josette Simon, Glynis Barber
Synopsis: A rebel leads a group of convicts and outcasts in a struggle against the totalitarian Terran Federation.

Trey: Blake's 7 ran for four 13 episode "series" on BBC1. It was created by Terry Nation, known for his work on Doctor Who (he was the creator of the Daleks), who also wrote the entire 1st series. We watched the first episode "The Way Back" on YouTube. We're introduced to former resistance leader Roj Blake who had been mindwiped, but after an attempt by old comrades to bring him back to the cause, witnesses a massacre and is subsequently framed for a series of fictional crimes by the totalitarian Federation and sent to a prison colony.

I'd seen this episode before, but it was decades ago on a public TV funding drive. I think it's ripe for a re-imagining a la Battlestar Galactica. It already had the grit so there would be no need to add it! With the re-ascendance of Star Wars and the arrival of Guardians of the Galaxy style bombastic space fantasy, maybe it's time is actually past?

Jason: As I understand, the series makes a pronounced tonal shift into the fantastic following this dark, serious opener. 

Trey: Well, from what I've seen, it definitely goes more space opera, but I think it stays roughly Deep Space Nine level of darkness. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. We should talk about the actual episode! 

Jason: We owe Roj Blake that much.

Trey: Its visuals (both in terms of design and casting) and its music give strong Dr. Who vibes, of course. Its story, though, reminds me more of dystopian science fiction films of the 70s, things like Soylent Green, THX-1138, or Logan's Run. It also made me think a lot about the recent Andor.

Jason: As regards the visuals, one must go in with an understanding of the BBC's standards of the day. The budget is as austere as the world depicted and TV technology is limited. The subject matter of this premiere episode is well-suited to these limitations. 

I agree that this episode was very much in this pre-Star Wars mold, with a dash of Nineteen Eighty-Four and a pinch of Phillip K. Dick. We are not really given much of a clue as to what's to follow in the narrative, but this grim bummer of a tale works well. The heaps of bodies piling up throughout its narrative arc make the stakes seem real. 

Trey: Gareth Thomas doesn't seem to have to look for an American lead (maybe the closest American equivalent would be Elliott Gould who did get leading roles in the 70s, though) but he seems believable in this position.

Jason: He's no Don Johnson or Phillip Michael Thomas (see last week's post)! And the drab concrete-and-steel world he inhabits under the influence of stultifying mind-control drugs is about as far from dreamy, cocaine-fueled 80s Miami as one can get. I've only seen him in this, so far as I recall, but his performance is very good. The rest of the cast deliver solid performances and do well with the material. I'd say this is the most intentionally mature work I've seen from screenwriter Nation, lacking any and all of the whimsy and slight goofiness of his Dr. Who work. 

 

Trey: I like the very 70s, post-Watergate subplot of the idealistic public defender and his partner whose idealism leads them to be crushed by the system. It's not the sort of thing most space opera-ish shows give you!

Jason: The public defender subplot was one of the few outright surprises of the episode, and perhaps worth not spoiling* for any readers who have not seen this episode! 

My verdict: a well-done and appropriately grim take on the dystopian hell-world of tomorrow that remains watchable and tense throughout its run.

Trey: I agree. I wish this was a series available on physical media. I would pick it up.

*SPOILER ALERT! Seeing the crumpled bodies of the public defender and his associate came as a bit of a shock! Against any reasonable hope, I expected them to be ongoing characters!

Classic TV Flashback: Miami Vice (1984)

Miami Vice

Debut: September 16, 1984

Created by Anthony Yerkovich

Starring: Don Johnson, Philip Michael Thomas, Saundra Santiago, Michael Talbott, John Diehl, Olivia Brown, Gregory Sierra

Synopsis: Two undercover detectives and their team fight crime on the mean yet colorful streets of Miami.

Trey: Miami Vice aired on NBC from September 1984, to January 1990. We watched the pilot episode, "Brother's Keeper" on Freevee. It gives the origin story of the partnership between Floridan, good ol' boy detective Sonny Crockett and New York City street cop Rico Tubbs when both of them want to bring down a Colombian drug dealer who killed someone close to them (Tubbs' brother and Crockett's old partner).

Jason: I'll come clean right now: In my early teen years, I had made up my mind that cop shows were boring as Hell, ubiquitous, repetitive, and I had zero interest in seeing them. Hill Street Blues, a staple in my home, was the exception. As a result, I came to "Brother's Keeper" and Miami Vice a clean slate. I was always suspicious that Vice would present a particularly dumb approach to cop drama, given its reputation for visual splendor, bikinis, and beautiful people, and I was having none of it. Now, decades later I must publicly admit (yet again!) how spectacularly wrong I was!

The opening sequence set in New York, where we receive important set up information and a good chunk of Tubbs' origin story, put me in mind of The Wizard of Oz, the familiar, perhaps overused cop show setting seemed almost black and white like Dorothy's Kansas, and about to make a stark, pastel-and-neon tonal shift as the story sweeps Tubbs off to Miami.

This pilot episode does its job, setting up the series' characters, situations, and style for its run while successfully standing on its own. The story itself is suitably adult and entertaining, but we're not here for complexity or literary quality. 

Trey: I saw the pilot when it aired in 1984. Today, after years of TV shows and even films that borrowed from its style, it's the 80s TV cop show chassis that is most apparent to me. I mostly see how it is like all the Equalizers, Matt Houstons, and Hunters rather than its differences. But my memories of certain scenes in it are vivid from my childhood, and I still recall how much more dramatic and cinematic they seemed at the time than anything else. I have to think about it in pre-prestige TV terms.

The elevator pitch was "MTV cops," and I certainly think we get that, but it's interesting how much that feel is used to create moments of moody, neon noir, rather than the hyperkinetic, quick cuts we associate with the style today.  The story and the characters aren't really completely there yet to support it, but the idea was a solid one. Wikipedia says that TV critics Alan Sepinwall and Matt Zoller Seitz ranked Miami Vice the 51st greatest American television series of all time. While such rankings are always iffy, I think that feels about right in terms of importance.

Johnson and Thomas do a good job with the material. Honestly, Johnson seems to have pretty much one character in slightly different moods across his roles, but it's an entertaining one. 

Jason: They are both conspicuously and extravagantly handsome dudes for vice duty, but in a world where a young Jimmy Smits is expendable, it works.

Trey: I had forgotten Gregory Sierra was in this. I only remembered his replacement, Edward James Olmos. It amuses me to think Sierra is really playing the same guy he played on Barney Miller, just transferred to Miami.

Jason: He never imagined the strange fate in store for him when he put in for the transfer!

I thought the cast delivered admirably, while the most effective and affecting scenes were primarily visual and driven by their musical accompaniments. The iconic scene featuring "In the Air Tonight" is iconic for a damn good reason, as it happens. I'd rather watch dreamy Miami zoom by, reflected in the paint job of a speeding hot rod while listening to Jan Hammer's highly effective theme music (it helped that i hadn't heard it in decades) than be enriched by character development. 

Trey: Weirdly, Hammer's theme is missing the iconic solo in this episode. This is the version I remember: 

Classic TV Flashback: Blackstar (1981)

Blackstar

Debut: September 19, 1981

Starring:  George DiCenzo. Linda Gary, Alan Oppenheimer, Patrick Pinney, Frank Welker
Synopsis: An astronaut, swept through a black hole, is stranded on a primitive planet in another universe, and joins the fight against the tyrannical Overlord.

Trey: Blackstar was a Saturday morning, animated, fantasy series produced by Lou Schiemer and Norm Prescott for Filmation. It's original run only lasted from September to December 1981, but it was revived again in 1983. We watched Episode 13, "The Zombie Masters" on YouTube. It was written by Marc Scott Zicree and Michael Reaves (the writers responsible for most of the series) and originally aired on December 5, 1981. It was the final episode. In it, Blackstar and friends are trying to convince the leaders of Gandar to join their fight against the Overlord when the city is attacked by Marakand, the flying city of zombies. Soon Princess Luwena, Mara and Poulo are under the spell of Shaldemar the Zombie Master.

In many ways, Blackstar was a "trial run" for Filmation's He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. They are both science fantasies and both feature magical swords that have been split in half. Blackstar is a bit more "Planetary Romance," however, and not as superheroic as He-Man. You could say it kind of bridges Filmation's adaptations of older characters like Flash Gordon and Tarzan and the later He-Man.

Jason: I'm not all that conversant with He-Man, but Blackstar feels like its aiming for a slightly more sophisticated audience, while still abiding by the rigid standards for children's entertainment in play in those days. This makes for a frustrating mix of relatively complex fantasy concepts and characters amidst kiddie comic relief (in the unfortunate form of Trobbits) and awesome swords that can only be used defensively (deflecting incoming magic blasts for instance) or to inflict property damage.  The problem of Chekhov's Awesome Sword would have plagued my mind as a kid. 

This episode could have sold young me had Blackstar been able to hack and slash his way through the packs of zombies* infesting the flying city rather than all the skulking around. And don't get my inner 11-year-old started on the Trobbits!

If this show had been made in the more relaxed standards of say, the Jonny Quest 1960s, it might have been a more satisfying action adventure that I would have loved in syndication while complaining that cartoons just aren't as cool as they used to be.

Trey: An interesting note on the protagonist. Original Blackstar was conceived of as Black. His ethnicity was made indeterminant (perhaps Native American like the later Bravestarr) before production, however.

Jason: An opportunity wasted while simultaneously sparing the world another Black hero with "Black" in his name. 

Trey: In summary, Blackstar has the flaws of the Filmation cost-conscience method as we discussed with Flash Gordon. Compared to modern cartoons in a similar vein, it is neither as action packed nor does it feature as much story in its run time. What it excels at though is worldbuilding or perhaps implication of worldbuilding. There is so much for the 8 year-old mind (the age I was when this aired) to latch on to. 

Jason: I agree on all points! A couple of years make a lot of difference in that age category, so it wasn't in the cards for me - I was busy with early adolescent rejection of childish things at the same time. I already loved Dungeons & Dragons, so I'm a little surprised I almost completely ignored this show, which based on this episode, might be the most D&D of the Saturday morning age including the D&D cartoon (with the possible exception of Thundarr). This episode features a veritable monster manual of fantasy species, rampant use of magic missiles and the like, soul-harvesting magic items, and an actual dungeon exploration sequence. 

And yes, the animation is weak sauce, but the character designs and background paintings do a lot of heavy lifting in the worldbuilding department and are very nice. 

My verdict, adjusted for the children's entertainment of this vintage: 3 dead Trobbits out of 5, but the unfulfilled potential is painful to contemplate. It could have been great!

*Spoiler! As it turns out, its a damn good think Blackstar didn't slay his way through the city, as each and every enslaved soul would be reunited with it's body at the end, right down to the gargoyles and other monstrous city dwellers that looked so prime for gratuitous sword-fodder earlier on.

Classic TV Flashback: Yancy Derringer (1958)

Yancy Derringer

Debut: October 2, 1958

Created by Mary Loos and Richard Sale

Starring: Jock Mahoney; X Brands
Synopsis: An adventurer gambler, and dapper Southern gentleman works as a secret government agent in post-Civil War New Orleans.

Trey: Yancy Derringer ran on CBS from October 2, 1958, to September 24, 1959. According to Wikipedia, Sale and Loos based the series on "The Devil Made a Derringer", a short story by Sale that appeared in All-American Fiction in 1938.  Sale was apparently a very successful pulp writer in the 1930s. The the original short story was about a destitute aristocrat who returns to New Orleans three years after the Civil War. In the story, Derringer is given no first name; "Yancy" was added for the series.

We watched episode 15, "The Fair Freebooter," on Amazon Prime. It originally aired on January 15, 1959. In it, the pretty river pirate Coco LaSalle threatens to cause an international incident after she robs Derringer's riverboat, stealing a jeweled necklace, once belonging to Empress Carlota, that is to be returned to the Mexican government. Yancy just wants to get his new shirts he bought from St. Louis back and sets a plan in motion to get both while escorting LaSalle to the Comus Ball.

Jason: I snapped to attention when Yancy declared his passionate intention to retrieve his damn shirts. He'd been waiting for three months already! If he can help smooth over international relations in so doing, fine, but he's got to look good!

Trey: Clothes maketh the man. Anyway, I'd seen the first episode of this series before, but that was all setup really, I imagine this one is more like most episodes. I think this is sort of similar to Barbary Coast with the same sort of spy-type doings and the touch of humor. I think it works better here than there, though. Maybe it's the 30 minute timeframe?

Jason: It definitely works better here! The 30 minute run length for this kind of material is starting to feel revelatory, despite the obvious limitations. At no point are we allowed to be bored as the story goes through its paces. Unlike M Squad, which felt ruthless in its devotion to delivering the plot with absolutely no fat, this episode's scenes almost feel leisurely in pace, allowing us to infer whatever we can about the characters through their dialogue and behavior. No info dumps here. 

Trey: No indeed! It's interesting to me how none of this historical background is explained. No brief exposition on Emperor Maximilian. No dialogue illuminating why an "administrator" is in charge of New Orleans. Either they expected the average viewer to know more history in 1959, or they expected audiences to just roll with it!

Jason: There's just no time for any of that! Here again, I think it works in the show's favor. The dialogue, always in service of the plot, still feels naturalistic enough that it carries us along, leaving any filling in of context to the audience. Kind of refreshing! 

Trey: Another interesting thing: mutiny appears to be stirring among Coco's men, but this doesn't really come to anything in the episode despite a fair amount of setup.

Jason: That's true, and maybe is vestigial evidence of editing for time. That said, this undercurrent of perhaps imminent revolt does lend some extra peril to the scenes in the pirate camp and communicates the treacherousness of this pack of weasels. 

I was further impressed by the seeming lavishness of the sets and costumes. Production values are strong for the era and the setting. 

My verdict: It was pretty good, leading me to wonder if further investigation of 1959 might reveal it be the peak of some kind of golden age of television. 

Trey: It does seem a particularly fertile era. I liked this one as well. It would be interesting to see where this episode fits in the "scale of quality" of the series.

Classic TV Flashback: Flash Gordon: The Greatest Adventure of All (1982)

Flash Gordon: The Greatest Adventure of All

Debut: August 21, 1982

Written by  Samuel A. Peeples, Alex Raymond
Starring: Robert Ridgely, Diane Pershing, Bob Holt, Vic Perrin
Synopsis: Flash Gordon, Dale Arden and Dr. Hans Zarkov travel to the planet Mongo and wind up fighting the tyrannical rule of Emperor Ming the Merciless.

Trey: Flash Gordon: The Greatest Adventure of All is animated television movie that aired on NBC in 1982. The project was begun in 1979 following the success of Star Wars, but lead to a Saturday morning TV series, which actually aired before the movie.

This film has never been released on home video in the U.S., so far as I know, but it's available on YouTube.

Jason: I grew up on Filmation as my primary supplier of action/adventure Saturday morning cartoons. Foremost in my memories are the Tarzan and Batman series from the 70s-80s, but I also have some dim recollection of the Flash Gordon series. My memories are occluded by pre-teen rejection of "greasy kid stuff". As a result, I mostly remember viciously lampooning the reused animation elements that resulted in Batman, Tarzan, and Flash jogging identically down and to the left or down and to the right. These rotoscoped sequences looked cool, and were typically the most fluid and impressive bits of animation in the shows.  But as a kid, I bristled at what could only be regarded as Filmation's repeated and unrepentant insults to my intelligence. Do they think I can't tell that when Tarzan swings on a vine he does so in precisely the same manner as when Batman does a Bat-swing on the Bat-rope?

Though many of those sequences were trotted out for Flash, I was pleasantly surprised by this production, which not only looks very good and includes many novel bits of animation previously unseen, but also embraced an ambitious agenda of visual storytelling.

Trey: I think in this era of overseas outsourcing of animation and heavy use of computers, it's easy to be derisive of the shortcuts and failings of animation with less than a feature film budget in the 80s. Filmation here shows the failings of their economical style, but also brings in some techniques borrowed from Japanese animation and even, I believe, some early computer use in addition to some accomplished rotoscoping.

Jason: I found the battling dinosaurs to be remarkable for American animation of the era. 

The Beast Men's Temple of Ming sequence sold me. I was amazed at the minimal dialogue and long, entirely visual sequences. Danger felt real! Violence felt consequential!

The script by Peebles hummed along at a steady pace and seemed unusually adult, again for American animation of this vintage. And when I say adult, I mean stand by for 1930's norms visited upon impressionable children of the 80's. Eugenics comes into play, retrograde depictions of female characters (Dale Arden, in peril of a horrible marriage to Ming, disappears for a lengthy portion of the movie), and, astonishingly, Hitler! Yes, Hitler! Sorry for the spoiler, folks. Trey, help me understand!

Trey: Yes, Peeple's (who wrote the second pilot for Star Trek as well) provides a script clearly for primetime, not Saturday morning. Note the use of firearms in the fight with the dinosaurs and the flaming sword in the final duel. Overall, not only does it move along pretty well, it's fairly faithful to Raymond's original comic strip, though not as faithful as the more extended Saturday morning cartoon version. The Hitler connection is original to Peeples, so far as I know.

I enjoyed hearing Ted Cassidy as Thun. He doesn't voice him in the series. Several of the other voices are different as well: Vultan, Barin, and Ming. No disrespect to Vic Perrin here, but I miss Alan "Skeletor" Oppenheimer's villainous cackle for Ming.

Jason: My verdict: Overall, this incarnation Flash Gordon delivered constant (adequate) thrills, solid animation, well-imagined vistas, and was, against all odds, pretty entertaining. 

Trey: I love the animated series from my youth, so it's hard for me to judge with objective eyes. This is only the second time I've seen the TV movie, though, so I was pretty fresh on it. I enjoyed it for the reasons you say, but I miss the more expansive storyline of the series.