fan
feedback From Dave:
 I share your sentiments on
the show. I grew up with this show and my friends and I would
all run outside and "Run like Steve" after we watched
the episodes. My friend even went to school with kid who somewhat
resembled Lee Majors and began to think he was. He dressed like
him (big '70s collars) and used to run around saying to people
"Don't I look like Steve?"
 I still
remember a lot of the famous episodes (I was 12 in 1976) such
as "The Venus Probe" and "Bigfoot." The episode
where Oscar Goldman has an evil double ("Steve, it's me,
it's me, Steve!") "The Liberty Bell with Chuck Connors."
To this day i think the show has one of the coolest openings
of any TV show. "Steeeeeve Austin, astronaut, a man barely
alive... Gentlemen, we can rebuild him." With those words,
the hair on the back on my neck stood up in anticipation of something
extremely cool about to happen. There is a car commercial currently
running that has used the exact opening to sell trucks. I had
the same reaction i did from back when I was a kid. Clever ad
people. I hate them.
For me the show worked and
is memorable because you got the sense that Steve was part of
some new radical technology that actually existed. Also the fact
that what kid could possibly resist a real live superhero, no
cape, no boots, just an astronaut who is now superhuman and now
solves espionage cases.... you couldn't miss. The show also had
a great sense of adventure which i really believe is sorely missing
in today's TV.
The funny thing is practically
all my friends and I talk about the show with great reverence.
We all know the famous opening verbatim. Why? I doubt you will
see kids today talking about shows in 25 years from now the same
way. Obviously Six Mill captured the imagination of many kids
the same age as me.
P.S. If you examine the feasibility
of how Steve's arms or legs worked, the whole thing falls apart.
If his arm is lifting something that is half a ton, his bionic
arm is capable of doing this but the problem lies in where his
arm connects to his real body. How is it possible for his human
joint to withstand this enormous pressure?? It would be ripped
out of his socket. He would have to be entirely made of the same
material. I think the eye would have a much better chance of
actually being able to work. From Curt
James:
In the episode where Steve holds up a soon-to-collapse cave ceiling:
If he had bionic legs and a bionic arm, wouldn't he also need
a bionic spine to prevent that arm from being shoved into his
bionic shoes? From Julie:
Your web page made my day! How hilarious and truthful your intro
was. I too grew up watching both shows (mostly the
bionic woman) and ran around the playground pretending I was
bionic. Your site brought back some funny memories. From Ian:
The
Bionic Man was very therapeutic to me growing up. I was diagnosed
after birth with cerebral palsy. The Bionic Man inspired me to
work hard on physio so I could walk better. I can now walk down
a street without my disability being noticed because of shows
like the Bionic Man, which demonstrates that if they want something
bad enough the sky is the limit. From Getadell:
I
am 38, with a wife and two kids, and I still run around the house
in slow motion when I'm home alone. Here is my vote for the sexiest
moment in TV history: The Gilligan's Island episode in which
Ginger tries to seduce the robot that comes to the island. I
mean, the contrast between her soft sensuous body and the cold
hard steel of that robot was unbearable. I think she deserves
every conceivable award for her performance. You probably think
I'm a nutcase, but if you saw me in the supermarket, you'd just
say to yourself "Well, there's a completely normal looking
guy running in the dairy aisle in slow motion." How I wished
John boy would have kicked Job's ass in that Waltons episode
when cousin Ham, his wife and son Job come from Kansas to visit
the Waltons. Sexiest female actress of all time? Gina Lolobrigita,
hands down. From Jeff
Stone in New Zealand:
I
grew up watching TSMDM, as well as the Man From Atlantis. One
of the Bigfoot episodes, the one with the semi-invisible aliens,
has stuck in my mind ever since. Some isolated points:
The networks here have never shown the opening telemovies.
What does a guy have to do to see them?!
Rod Rehn liked "Stranger In Broken Fork"?! That
has to be top of my Worst Episodes" list. It's full of inexplicable
plotholes: Steve crashes his plane into a lake, yet the next
time we see him he's bone dry and in shirt and slacks. Did he
not wonder why he was in a flight suit? Why did he take it off?
The hick who wants to run Steve and the loonies out of town commits
attempted murder in front of 50 witnesses and no one does anything.
The plot has to bend over backwards to avoid the simple "Let's
just go to the county seat" solution.
On the other hand, I love Burning Bright. William Shatner's
comedy toupee aside, this was an excellent and rather eerie SF
story. Other underrated early classics: The Deadly Replay, Straight
On 'Til Morning.
I've noticed that Oscar is blatantly in love with Steve.
There are numerous references, implict and explicit, to this
strange plot facet. The Peeping Blonde is a classic example.
Steve and Oscar are going on holiday to a remote location alone
after working with each other for two years straight. When bloody
Farrah tags along, Oscar is mad keen to do her in. The scene
where Oscar is digging for fossils(?) is so obviously a surrogate
grave for the catstrating female archetype Farrah Fawcett represents,
it made me want to cry. (Sorry, the benefits of a college education
in Gender Issues there.)
Dr. Wells is a genius! Not only has he developed a bionic
limb/organ replacement system that doesn't reduce the organic
parts of Steve's body to mush (imagine the strain on his right
shoulder joint when he lifts a car), he's also figured out a
way to transmit tactile information from the limbs to the brain.
And moreover, it's only tactile information, and not pain data
as well. How the hell did he do that? From Michael
Glaizer, Canada:
I
have been a fan of the Bionic Woman and the Six Million Dollar
Man for years. I was a fan of the Bionic Woman first; when the
show came on I would record the episodes. I even recorded the
show in French (La Femme Bionique). My favorite Bionic Woman
episodes are Mirror Image, Deadly Ringer, Kill Oscar, The Bionic
Dog, Fembots In Las Vegas, Which One Is Jaime, The Ghost Hunter,
Black Magic and episode with Max. My favorite Six Million Dollar
Man episodes are The Bionic Woman, Return Of The Bionic Woman,
The Death Probe and the Return of the Death Probe, The Secret
Of Bigfoot and The Return Of Bigfoot, The Omega Project with
Elke Sommer, A Bionic Christmas Carol, The Seven Million Dollar
Man and Bionic Criminal. Remember the episode where Rudy got
bitten by a monkey and he ended up with super strength? I have
all three bionic movies. It's too bad that in Bionic Ever After,
Steve's parents weren't there, or his son, Kate or Barney Hiller,
the Seven Million Dollar Man. It would have been great seeing
all these bionic people in one movie as well as Max. The Bionic
Boy doesn't count because he has only bionic legs that were later
made normal. Too bad they couldn't let Lee Majors II to play
the role of Michael Austin, but then he wouldn't be in Bionic
Showdown. That's all for now. From Briony
Coote, New Zealand:
My
favourite Bionic woman episode has always been "Deadly Ringer."
Courtney's plan to bury Jaime under the name of Lisa Galloway
has to be one of the most brilliant, well-organised conspiracies
ever! It really has you wondering — how on earth is Jaime
going to get out of this one, even with bionics? The only problems
are a few production hiccups. They really needed a better location
for Jaime's prison breakout. That looks more like a lumber yard
than a prison courtyard. You can clearly see lumber stacks, trucks
and forklifts in the background. And the penitentiary's only
parameter is a wire fence? I would be expecting a concrete wall.
I remember reading somewhere
that someone was asking whether it was Jaime or a stand-in doing
the veil dance in "Jaime and the King." I would say
a stand-in. I have done belly-dancing, and I could tell the dancer
was a professional. From John
Taylor Thomas:
In Episode 16, the Seven Million
Dollar Man, Monte Markham's character, is named Barney Miller.
In a later episode, The Bionic Criminal, the character's name
is changed to Barney Hiller. Why is that? Is it because of the
TV series Barney Miller?
What makes laugh is the stunt
men used in these shows. You can always tell who is the stunt
man and who's Lee Majors. What I can't understand is, why would
they use a stunt man to run through the woods? Was Lee out of
shape? Plus when the stunt man runs and we see him from behind,
you know he's not Lee Majors, because Lee runs with elbows extended
practically to his shoulders. When the stunt guy runs , he runs
like Jamie Sommers.
How did they make it so real
looking when Austin pulls the pole out of the ground? I thought
that was really cool , especially for the 1970's version of special
effects.
You know what makes me crack
up everytime I see it? The "Lookalike" episode with
George Foreman. The two scenes that made me laugh my ass off
is when Austin knocks a guy off a ledge after the guy tried shooting
him. The guy falls about five feet but screamed on the way down
as if he was falling off a roof. The second scene is when Majors,
Foreman and the bad guys were
fighting in the ring. Everytime somebody got hit, you heard that
"uuhhll" sound effect.
I have the 1975 Donruss card/sticker
set. Every card shows scenes from the show. But there are two
cards that I have never seen in any of the shows , Card 24 says
on the card that Austion is trying to save a runaway train. It
shows him wearing a blue turtleneck and turning a wheel. I wish
I knew where that came from. But you know, from where that picture
looked with the white beams in the background and what he is
wearing, its almost identical to the picture that Steve Austin
carries around as his OSI ID card. Card 39 shows Steve and Oscar
talking.
Here is my list of my favorite
episodes: Population: Zero, The Seven Million Dollar Man, Killer
Wind, The Day Of The Robot, The Return Of The Robot Maker, Lookalike,
Nuclear Alert, Run Steve Run, The Last Kamakazee, The Bionic
Criminal and Big Brother. From Dawn
Candiolro:
When he discusses bionic toys, Rod Rehn neglects to mention the
rocket for Steve Austin. It opened to reveal on operating table
with a three-dial control panel that had wires.These wires could
be attached to Steve. How do I know? I still own mine.
Guest
articles by Rod Rehn, former curator, The Bionic Site:
(1) Top secret intro, (2) Show
intro; (3) Inside bionics
(4) Best & worst episodes;
(5) Bionic toysFeedback
from visitorsLinks:
Bionic Woman
(VHS);
Bionic Woman Poetry
(site)
Bionic
Fan Network
(site)Don't
miss Bionic
Con, Tampa, Florida, June 23-25, 2006U.S.
products: Six Million Dollar
Man T-shirtU.K.
products: Six Million Dollar
Man: Season 1 Box Set (DVD)
The Bionic Woman:
Season 1 Box Set (DVD)Copyright
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