KISS bassist-vocalist Gene Simmons created My Dad The Rock Star for Nickelodeon and Canada's Nelvana Studios, and served as the show's executive producer. Sad to say, that was the extent of Simmons' involvement with the series, which lasted a year (26 episodes) before being cancelled.
Rock Zilla was based on Simmons himself, though no one's sure if the same can be said for Rock's kids being analogues for Simmons' own children. While the Simmons family has since gone before the cameras in the reality series, Gene Simmons' Family Jewels, Simmons' 1st series didn't exactly set the world on fire. The animation may be to blame, as Nelvana's production values had dropped by this point. If you don't believe me, check out the open:
Because it aired on Nick, the show aired on various days, so, predictably, Nick burned the show off and out too quickly to suit us older fans. Believe me, you might be better served finding a DVD of "KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park" to rent.
Rating: B-.
4 comments:
The premise was a great one - what do you do when your dad is a mega famous rock star, you live in a huge gaudily decorated mansion, older sis is a spoiled valley girl who hates you and mom is a sweet, well meaning but dippy personality? Where do you fit in?
The possibilities for it were great - but as you mentioned the writing wasn't up to par and the animation was also lacking. It also would have helped if Zilla could have been out of makeup when he wasn't onstage - even Gene Simmons knew when to take off the greasepaint.
True dat. And who knew that Simmons was really Jewish? Figure that one out.
That I actually knew. He was born in Israel and his mom (and if I'm not mistaken, Paul Stanley's mother as well), was a Holocaust survivor.
Given that KISS was supposed to be an acronym for the devil, how ironic is that?
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