When her father, The Phantom, is presumed killed, Jedda dons the iconic purple costume herself to take on Ming and a deranged civilian named Madden, further proving her worth to the Defenders of The Earth.
Here's "The Ghost Walks Again":
From season 1 of Pee-Wee's Playhouse:
Pee-Wee (Paul Reubens) and Captain Carl (Phil Hartman) play a game of restaurant, where Pee-Wee is a one-man operation.
Disney decided to produce what amounted to a teaching tool about the Olympics, done for laughs with Goofy demonstrating various Olympic sports. Here's "The Olympic Champ":
Please excuse the YouTuber who posted this next item.
Nissan commissioned a series of ads from claymation icon Will Vinton, including this bit, in which an explorer action figure courts a redhead, much to the dismay of her blond companion. No, it's not a meeting of GI Joe, Barbie, & Ken, contrary to what the poster stated. Dale Ishimoto appears as Mr. K, with Van Halen's cover of The Kinks' "You Really Got Me" on the soundtrack.
The Three Musketeers investigate when a simple puppeteer (Don Messick, also the voice of Aramis) and his "puppet" steal the King's crown.
In 1985, Project Literacy was formed to help not only children, but adults, too, to learn. ABC & PBS joined forces for a series of specials and interstitals, which included commentary from President Ronald Reagan, and a number of network stars.
Around 1986, ABC began running interstitals during its Saturday morning programming as well as in primetime, utilizing the talents of some the stars on their primetime roster, including Oscar winner Louis Gossett, Jr., John Ritter, and, in this quickie, Dana Delany (China Beach).
Burger Chef restaurants were the sponsors of Rankin-Bass' syndicated Festival of Family Classics series of animated specials. The irony here, though, is that a rival studio produced the animated commercials featuring Burger Chef & Jeff.
Jeff (sounds like it might be June Foray using her Rocky voice) turns to his boss, the Burger Chef (Paul Winchell) for help whenever he runs into a difficult customer, such as, in this spot, Count Fangburger......
Biker Mice From Mars turns 30 this year, and with news that a new version of the series is in development (more later), it's time to take a look back at the original, which aired on Sundays in most of the country during its 3 year run (1993-6).
Yes, there was the inevitable toy line that came out of this series, and Marvel's television arm, under the aegis of New World Television, put it on the air. Marvel produced a miniseries that lasted three issues out of a scheduled four.
The titular mice have arrived on Earth after their homeworld was overrun by the Plutarkians. Much like a certain team of sentient turtles, the Biker Mice gain a human confidante who provides plenty of assistance.
The voice cast had a decided Beverly Hills 90210 beat, with Ian Zierling, Jason Priestley, & Brian Austin Green all on the roster. Zierling voiced Vinnie, one of the Biker Mice. The cast also included Michael Dorn (Star Trek: The Next Generation), Leah Remini (ex-Saved by The Bell), and relative TV graybeard Peter Strauss (Rich Man, Poor Man).
Check the opener. Mind the French subtitles.
I'm willing to guess this next entry from NBC's Special Treat might've also served as a pilot for a possible spin-off series, which, unfortunately, didn't come to fruition.
KidsTown USA aired in September 1983, with Nancy McKeon (The Facts of Life, The Puppy's Great Adventures) co-hosting with David Saunders. They're in Chicago, meeting some local kids, who get to visit the set of "Sixteen Candles" and what was then Comiskey Park, home of the Chicago White Sox.
Since this is 1983, Casey Kasem (American Top 40, America's Top 10, Scooby-Doo, etc.) takes us in and out of commercial breaks.
It had been 20 years between albums when the Monkees released "Good Times" in 2016. "You Bring The Summer", the 2nd single from the CD, was written by XTC's Andy Partridge. The album also includes a posthumous contribution from Davy Jones, who'd passed on four years earlier, plus Harry Nilsson and Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo.
Seth MacFarlane paid homage to the Rat Pack by performing "Mr. Booze" (from "Robin & The 7 Hoods") in a season 9 episode of Family Guy. Yes, he makes a mockery of Alcoholics Anonymous in the course of all this, but with Seth singing as Brian & Peter, plus backing vocals from the likes of H. Jon Benjamin (Archer, Bob's Burgers) and Phil LaMarr (ex-MadTV, Justice League, Static Shock, Samurai Jack, etc.), among others, it is at the same time a love letter to one of the auteur's likely favorite movies.
Today, Ryan Seacrest is one of the busiest guys in Hollywood, between American Top 40 on radio and American Idol on TV, and a handful of projects in between, including Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve every New Year's Eve.
You know, of course, that Seacrest will take over Wheel of Fortune after current host Pat Sajak retires next year, but it's not the first time that Seacrest has taken on a series developed by the late entertainer Merv Griffin.
In 1997, Griffin sought to capitalize on the growing internet, and came up with Click, a quiz show that pitted three teams of teenagers against each other. The series lasted two seasons (1997-9), but ye scribe has no record of the show airing in the 518. It was Seacrest's 1st hosting gig, predating Idol by 4 years.
Let's check a sample episode:
From Disney's Wonderful World of Color:
Ludwig Von Drake (Paul Frees) is our guide for an exploration "Inside Outer Space", prefaced, of course, by host Walt Disney. Donald Duck appears briefly.
The Squirrel Nut Zippers earned an award at an animation festival in Vancouver, British Columbia for this next item.
"Ghost of Stephen Foster", visually, is a throwback to the black & white era of animation in the Golden Age, particularly the style of the Fleischer brothers. Given the theme, I'd have saved it for Halloween, but why wait?
With football training camps for colleges, high schools, & the NFL due to open in about two weeks, it's time to check in with Our Gang in 1937's "The Pigskin Palooka".
Alfalfa has been sent to a military school. To impress his prospective lady fair, Darla, Alfalfa lies about being on the football team, and when Spanky and the rest of the gang buy his tall tales, it's put up or shut up time for Alfalfa.
This really is about as rare as it gets.
While the title shown in the video is The Wonderful World of Disney, this next item first aired when it was still Disney's Wonderful World of Color.
Moby Duck (Paul Frees, who also narrated) makes his lone TV appearance as the star of "Pacifically Peeking". Moby is better known as having appeared in comics when Gold Key held the license for Disney properties appearing in comic books.
Kenny Loggins & Jim Messina scored a huge hit with 1973's "Danny's Song", which landed them on The Midnight Special:
Disney produced a series of True Life Adventures for theatres, usually as featurettes preceding features like "Charley & The Angel" or "The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes", to use a couple of examples.
However, a made-for-TV piece like "Inky The Crow", produced for The Wonderful World of Disney, was mostly for laughs. The titular bird is taken in by a teenager who has no clue about a crow's nature as a mischief maker.
Olan Soule (Dragnet) is the narrator.
Long before her reputation was destroyed by scandal, Lillian Ellison, aka the Fabulous Moolah, made the first of two appearances on To Tell The Truth, at the time moderated by Bud Collyer. After she and the imposters, both male, completely fooled the panel, Moolah would return 11 years later on the syndicated Truth with Garry Moore.
20 years ago, WB & Cartoon Network decided to experiment.
Teen Titans didn't have the standard look of DC's animated fare of the period. Instead, the character designs were made with Japanese chibi anime in mind. The series was a huge enough success, such that fans are still waiting for the series to be revived as an alternative to the current cash cow, Teen Titans Go!, which CN continues to spam into the ground on a daily basis.
My Adventures With Superman, which premiered this morning on [adult swim], and is streaming on Max, with replays on [as]' Toonami block starting Sunday morning, also uses anime influences in its designs. Based on what we've seen so far, you could make a case for WB acquiring the rights to do an American version of Dragon Ball Z, as some of the designs are similar.
Plans call for Superman to encounter an iteration of Task Force X, aka the Suicide Squad, as well as Monsieur Mallah (Brotherhood of Evil), Deathstroke (Chris Parnell, ex-Saturday Night Live), and Brainiac (Michael Emerson, ex-Arrow, Person of Interest). Livewire figures into the first two episodes, but, as with Jimmy and Perry White, has a new look. Subsequent episodes will premiere at Midnight every Thursday night/Friday morning, and will continue into the end of August.
Long time fans will love the almost immediate meet cute between Clark & Lois, so they're not wasting any time there, plus the fact that this Lois, as a 20-something, is cute as a button.
Rating: A.
FM radio fans will love this. Peter Frampton closes a 1975 episode of The Midnight Special with "Show Me The Way".
Disney's Wonderful World of Color, aka The Wonderful World of Disney, had a delicious mix of animated and live-action entries. We have one of the live-action two-parters over at The Land of Whatever, so now let's give the animation some equal time.
Walt Disney is our tour guide. "Fly With Von Drake" starts with a brief, speculative exploration of space, narrated by Paul Frees. Later, Ludwig Von Drake (Frees) takes over, trying to claim he was there when the Wright Brothers took that first flight.
The Bay City Rollers Meet The Saturday Superstars hyped up NBC's 1978-9 lineup in an hour-long primetime special, which at the time was rare.
To refresh, this was NBC's freshman class of 1978:
Yogi's Space Race.
The Krofft Superstar Hour.
The Fantastic Four.
The Godzilla Power Hour.
It didn't take long before the network tinkered with the lineup, as Space Race was split into 3 component parts, and reruns of Jonny Quest were added to create Godzilla Super 90.
We've reviewed all four of the above before. The Bay City Rollers are joined by Scott Baio (Who's Watching The Kids?), Joe Namath (The Waverly Wonders), Erik Estrada (CHiPs; he'd also appear on the Krofft Superstar Hour), and Kaptain Kool & The Kongs. We've previously seen "And I Never Dreamed", and, as has been documented, Debra Clinger (Superchick) had been cast in CBS' The American Girls, and Michael Lembeck (Kaptain Kool) moved on to One Day at a Time and a directorial career. Seems as though Mickey "Turkey" McMeel went to the Barry Gibb Falsetto School.
Billie Hayes reprises as Witchiepoo, and Jay Robinson, whose Dr. Shrinker was rebooted as Dr. Deathray, plays Dracula here, recalling his role in "Train Ride to Hollywood" 3 years earlier. Dick Tufeld, the announcer for Fantastic Four, has that gig here.
They don't make Tastycake pastries like they used to.
I've had some of their chocolate pies, and the crust is some kind of crumbly, even before you eat.
In 1974, they tried an ad campaign with a puppet, the Tastycake Baker (sounds like the voice is Don Messick). I've never seen this until today.
When Smokey Robinson went solo, the Miracles didn't split, oh no. Billy Griffin was signed to succeed Robinson as the group's lead singer.
Just before Christmas of 1975, Griffin & The Miracles appeared on American Bandstand to perform "Love Machine":
Mix Nickelodeon's Double Dare with Family Feud, and you have Family Challenge, a Family Channel series that ran for 2 seasons (1995-7), and deserved a better fate.
Ray Combs (ex-Family Feud) was reunited with announcer Gene Wood in the 1st season, but Combs' off-camera issues led to his suicide in between seasons. The Family Channel (now Freeform) forged ahead with season 2, bringing in Michael Burger (Home & Family) as the show's new host. Wood had left, ending his association with the network after three years.
Family Challenge sprang from the minds of veteran producer Woody Fraser and actor-comedian Dave Thomas (Grace Under Fire, ex-SCTV), meant to be fun for the entire family. The families weren't limited to a finite number of players, like, for example, Double Dare and Family Feud, and even Combs got in on the action, usually at the end of the show, as Burger would also do.
Following is a season 1 sample, taken from a rerun on Game Show Network.
