What do Bruce Campbell and the Olympics have in common? – Tuesday TubeWatch

I knew that I knew it from somewhere. It sounded familiar, but I couldn’t place it. Now I know. The Olympics stole their theme song from the opening credits of one of my favorite too-quickly-cancelled shows.

The Adventures of Brisco County Jr. had much in common with another favorite western of mine, Wild, Wild West (not to be confused with the unfortunate movie reboot version). Bruce Campbell brought his trademark snarkiness to Brisco and we were treated to a show that made westerns fun again. Light humor and abundant action made this show a treat to watch on Saturday mornings. Brisco County Jr. starts out as a pretty standard western story, where Brisco is tracking down his father’s killers, but as the season progresses we discover that the plot is bigger than we were led to believe, and a sci-fi element is brought in. That sounds like it won’t work, but it does. Wild, Wild West did it (though without a continuing story arc), and Firefly just reversed the emphasis (sci-fi with a bit of western thrown in).

I’m still a bit surprised they cancelled it, actually. It really was good. And apparently the theme song was good enough for NBC to use as themes for both Major League Baseball and the Olympics.

Come to think of it, the theme songs for the other two shows are great, too.

Wild, Wild West‘s theme had a bit more of a western feel to it, and the animated opening was just great (though he’s supposed to punch the lady at the end… weird version):

Firefly‘s was a bit moodier – which was fitting as the show was much more serious than Brisco or West.

Anyway… back to Brisco. That show was my first taste of Bruce Campbell, and I was an immediate convert. I’ve seen him in a few other shows, most notably Hercules and Xena, and most recently, Burn Notice (excellent, btw). I know about Jack of all Trades, but haven’t seen it. What’s your favorite Bruce-related show?

(Yeah, I know he’s in movies, too… but I’m sticking to TV at the moment.)

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