Caddickisms

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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I’ve fallen really behind on posting lately. Given the upcoming holiday there probably won’t be much for the next few days either. But I wanted to quickly throw a few things out there in Sci-Fi and Entertainment news.

Hobbit films (report stolen from Slice of Sci-Fi):

Director Guillermo del Toro told reporters during a Hellboy press junket that his first “The Hobbit” movie will stick strictly to J.R.R. Tolkien’s original “The Hobbit” material, however, the second film will take in a wide range of materials from the Tolkien universe inlcluding many of Tolkien’s own notes.

It will be interesting to see what happens with that second movie. Do we have a screenwriter who can take those notes and other materials and make a script that feels Tolkien-ish?

Doctor Who: Parts 1 and 2 of the season finale were extremely good. Like everyone else, I’m waiting with very little patience for the final installment (I hope the Sci-Fi channel runs it in its entirety when it’s their turn – it’s a super-sized episode at 65 commercial-free minutes). Then I intend to be very annoyed next year when we only get a few specials. I’ll do another review of the season after it’s over.

Batman Begins: Heath Ledger continues to get rave reviews on his Joker portrayal. I hope the movie lives up to the buzz.

Starship Troopers 3: Three? Really? Do we need three of these things? Wasn’t one painful enough? If you really want to see the trailer, it’s out there.

Hancock: Apparently this has a pretty short running time. And it’s getting middling reviews. Apparently the first half is pretty good, but then it falls apart. This is really driving me nuts. The more I see of clips and trailers for this, the more I want to see it, but then I find out it’s short and may not live up to expectations? I don’t know if I can throw my money and time at that. I really want to see it, though… blah.

Star Wars: Clone Wars – The new trailer is out there! It’s a bit moodier than the others. I think I liked Trailer #1 better. Still on the must see list, though.

The Prisoner: AMC is remaking 60’s TV show “The Prisoner” in a 6-part miniseries with Jim Caviezel and Ian McKellan. Top notch actors, ground-breaking original… I hope it turns out well!

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-along Blog: Joss Whedon, the creator of Buffy, Angel, and Firefly, has got himself a nice little humorous project with some familiar faces. Looks intriguing.

And finally…

Bruce Campbell, who “starred” in all three Spider-man movies and my favorite western-sci-fi TV show (The Adventures of Brisco County Jr.) – and a few well known cult classics – is coming out with a new film in which he plays himself. Sort of. Looks really good to me…

In case I’m too lazy to blog again before the weekend, have a great Independence Day (unless you happen to live in a non-US location, in which case, have a nice normal weekend.)

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Adventures of Brisco County Jr., The – Brisco date, art and tons of extras!
This was a fun show. Great sense of humor, great mixture of sci-fi and westerns, and my introduction to Bruce Campbell (as the title character).

At just under $100, I’ll probably pass on purchasing it, but I’ll rent it. Gotta get my wife up to speed on yet another show I was hooked on.

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