The Irwin Allen TV Series And Movie Thread

[BAYLOR]

In 1976 he did a made for Tv film The Time Travelers probably a pilot for never made series. In this film the country is being ravaged by a disease that hadn't been seen since the 1870's . There was a doctor living in Chicago at that time who had found a an effective treatment to this disease that is ravaging the present. Though they know about the Doctor, they don't have any of his research records because he and his records perished in the the great Chicago fire of 1871. There is organization funded by the government that has discovered time travel, what they do is send two doctors back in time to find out from the 19th century Doctor how he cured the disease. One the problems is they have to send him at point just before the fire breaks out. The other problem , they won't be able to do anything to change any history. It wasn't a bad film and it might have made a good series.

 

[F.J. Hansen]

I liked Time Tunnel. I missed the episode, the premiere I think, which had a soldier shooting up the Roman Empire with a machine gun. When I heard about it a school I got really mad. Even now I don't think I ever saw it, even during summer reruns.

That wasn't the premiere. The premiere was the one where they're on the Titanic.

 

[Dave]

Episode list here: http://www.tv.com/shows/the-time-tunnel/episodes/
Titanic 'Rendezvous with Yesterday' was the first. Amazingly only 30 episodes were made as they must have been shown repeatedly.
My favourite would be the 'Secret Weapon' which just placed another layer of complexity to the story of the Time Tunnel experiment, while the worst were 'Merlin the Magician' and 'The Ghost of Nero' that were both just too hokey.

 

[BAYLOR]

Silly as it was , I did like the Captain Nemo Miniseries.

 

[BAYLOR]

I have the entire Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea tv show on dvd This was by far his bet show . It starts out as a fairly serious adventure series but as it progress , the show degenerates into a camp since fction series in which get see the endless reuse of props and stop footage from other Fox films. For me , this show is a bit of a guilty pleasure.

 

[Al Jackson]

I have the entire Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea tv show on dvd This was by far his bet show . It starts out as a fairly serious adventure series but as it progress , the show degenerates into a camp since fction series in which get see the endless reuse of props and stop footage from other Fox films. For me , this show is a bit of a guilty pleasure.

As I think I stated, Harlan Ellison called his time on Allen's show Voyage to the Bottom of the Toilet.

One thing about that show that used to send me into paroxysms of laughter was .... here was a hand picked top crew or professionals for the most advanced submarine in the world ….. and they would mutiny at the drop of a pin!

 

[BAYLOR]

As I think I stated, Harlan Ellison called his time on Allen's show Voyage to the Bottom of the Toilet.

One thing about that show that used to send me into paroxysms of laughter was .... here was a hand picked top crew or professionals for the most advanced submarine in the world ….. and they would mutiny at the drop of a pin!

One episode of Voyage used alot footage from The 1960 film The Lost World , In fact ,the episode was practically a one hour recap of that film . The reuse of Props and monster to save money a hallmark of all of his shows. The the two most popular guest staring monsters on Voyage were Double Hearer and Mr Man Fish, both of these monster were frequent guest stars to the point of practically being series regulars. And they could be large or small depending on the story requirement. And then he the show first in the 1970's anthem the 1980's . Allen would have been better off to do less recycling of props and should have stayed of day to day production of his shows.

I do enjoy the silliness of this show.

 

[BAYLOR]

The show that did that had the greatest post entail was The Time Tunnel . The problem with the show ran into was they quickly ran out of Historical events to do So they started doing alines and monsters and the future . None of which the should have done at all. For this show to have worked , they would likely have had to switch to a serial format. meaning continue story arc , stretching out the historical events. Im not at all sure the audiences of that era would have gone for that kind of format .

 

[BAYLOR]

Lost in Space . My favorite season is the first season because it has a grittiness which they dispensed with in later seasons . Also Like the early Laser Pistols and rifles they had in the beginning .

 

[BAYLOR]

I also have the Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea film.

 

[BAYLOR]

In 1976 Alen Produced a tv film which I suspect was a pilot for a never made tv seers. Time Travelers. It was a very good movie and it set itself up fir a continuation but wasn't picked up .

 

[BAYLOR]

There was also I hour pilot reboot of the Time Tunnel made in 2002 which was surprisingly good but was not picked up by the networked.

 

[BAYLOR]

Yes his shows had their obvious flaws, but at least they were fun to watch.

 

[Al Jackson]

Yes his shows had their obvious flaws, but at least they were fun to watch.

Funny thing by 1970 Irwin Allen was having trouble finding a buyer for any new TV so he switched to movies.
The 1972 The Poseidon Adventure started a long run of disaster movie deals, that movie is quite good. Allen did not direct it, supposedly some action sequence.
Alas as time went on the DISASTER film become more Family Friendly taking all the scare out of them …. which has been its own disaster ....
Alas Allen made some god awful disaster films later …. The Swarm (gad!) , When Time Ran Out (gak!)….

 

[Jeffbert]

I think the thing that makes a good concept for a show turn into a poor series, is that Allen, as I understand it, created the shows, but had little to do with them after that. The people who actually write the scripts, went way out on a limb, far away from the creators' ideas, & may have disregarded his desires.

If I were to create a series, I would start by establishing the basic premise, the characters & their backstories, & rules for the script writers to follow. This may be the most extensive part, stating what types of stories are not to be written. I would also, from time to time, check out the scripts they were writing. I had watched the 1st 4 seasons of Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda. But, it had seemed to lose its way since the 1st few seasons, & during s5, I lost interest. Of course, GR was dead 10 years before it even started.

 

[Al Jackson]

I think the thing that makes a good concept for a show turn into a poor series, is that Allen, as I understand it, created the shows, but had little to do with them after that. The people who actually write the scripts, went way out on a limb, far away from the creators' ideas, & may have disregarded his desires.

Not what I heard. Several writers for Irwin Allen shows felt he mettled with the scripts with dumb ideas, Harland Ellison who worked on Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea called him a pinhead.
Anyway I found Allen's show either low concept or too juvenile.

 

[BAYLOR]

Not what I heard. Several writers for Irwin Allen shows felt he mettled with the scripts with dumb ideas, Harland Ellison who worked on Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea called him a pinhead.
Anyway I found Allen's show either low concept or too juvenile.

Ellison's script for voyage was originally titled Mealtime. Irwin Allen ruined his script and change the title The Price of Doom . Im not sure but I think this was the first time Ellison used Cordwainer Bird in the writers credit.

 

[BAYLOR]

He also brought us such films as The Lost World based on Arthur Conan Doyles novel of the same name. The film had a very impressive cast but the Dino effects consisted of Monitor lizards , an Alligator and iguanas with horns and frills stuck to them as stands ins for the Dinosaurs which didn't work. They did similar thing in Journey to the Center of the Earth using Iguana's as stand in for Dimetrodons which did work.

And in the 1970's The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure both of which are good films. The Swarm about killer bees is not a very good , Beyond the Poseidon Adventure really bad and his final theatrical film The Day the World Ended , abysmal.

 

[BAYLOR]

Episode list here: The Time Tunnel
Titanic 'Rendezvous with Yesterday' was the first. Amazingly only 30 episodes were made as they must have been shown repeatedly.
My favourite would be the 'Secret Weapon' which just placed another layer of complexity to the story of the Time Tunnel experiment, while the worst were 'Merlin the Magician' and 'The Ghost of Nero' that were both just too hokey.

What they should have done with that show was serialized story telling rather then the history even of the week, they could have gotten 4 years aout of it that way . Also no aliens any trips to the future. This show had huge potential.

 

[Dave]

I think it was just too expensive to make. They made good use of unused clips from movies and old news reels, but you couldn't imagine anyone doing that today, and period sets and costumes are costly. Doctor Who suffered the same, which I expect is why there were so may episodes of that running down spaceship corridors and fewer on location in slate quarries. I agree with you about the potential. I really liked that series as a kid. I think that the not bringing them back home was a way to allow the episodes to be show out of order. That was very important with syndicated shows in the 1960's that might be on several different US stations, but I would certainly have liked to see a story arc. If they had been able to have developed further the Russian "secret weapon" and had had a time tunnel "space race" between the USA and USSR.