I have to admit not knowing the old series, so my judgement is to be taken with a grain of salt, but I think it is definitely worth watching for what it’s worth. Interesting effects, interesting modern take on a concept…
I used to love the old series as a kid but it is strictly for fans of camp kitsch these days. The new series I have only just started on (a couple of episodes) but I am really enjoying it. Revamped for the 21st century in all the right ways I think. references to the old series but darker in tone while still definitely being family friendly. My wife and I and our middle daughter have all been enjoying it anyway and one we watch together.
CARDINAL (2017)
A thriller series in 6 parts, called the Canadian answer to Scandinavian noir series like The Killing and The Bridge. It was well-received by critics and also received no less than six Canadian screen awards.
Billy Campbell (who starred in the English language adaptation of the Danish series The Killing) and Karine Vanasse play an unlikely couple of detectives trying to solve a case involving a series of brutal abductions and killings. They both have troubles at home and don’t really trust each other, and have all the good reasons for it: while investigating the murder case, Vanasse is also hired (by her former superior from another department) to investigate Campbell, who might be a dirty cop.
Cardinal (by the way: that’s the name of Campbell’s character) was shot in winter, in Ontario, and the cinematography of the snow-covered desolate landscape is breathtaking. It’s also the series’ major asset. Not that it’s bad, far from, it’s a well-plotted crime drama that will most certainly keep you hooked, but it can hardly be called exceptional. The script offers more twists and turns than you can ask for, but at the same time there are no real surprises, you’ve seen it all before. Campbell is not a bad actor, but for some reason he speaks most of his lines in a loud whisper, an affectation that soon becomes irritating
Yeah, i never was a huge fan of the series, but i do remember enjoying it for what it was back in the day.
Well, i’m only 4 episodes in, and not sure about going on with it. I was hoping it would get better, but the poor writing and annoying characters plus a boring Dr. Smith is what’s killing it for me. Good special effects though!
The Falcon, with Charles McGraw… I love the campy hyper-reality of these type of shows, featuring ‘a former criminal turned criminal-investigator’ known worldwide by a nickname as well as his regular name. Yet his presence is utterly void of worldwide charisma. In The Falcon’s case, the show’s writers forget who he works for. Army Intelligence, ‘government troubleshooter’, tax-fraud investigator, private-detective… none of it makes any sense to justify being world-famous. Plus, the writing is terrible. McGraw is constantly surprised, easily ambushed, and embarrassingly beat-up on a routine basis… somehow managing to be holding a gun at the end of these actionless scripts. Illogically entertaining though, if nothing else is on.
Tenspeed And Brownshoe, from 1980. Wow, this series is horribly scripted and plotted despite top-notch production values and the acting talents of Jeff Goldblum and Ben Vereen. In the pilot, Goldblum is a stockbroker about to be wed and Vereen is a con-artist of some sort. Their paths cross in some sort of unfocused fraud scheme that would never happen in real-life. It’s simply an excuse to showcase clumsy disguise-wearing scenes and unenthusiastic car-chases.
Strangely, the series is from the creators of The Rockford Files, but there is absolute zero carryover of any ‘Rockford writing-magic’. By episode-11 I finally figured-out what the scripts’ problem was. No interaction with cranky police-lieutenants.
Because the creators never explained exactly why Vereen and Goldblum teamed-up to become private detectives in the first-place. Suddenly, Goldblum was a fan of some detective-novelist. And each episode is counterpointed by some lame narrative from his readings. Bizarre.
The show’s title doesn’t make sense. There aren’t any bicycles. And Goldblum wore brown-shoes in the pilot.
Another unexplained gimmick are the mystifying martial-arts abilities the duo somehow possess by episode-2. -Other than a weak " I know martial-arts. " proclamation to expedite the end of an awkward fight-scene.
The music is awful… with a maniacal banjo-track underneath a bland studio-rock score.
Thankfully, Goldblum went-on to do greater projects. But Vereen essentially disappeared after this turkey. Yes, it’s the kind of show where they say ‘turkey’.
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I liked it in the early 80s. It had the Rockford touch for me then.
And the Rockford Files is probably the only US TV series from the 70s which I can still watch, actually it is often pretty great.
It seemed like a lot of fun at the time, back in a less demanding or sophisticated world.
Wondered why it never showed up for repeats (in the UK)
There are a lot of shows that haven’t aged too well … but sometimes that cheesiness is all part of the fun of the revisit.
I picked up a boxset of ‘Hart to Hart’ recently, series 1, for 30p … and just looking at Robert Wagner’s smug face is enough to ensure I’ll probably never get around to watching it … and yet, in the late 70s/early 80s these programmes were massively popular.
Also watched bits of ‘The Winds of War’ and ‘Rich Man, Poor Man’ which were hailed as epic TV masterpieces … well, they’re not. That has much to do with the strict censorship for television drama of the time … making every period enacted appear about as realistic as the ‘Children’s Illustrated Bible’ 
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I think Columbo aged well as a series. It’s a murder mystery series in the sense that the murder is a mystery to the detective but not to the murderer or the audience. Episode after episode of dramatic irony.
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Yup … you can’t go wrong with a few Colombo episodes on a lazy Sunday afternoon 
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Columbo is at least still watchable, but Rockford is much better.
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Rockford is the one guy in human history to have a trailer home right on the beach in Malibu, California. 
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The Life And Legend Of Wyatt Earp. Starring Hugh O’Brian.
" We just wanna have fun. "
"Leave your guns in the Marshal’s office and you can have all the fun you want. "
" Draw fast. Aim slow. "
Those quotes sum-up the essence of this amazing series. Took me over a month to watch all 226-episodes. I watched it in real-time as a kid and it all seemed disturbingly sinister. Doc Holiday (Douglas Fowley) was scary and Old Man Clanton (Trevor Bardette) was verrry scary. Just about every character exuded chaos to various degrees.
Even Roscoe The Mule… embodied with chaotic human-traits by his gruff owner, Morgan Woodward, as Deputy Shotgun Slim.
There’s never been a TV-western like it. Virtually zero plot-contrivances. It follows Earp’s career chronologically, as if the creators knew the show wouldn’t be cancelled until the OK Corral finale. And it wasn’t. In fact, the OK Corral finale is a masterpiece of pacing and camerawork. It might be what gave Peckinpah the idea of slow-motion action-scenes. Each gunman has his own individual scene, which concludes, then the next scene begins… with voiceover narrations (it’s all being recalled to a judge in a courtroom).
It might be only the 4th-or-5th time Earp actually killed someone thru-out the series, despite him being one of the most violent characters ever. He was constantly sucker-punching someone, severely slapping them multiple times, or devastatingly pistol-whipping them multiple times. There was even an episode where a gunsmith was tired of repairing Earp’s gun and tried to get him stop beating people over the head with it.
The inventor of Wyatt’s trademark 15-inch barreled gun, Ned Buntline makes various appearances every so often, with plots generally involving the gun. There’s so many interesting nuances the writers worked into the show, it’s impossible to mention them.
The last episode simply ends with Wyatt going to get breakfast after a fistfight with the last of Clanton’s gang.
10-out-of-10.
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I’ve been binging Preacher and am now 3 episodes into season 3.
Fucking incredible show, almost perfect blend of absurdity with spiritual philosophy, and finally answers the question of if god is to be found in a dog.
Yet another comic I am going to have to read at some point
Iron Horse, with Dale Robertson as Ben Calhoun.
IMDB rates it at 7-something, when it’s been low-rated since the beginning. I figured-out the problem with the show. The audience doesn’t grasp its premise. It was a ‘half-built’ railroad, which Calhoun won in a card-game.
Not a full up-'n-running railroad. No railroad-owner would love poker that stupidly to bet his railroad on it.
The pilot was centered-around a large bridge being blown-up behind the train, as it brought supplies to the construction-crew a mile-or-so ahead. So the episodes feature Calhoun’s train essentially traveling a short amount of miles… No endless parade of guest-stars and their ‘old west’ railriding-dramas.
The audience wasn’t entertained by Robertson & Co. standing-around talking, aboard a train that isn’t moving.
Though there’s some nicely-paced fistfights and gunplay, edge-of-your-seat railroad-hijinx only works in a movie format.
My film watching time has suffered in the last week as I’ve been watching Man In The High Castle - I attempted to start this series a couple times in the past, but the first episodes are slow paced and not particularly grabbing. But the show picks up from there and becomes quite excellent. I’m a huge fan of PKD’s written works, one of my top 5 authors, so its great to see such an excellent adaptation of his work here since usually the movies are crap. The recent Amazon episodic series based on his short stories is terrible. But Man In The High Castle really captures a lot of Dick’s core concepts that are always present in his writing, and besides this, its a very good show all around.
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The Punisher is back for Season 2 and he’s ready to kick some major ass.
First season was awesome, hoping for the same in S2.
Trackdown, with Robert Culp. Put-together by the same production-crew and writing-team that did Wanted: Dead Or Alive. Featuring an episode where Steve McQueen plays a murderous villain… probably the only time he’s ever played a psycho. Culp is formidable and believable as a Texas Ranger, though the plots are unfocused as to why he switches between saddle-tramp and town-marshal. Or why some episodes have a narrator while others don’t.
The plots themselves are tight and a little wooden. Culp just didn’t have the charisma of McQueen when it came to westerns and character-interactions. Not an awful show though. The gunplay is crisp and there’s attention paid to detail.
Hell on Wheels - I watched the first two seasons few yrs ago, then forgot about it to find out recently it got five seasons! Wow. So, I started from the beginning, I hope the rest is as good as those first seasons.
I enjoyed them through to the end.