REVIEW: THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2

I’m actually glad I read so many negative advance reviews of The Amazing Spider-Man 2. They lowered my expectations to the point where I went in prepared to see a disaster on the order of Batman and Robin or X-Men 3: The Last Stand . . . or Spider-Man 3. So I was surprised—very pleasantly so—to find myself actually enjoying Marc Webb’s sequel to his 2012 series reboot. My feeling is, if you liked the last one, you’ll probably like this one too.

The film picks up about a year after its immediate predecessor, with Peter Parker (once again played by the perfectly cast Andrew Garfield) having settled into a nice groove as the web-slinging crime fighter—he’s having a great time stopping bad guys, and is even making some money from it, as he occasionally sells photos of his exploits to Daily Bugle publisher J. Jonah Jameson (who is represented here by a couple of amusing e-mails—but when are we gonna see him already?). Peter is also graduating from high school, along with his beloved girlfriend Gwen Stacy (the exquisite Emma Stone, who is even better here than she was in the previous movie—and that’s saying something), with both headed for college. 

Gwen's future is looking bright.  

In the meantime, Gwen is continuing her internship at Oscorp, the scientific research company founded by Norman Osborn, who, if you recall from last time, is desperately seeking a cure for the disease that is killing him. We’re finally introduced to Norman here, and he’s played by Chris Cooper, who would not have been my first choice to take over the role from the more youthful and dynamic Willem Dafoe. But Norman has a fairly limited role in this film, not really enough to make much of an impression, though I am left wondering if Webb and his team have future plans for him. 

Norman’s son Harry (Dane DeHaan)—who was Peter’s close friend when they were children—returns to New York after years abroad to see his ailing father, and reconnects with Peter. But it turns out that Harry has the same affliction as his father, and he becomes convinced that the key to curing himself is Spider-Man’s blood. Aware that there’s some sort of connection between Peter and Spider-Man, Harry implores his friend to convince the wall-crawler to help him. Peter wants to help Harry, but he’s concerned about what his genetically re-engineered blood will do to his friend, considering what happened to Dr. Curt Connors in the previous film when he messed around with this kind of stuff (he became the Lizard, in case you missed it). 

Meanwhile, Max Dillon (Jamie Foxx), a nebbishy maintenance man at Oscorp, meets Spider-Man when the web-slinger saves his life during a melee in the streets of Manhattan. In the aftermath, Dillon develops an unhealthy fixation on the superhero—and then survives an accident at Oscorp involving damaged electrical lines and electric eels being used in genetic experiments. Dillon is transformed into an energy being who feeds on the city’s power grid, and renames himself Electro. In this new form, he encounters Spider-Man again, but the wall-crawler fails to live up to his expectations and earns Electro’s wrath—which is a major problem, as Dillon is becoming more and more powerful and is beginning to see himself as godlike.

There are other plot threads, as well. A Russian thug played by a hilariously unhinged Paul Giamatti shows up a couple of times, and is set up for future appearances. The mystery of Peter Parker’s deceased parents (played by Campbell Scott and Embeth Davidtz), established in the previous film, is further developed—and pretty much resolved—here. (Interestingly, no mention is made of Spider-Man’s ongoing search for the criminal who killed his uncle Ben.) And Peter is racked with guilt over the fact that he has broken his promise  to Gwen’s late father, NYPD Captain George Stacy (Denis Leary), that he would stay away from Gwen and not let her get caught up in his activities as Spider-Man. Captain Stacy haunts Peter throughout the film, casting disapproving glares at the young hero.

So there’s a LOT going on in this film, almost more than its running time of nearly two-and-a-half hours can handle. And there was clearly plenty of additional stuff that got cut out during the editing process—key moments that were shown in the trailers are missing in the final cut. And an entire subplot featuring Shailene Woodley as Mary Jane Watson was removed entirely. (I absolutely agree with this decision, by the way—adding Mary Jane would have been one element too many. I can’t see any way that they could have introduced her into this movie without it feeling totally forced. In addition, I don’t think Woodley was a good choice for the role to begin with. Don’t get me wrong, she’s a good actress, but I find that she lacks the charisma and sexiness to play MJ the way she ought to be portrayed. Alas, the ideal actress to play Mary Jane is . . . Emma Stone. Oh well!) 

But The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is never boring. The pacing is solid, the storylines are compelling, and the character interactions are wonderful. All of which sets it apart—FAR apart—from Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 3, which continues to be the absolute nadir of the Spider-Man movies.

Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone have incredible chemistry (no surprise, given their real-life relationship status)—it reminds me of Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow in the Iron Man movies. Their scenes together absolutely sparkle, and watching them play off one another is a real delight. 

Peter and Gwen get a rare opportunity for some quality time.

Actually, Garfield has a great rapport with pretty much everyone in this film—there is one scene in particular, between him and the magnificent Sally Field as Aunt May, that very nearly brought me to tears. 

Peter and Aunt May confront some painful family history.

And Garfield and DeHaan’s Harry really do seem like old friends reunited. DeHaan is fine in the role—it’s a strong, multi-layered performance, though I found his Harry to be a bit creepier than James Franco’s, which makes it all the more obvious that he’s not going to be on the side of the angels for very long.

Harry Osborn can't escape his family legacy. 

Foxx’s Electro is a cool visual and I love his voice once he transforms into an energy being. But his storyline and his motivations are somewhat weak. His shift into super-villaindom comes off as arbitrary—it’s simply not developed sufficiently. As other reviewers have noted, he spouts off one or two groan-inducing lines of dialogue—but nothing as bad as Arnold Schwarzenegger’s ice-themed puns in Batman and Robin. And I think the film goes a bit overboard in terms of showing what a pathetic soul Max Dillion is before his accident.

Electro before...

... and after.

For me, the absolute worst element of the film was the character of Dr. Kafka, a scientist working at the Ravencroft Institute for the Criminally Insane, played by an actor named Marton Csokas. Never mind the fact that in the comics, Dr. Kafka is a woman. Csokas plays Kafka completely over the top, as if he thought he was appearing in the Adam West Batman TV series, and delivers one of the most ridiculous German accents I have ever heard, more comical than anything in Hogan’s Heroes. 

And as with the previous film, the musical score is totally unmemorable. Hans Zimmer replaces James Horner, and surprisingly, neither of these fine composers have come close to surpassing the work of Danny Elfman on the Raimi-directed Spidey movies—and this is coming from someone who doesn’t think that Elfman’s work was particularly spectacular. (Then again, the bar was set by John Williams with Superman: The Movie—it's doubtful anyone will ever be able to top that.) 

On the other end of the spectrum, I cannot say enough good things about Spider-Man’s new costume. I’m so glad that the filmmakers decided to ditch the one from the previous film and return to the classic look established by legendary artist Steve Ditko in the very first Spider-Man story, back in 1962’s Amazing Fantasy #15. 

Garfield’s new outfit is beautiful, easily rivaling the one Tobey Maguire wore—and in some areas, especially the eyes, it is actually a significant improvement. I did find it notable that no one in the film, not even Gwen, mentioned that Spidey is suddenly wearing new duds. (Maybe that was one of the bits that ended up on the cutting room floor?)

I was also pleased that Spider-Man’s trademark wit and mischievous nature were very much on display in this film—a stark contrast to Tobey Maguire’s Spidey, who was far more serious and hardly ever made wisecracks. And the movie goes out of its way to show Spider-Man making it a priority to save and protect civilians and first responders from the chaos and destruction caused by Electro’s rampage. Take that, Man of Steel!    

In addition, Spider-Man himself gets plenty of screen time—and he keeps his mask on for most of it! This is a huge step forward.  

Without getting too heavily into spoiler territory, I will say that the film is based in part on one of the most important Spider-Man stories ever published. In that sense, it’s a bit like X-Men 3: The Last Stand, which took many of its cues from the now-legendary comic-book storyline “The Dark Phoenix Saga.” But unlike that cinematic misfire, which reached for the stars but never even got off the ground, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 does its original source material proud, though not everyone will be pleased. I can say no more.

Longtime Spidey fans are sure to catch at least some of the numerous in-jokes (the number 121 figures prominently in one key scene) and subtle hints of future story plans. There’s even a shout-out to Star Trek—I guess Webb is a fan.      

I’ve seen some criticisms aimed at this film that I found to be fairly petty and downright ridiculous. Granted, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 has its flaws, but they are totally outweighed by its virtues. I still wish Marvel had the film rights—I think they would do an even better job with the property. Their most recent release, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, is one of the best superhero movies ever made, hands down. But Webb and his team have put together a thoroughly entertaining and satisfying film, and it’s nice to know that they will be back for at least one more Spider-Man movie. (Then again, I felt the same way about Sam Raimi and company after their Spider-Man 2, so maybe I shouldn’t be too optimistic. For now, at least, I’ll give Webb the benefit of the doubt.) I’m interested in seeing where they take things next, because at the end of this film, Spider-Man is left in a very, shall we say, intriguing place indeed.          

© All text copyright Glenn Greenberg, 2014.
        

EARLY REVIEW — CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER

At this point, Warner Bros. should just get Marvel to produce their superhero movies. Superman Vs. Batman (or whatever it’s going to be called) is looking more and more like a desperation move, while Marvel’s latest cinematic offering, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, raises the bar and sets a new standard for the genre. It continues Marvel’s remarkable winning streak, delivering a film that manages to be highly enjoyable in its own right, while remaining faithful to its comic-book roots.

Like last year’s Iron Man 3 and Thor: The Dark World, it opens some time after the events of 2012’s blockbuster The Avengers. Steve Rogers—Captain America (played once again by the perfectly cast Chris Evans)—is now working for the international peace-keeping organization known as S.H.I.E.L.D., partnered with agent Natasha Romanoff—the Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson, who more than holds her own)—under the command of Director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson, of course). But as Fury is about to launch a new initiative called Operation: Insight, designed to stop threats before they happen, Cap finds himself having difficulty reconciling his personal values with the activities of the agency giving him his orders. Meanwhile, as Fury discovers that S.H.I.E.L.D. itself may have been compromised, enemy forces make their move, aided by a near-mythical assassin called the Winter Soldier—a brutal and merciless operative who also serves as a painful reminder of Cap’s past. 

The Winter Soldier. No, this is not a crossover with The Six Million Dollar Man.

That’s about as much as I can say without getting into spoiler territory (although Marvel did a pretty thorough job blowing one of the movie’s biggest surprises—at least for those not familiar with the comic-book lore—in its Assembling a Universe TV special that aired on ABC on March 18). 

Even if you’ve read the comics upon which the film is based, there are plenty of twists and turns that should leave you reeling. Even I, a jaded comic-book reader who actually worked at Marvel for nearly seven years, found myself gasping in surprise—and delight—by the revelations sprinkled throughout.

The Winter Soldier is a high-octane thriller with jaw-dropping action sequences and eye-popping special effects. But it also has substance. It explores the difficult question that we’ve all been asking ourselves since 9/11: How willing are we to give up our freedoms and our rights as American citizens in the name of security? What’s especially thrilling to me is that the film also has so much heart. The character dynamics are simply fantastic and touching. There’s one scene in particular, early on, that picks up on some key continuity from the first Captain America movie, and it’s both bittersweet and absolutely heartbreaking.

As an aside, I love the fact that, as with the previous Cap movie, the filmmakers make no apologies for the fact that Captain America is not some complicated, angst-ridden figure filled with inner conflict. He’s a straight arrow, completely noble, and sure of himself and what’s right. If that makes him seem boring or square to some audience members, tough. 

And I have to note that while there are long stretches in the movie where Steve Rogers is dressed in his civilian clothes, he does get to wear two versions of the Captain America uniform, and I heartily approve of both.   

The interaction between Steve and Natasha is one of the main highlights of the film—the chemistry between Evans and Johansson is rock-solid. 

Expect some major character building for the Black Widow in this film. 

Ditto the burgeoning relationship between Steve and incoming character Sam Wilson, aka the Falcon, played by the excellent Anthony Mackie. I’ve liked the Falcon ever since I first encountered him in Captain America #230, published in 1978, and I’m extremely pleased that his live-action debut has been handled so well. 

Captain America and the Falcon: Teaming up on the big screen at last. 

Samuel L. Jackson has an integral role in this film, and is given more to do than usual—and of course, he’s great. (There’s one particular in-joke having to do with Fury that should give the more observant—and in-the-know—viewers quite a chuckle.)

And it’s very gratifying to see an actor of Robert Redford’s stature showing respect for the material. This may be a “comic-book movie,” but Redford is not slumming here. He turns in an effective, nuanced performance as Alexander Pierce, a major Washington, D.C. power player who also just happens to be Nick Fury’s mentor. (It’s interesting to note that had this movie been made about 40 years ago, Redford would have been perfect for the role of Steve Rogers/Captain America himself).

Pierce and Fury discuss the trouble brewing within S.H.I.E.L.D.

As is the norm for these movies set in the interconnected Marvel Cinematic Universe (namely, the movies produced by Marvel itself, which excludes the Spider-Man, X-Men, and Fantastic Four films), there are references to past events and established characters. Iron Man and the Hulk are each referred to more than once. But there’s also a seed planted for a possible future film, one starring a character we haven’t met before: A certain master of the mystic arts. Wow. All I can say, is bring it on!

And yes, you have to stay to the very end to get the full experience. There are two brief epilogues, one during the end credits and one after. The former is the more intriguing one, as it helps set up the upcoming film Avengers: Age of Ultron.

What’s also of note is that this film can’t help but have a significant impact on the TV series Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., which is set in the same universe. No lie: The Winter Soldier is a genuine game-changer for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and for S.H.I.E.L.D., so I’m very curious to see how the TV series—which has improved in a big way over the course of this first season—will be affected going forward.

Marvel has already announced that they’ve given the go-ahead for a third Captain America movie, to be released on May 6, 2016. It’s a vote of confidence that is very much deserved. Go see The Winter Soldier, and enjoy. 

© All text copyright Glenn Greenberg, 2014.

A BIONIC LOOK BACKWARDS, PART III

Well, we’re back to wrap up our retrospective look at The Six Million Dollar Man, and the timing couldn’t be more perfect, what with Dynamite Comics having just released the first issue of their new comic-book series THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN: SEASON SIX on March 12.

It basically picks up where Season Five of the TV series left off, and apparently—and unfortunately, in my humble opinion—it dumps the three reunion TV movies from the continuity. But it’s great to see the original Steve Austin back in action, albeit in comic-book form, and I’m looking forward to seeing where the creative team takes things. And now back to our show: 

SEASON FIVE

Let’s face it: The Six Million Dollar Man was always an uneven series. You can’t point to a particular season as a whole and say, “That’s the one to watch, nearly every episode in it is a gem.” In each season, the quality varied—sometimes wildly—from episode to episode. There were high points, low points, and many points in-between. But the same can’t be said about Season Five, the final year of the series. There’s a real deficit of high points in that season. There are no major stink-bombs either, but the vast majority of the season’s installments fall squarely into the “mediocre” category, sometimes amusing but rarely more than by-the-numbers efforts. And when an episode does show a spark of creativity and some genuine effort, it gets hobbled in the execution.

The series entered the fifth season at a major disadvantage. For reasons I haven’t been able to confirm, Executive Producer Harve Bennett, who had overseen the show since it became a weekly series, departed—somewhat abruptly. He’s still credited as the EP in the two-part season premiere, “Sharks,” but his name is never seen again after that. The show-runners who took over—one of whom was the notorious Fred Freiberger, the gentleman responsible for the third and final (and, overall, less-than-stellar) season of the original Star Trek—just didn’t seem to have the will or the ability to wring any true greatness out of the scripts they had on hand. (In the case of Freiberger, that doesn’t come at all as a surprise.)

Another major problem: The Bionic Woman was canceled by ABC after its second season, and then picked up by NBC. While Richard Anderson and Martin E. Brooks were allowed to continue playing, respectively, Oscar Goldman and Dr. Rudy Wells, in both shows, actual crossovers were now out of the question. Steve Austin and Jaime Sommers could no longer appear together. Steve never mentions Jaime throughout Season Five of TSMDM, and Steve is only referred to once, in passing, during TBW Season Three—in the first episode, which, incidentally, introduced Max the bionic dog.

Woof.

To top it all off, absolutely no effort is made to provide Steve with any depth or substance. There’s virtually no exploration of his character, aside from revisiting his past as an astronaut in several episodes, including one storyline that sends him back to the moon. As a result, Lee Majors basically sleepwalks his way through the season, given no chance to really stretch his acting muscles. He’s never allowed to show Steve’s vulnerable, more human side, the way he was in the first TV pilot and in “The Bionic Woman” and its sequel. He is, however, allowed to grow his hair out to epic proportions—perhaps to compensate for the loss of his mustache at the end of Season Four? 

Let it fly in the breeze, and get caught in the trees...

With a run of mostly unremarkable episodes, and no trace of Jaime, my daughter Maddie lost a lot of interest over the course of the fifth season, so she doesn’t have much to say about it. So, alas, you’ll be hearing mostly from me this time around. Let’s get to it.

One of the most notable things about Season Five is that there are quite a few two-parters—five in all. Presumably this was done as a cost-cutting measure rather than for any creative reasons, because most of the stories didn’t really warrant the extra time. “Return of Deathprobe,” a sequel to Season Four’s “Death Probe,” is probably the best of the two-parters. I remember really liking it as a kid, but I was a bit underwhelmed watching it again on DVD. That said, in some ways it’s actually an improvement on its predecessor.    

For me, “Bigfoot V” and “The Lost Island” are the closest that Season Five comes to having actual highlights.

“Bigfoot V,” titled thusly because it’s the fifth episode to feature Sasquatch (his two previous appearances were both two-parters), does a semi-decent job picking up on where the character was left off and wrapping up his storyline. That in itself is a major achievement, since writer/producer Kenneth Johnson, who created the character and was responsible for all of the previous episodes involving him, has nothing whatsoever to do with this one. 

Eye feel a change coming on...

It’s an interesting, compelling episode, with a genuinely touching ending, but there’s some truly bizarre stuff in there, and some mangling of continuity. For example, the aliens who created Sasquatch had mentioned at the end of “The Return of Bigfoot” that their people would not come to Earth to take them home for about 100 years, but in “Bigfoot V,” Steve mentions in passing that he saw the aliens off when they departed our planet. When—and how—did that happen? And if Steve was there when the aliens left, how could he not know that Sasquatch had decided to stay on Earth?  

Near the end of “Bigfoot V,” when Steve plays a video message from the aliens explaining Sasquatch’s current condition, it features some guy we’ve never seen before. What, the producers couldn’t bother to ask Stefanie Powers to do a 60-second cameo as Shalon, or, at the very least, Severn Darden as Apploy, both of whom were so memorable in the previous Bigfoot shows? For that matter, “The Return of Bigfoot” ended with Shalon’s fate uncertain, but there’s no resolution to that plot thread to be found in “Bigfoot V.” Had Shalon been the person in the video, there would have at least been the implication that everything turned out okay for her. 

As for the bizarre, there’s a scene early on where Steve, commenting on new reports of Sasquatch’s aggressive behavior, says, “That sounds more like the legendary Earth Bigfoot, not the Sasquatch I know.” Uhhhh... it was clearly established in “The Secret of Bigfoot” that the alien-built creature is the legendary Earth Bigfoot, since the aliens had been living on Earth for several hundred years. (Not to mention the fact that in all of their previous encounters, Steve saw just how aggressive and destructive Sasquatch could be.) And later on, when a battered Steve returns to Rudy’s mobile lab, he tells the scientist, “I found Bigfoot,” and Rudy replies, “Which one is he?” I can’t imagine why writer Gregory S. Dinallo even introduced this train of thought—it wasn’t necessary at all. You could remove every line of dialogue about the “Earth Bigfoot” as opposed to the “Space Bigfoot” and it would not change or hurt the episode in any way.

As for “The Lost Island,” it was an expanded episode that originally aired as a TV movie. Like “Bigfoot V,” it’s more science-fiction oriented, focusing on a radioactive satellite that crashes on a remote island and mutates some of the peaceful inhabitants into hairy, super-strong, power-hungry brutes. I watched this when it first aired on January 30, 1978, and I thought it was great. Watching it again years later, I didn’t think it was nearly as good as I remembered it being, but it was still a cut above most of the other episodes of the season.

"Yeeaaah, radiation, bitch!"

Other notables:

“Just a Matter of Time” features Steve returning from an orbital test flight to find that he’s apparently been thrust six years into the future—and is wanted for treason. It’s not a masterpiece, but I give this episode points for at least attempting to be a little more creative and innovative. Interestingly, variations of the central plot were used years later in the 1988 Star Trek novel Timetrap by David Dvorkin, and in “Future Imperfect,” a 1990 episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, both of which I enjoyed.       

“Killer Wind,” in which Steve, while contending with a trio of bank robbers, has to rescue students and their teacher in a stalled cable car halfway up a mountain as a tornado approaches. (Lee Majors did the death-defying stunt himself!)

“The Cheshire Project,” in which Steve rekindles his romance with an old girlfriend, Jenny Fraser (played by Suzanne Somers, whose star was on the rise at the time). Jenny is piloting a top-secret fighter jet that can be rendered invisible to radar, but when the plane mysteriously disappears in mid-flight, Steve sets out to investigate—and makes an unsettling discovery.

Can't help thinking that under different circumstances, Farrah Fawcett would have played Jenny.

“The Deadly Countdown” is nothing special, but it does feature the lovely Jenny Agutter and author Martin Caidin, who wrote the novel Cyborg upon which The Six Million Dollar Man is based. Apparently, Caidin’s performance was below par, or his voice sounded like Mickey Mouse’s, because all of his dialogue seems to have been dubbed in by another actor, to unintentionally hilarious effect. It’s so poorly done, so distracting, I can’t believe the producers allowed the episode to air like this. Honestly, it’s akin to this:  

   

And I have to mention the two-parter “Date With Danger” solely for the presence of guest star Elaine Giftos, who brought vitality, energy, personality, and a sense of fun to an otherwise fairly standard installment. You’ve no doubt seen Giftos elsewhere—she appeared in virtually every TV series during the 1970s and early ’80s. 

Bringing a spark of life to a dying series...

Among the lowlights:

“Dead Ringer,” a sloppy exploration into the paranormal suggesting that Steve is being haunted by his own restless spirit, which was set free when he was clinically dead following his plane crash. There’s a particularly gaping plot hole in this episode, along with the surprising suggestion that both Steve’s mother and stepfather are dead, even though Jaime Sommers was still living on their ranch over in The Bionic Woman and had never made any mention of their deaths. Helen and Jim Elgin had been important elements of both shows, so to reveal their offscreen deaths so casually, so abruptly, is extremely puzzling. Presumably this was just a careless continuity gaffe on the part of the SMDM crew, because, based on the episode, I can’t think of any story-driven reason to go there.     

“The Moving Mountain” is not a good episode, nor is it an awful one, but it’s exceedingly mediocre. The only thing notable about it is that it’s the last episode of the series, and it’s unfortunate that after five seasons, The Six Million Dollar Man ends with such a whimper. True, most TV series of that time didn’t go out with an extra-special finale that wrapped everything up, but even The Bionic Woman, which ended the same year, was given a send-off that provided at least some degree of closure for Jaime. TSMDM just... stops. And it doesn’t even go out on a high note. We’ll see if the new comic-book series can make up for that. As for live-action, we wouldn’t see Steve or Jaime again until 1987’s reunion movie, The Return of the Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman. (Though, amusingly enough, Lindsay Wagner did guest-star on a 1983 episode of Lee Majors’s next series, The Fall Guy.)

THE REUNION MOVIES

Yeah, they’re sort of cheesy. But come on, they aren’t any more cheesy than the two series they were based upon. And I’ll go out on a limb and say that despite all of its flaws, I really enjoyed—and still get a kick out of—the first one, the aforementioned Return of the Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman.

Embracing the '80s.

It adheres to the original series continuity, with a mention of Max and an in-depth explanation of what happened to Chris Williams, the O.S.I. agent played by Christopher Stone who became Jaime’s ongoing love interest during the third season of The Bionic Woman. 

MADDIE: “I didn’t like Chris Williams. Why? Because he wasn’t Steve.” 

He did have a better mustache than Steve's.

Reference is made to the final episode of TBW, “On the Run,” which concludes with Jaime convincing Oscar to let her cut back on her involvement in O.S.I. operations. And more importantly, Jaime’s memory loss, established in “The Return of the Bionic Woman,” is addressed and finally resolved.

MADDIE: “I was really excited that Jaime got her memories back because it meant that maybe she and Steve would get back together, or she would at least feel a stronger connection to him.”

There’s some fudging with Steve’s backstory, what with the establishment of his very brief marriage and the son that resulted from it, but it worked well enough for me, and I liked the character of Michael Austin, played by Tom Schanley—it’s a shame he wasn’t seen again in the two follow-up movies. Return was clearly set up to be a launching pad for a new series featuring Michael, but it never materialized.    

A (computer) chip off the old block. 

MADDIE: “I thought that adding Michael would bring a lot to the storyline and I thought that what happened to him was very clever, because now that he’s bionic, he can join the O.S.I. in place of his dad.”

Both Majors and Wagner, while significantly older, still look good and slip back into their roles quite smoothly. More importantly, in this film, when Michael Austin experiences the same tragic accident that befell his father, Lee Majors is given the opportunity to really perform as Steve, to react to events on an emotional level, to show human vulnerability, for the first time since he discovered Jaime Sommers was still alive.         

I liked the new character of smarmy O.S.I. agent Jim Castillian, played by Lee Majors’s real-life son, Lee Majors II. 

Wonder how he got the gig...

MADDIE: “I liked Jim Castillian! He was so goofy and cracked jokes and made the movie even more enjoyable. He would always introduce himself by saying, ‘I’m Jim Castillian, and that’s with two i’s and two l’s!’ He was so full of himself that he always said it. It just made me smile.”  

And to top it all off, a very young Bryan Cranston shows up in a small role. (For those of you who don’t know, I have a completely heterosexual man-crush on Bryan Cranston. I admit it freely!) 

And I think it’s cool that actor Gary Lockwood, who guest-starred on both bionic shows, turns up as a new character. A nice nod to the past. 

But I do have some issues with the movie. First, there’s the plot. Steve and Jaime are pulled back into action by Oscar to deal with the return of a criminal group called Fortress, led by a man named Lyle Stenning (played by future Oscar winner Martin Landau), whom, we are told, Steve put behind bars years ago. But we’ve never seen or heard of Fortress or Stenning before. It would have been so much stronger, and would have really resonated with longtime fans, had the main villain been someone from one of the original episodes. Hell, Gary Lockwood was right there on the set—why not just make him the main villain and have him reprise the role of Hopper, the criminal he portrayed in Season Two’s “Steve Austin, Fugitive,” who had plenty of reason to want revenge on Steve? Just establish that he’s out of prison and now hooked up with a paramilitary criminal group out to cause mass mayhem. The rest of the story would play out exactly the same.

Plus there’s the fact that Fortress turns out to be not all that impressive a threat, a fact presumably dictated by a limited production budget. 

The absence of the iconic Six Million Dollar Man theme music is a major source of disappointment, as is the lame synthesized ’80s-music soundtrack—composed, believe it or not, by Marvin Hamlisch—that sounded woefully dated even when the show first aired. 

But the film’s heart is in the right place, and all of the character stuff rings true. It ends with the promise of Steve and Jaime making an effort to get to know each other again, giving bionic fans everywhere hope for the future.         

     

MADDIE: “The ending made me think that Steve and Jaime could actually end up together without something or someone coming between them—someone like Michael Marchetti!”

I missed the second reunion movie, 1989’s Bionic Showdown, when it originally aired. I watched it for the first time only recently, via the DVD box set. Like its predecessor, it introduces a new bionic character. This time, it’s a second bionic woman, Kate Mason, played by a very young Sandra Bullock. 

Passing the bionic baton? Not so fast!

Kate is a paraplegic who is outfitted with experimental bionic implants designed by Rudy Wells, and she’s also close friends with Jim Goldman, Oscar’s nephew, who is played by Jeff Yagher. Jaime is on hand to help Kate adjust to her new condition, while Steve is overseeing security for the World Unity Games, an international sports competition that’s an obvious stand-in for the Olympics. Kate eventually ends up going undercover as an athlete at the Games to root out a traitor within the O.S.I. who is leaking top-secret information—and she faces off against a brutal enemy operative who, it turns out, is also bionic.

MADDIE: “I liked Kate Mason, how young she was and how she got to compete in the Games like an Olympic athlete. And I liked the storyline between her and Oscar’s nephew, how they get together. They made a cute couple and I liked how Jim was protective of Kate, even though he wasn’t bionic.”   

Bullock, here in the earliest days of her career, exudes the down-to-earth, girl-next-door sweetness and charm that would serve her so well in years to come. Jeff Yagher is slightly more likable here than he was in the original V weekly TV series—he’s still doing his cringe-inducing “I’m so slick and cool and witty and don’t you wish you were me” routine, but he’s added a dash of humbleness here, which makes him a bit more tolerable.

Gotta love that combination mullet/pompadour.

While Steve and Jaime are actively involved in the storyline, and their relationship is taken one step further, the movie is really a showcase for Bullock’s Kate Mason, serving as a pilot for a new Bionic Woman series. But it ultimately didn’t go anywhere and Bullock obviously went on to bigger things.

I have to mention that Lindsay Wagner looks terrific in this film—she’s ditched the short “woman of the ’80s” hairstyle she sported in Return and has let her hair grow long again, which makes her look more youthful than she did in the previous film.  

Not that Lindsay Wagner could ever look bad, but still...

MADDIE: “I liked the fact that Jaime’s hair was long again, because I prefer her with long hair—it reminded me of how she looked in her TV series.”    

It took five long years for Steve and Jaime to reunite one last time (I guess Bionic Showdown didn’t garner huge ratings—this movie even jumped networks, airing on CBS instead of NBC, which aired the previous two films). In 1994’s Bionic Ever After?, the focus is squarely on the original pair, with no new bionic characters being introduced. Even Michael Austin and Kate Mason don’t appear. 

"Steve Austin, I will not honeymoon in Silicon Valley!"

Steve and Jaime are finally headed to the altar, but Jaime is hit by a mysterious illness that causes her bionics to start breaking down. As Rudy Wells races around the clock to find a cure, Jaime calls off the wedding, leaving a heartbroken Steve to accept an O.S.I. mission paired with beautiful young agent Kimberly Harmon, played by Farrah Forke. (Yes, that’s right—Lee Majors found himself playing opposite an actress named Farrah Forke. Gotta wonder what was going through his mind during those scenes.) 

The other Farrah.   

While on assignment with Kimberly in the Bahamas, Steve starts showing signs of having contracted the same illness as Jaime. Gee, you think this mystery sickness was arranged?

Bionic Ever After? is okay. It gets the job done and provides a crowd-pleasing ending. I liked Farrah Forke ever since I first saw her in the sitcom Wings, and she does a nice job here. Wagner still looks great, Majors a little less so.

>Sniff< Excuse me, I've got something in my eye...

My main gripe with the movie is that once again, the main villains leave a lot to be desired. They’re not memorable at all (at least the first movie had Martin Landau and Gary Lockwood) and their ultimate plan isn’t all that impressive. They just don’t seem worthy of, or enough of a challenge for, the combined efforts of Steve Austin and Jaime Sommers—even an older Steve and Jaime. Since this was the last go-round for these two characters, it would have been nice to do what hadn’t been done in the previous two films, and finally bring back an already-established threat from the original series, something or someone from the past having returned to menace them again. Not necessarily Bigfoot or the Death Probe, which probably would have seemed too outlandish, but what about the Fembots, which were so popular and so fondly remembered? Just spitballing here, but they could have brought back Dr. Chester Dolenz, the evil robotics expert who appeared in “Day of the Robot,” “Run, Steve, Run,” and “Return of the Robot Maker,” and have him take over the work of John Houseman’s now-deceased Dr. Franklin, introducing a new series of Fembots in a last act of vengeance before he dies of old age. Henry Jones, the actor who played Dolenz in all three of those episodes, was still alive and working in 1994. Ah well. We got what we got, and it was satisfying enough. It ends our time with Steve and Jaime on a happy note, and provides a nice farewell.

Let the fighting begin! 

MADDIE: “I was really happy when Steve and Jaime got married because that’s what I wanted for them since Jaime was first introduced. I was really scared at the beginning of the movie, when Jaime’s bionics started to break down, because it was like deja vu, she was going to die again right before they were going to get married, and that would have been awful. I liked the twist about there being an O.S.I. agent who intentionally caused the bionics to start breaking down. I thought this was a good way to end everything, because it was on a happy note. I don’t think we needed to see any more movies with them.”

And that wraps up our look back at The Six Million Dollar Man. I want to thank my wife Ginny for buying me the DVD box set for my birthday a few years back. It is, without a doubt, a gift that keeps on giving! 

© All text copyright Glenn Greenberg, 2014.