Time Travelers

This is the second attempt by Irwin Allen to do a series about time travel. The only thing that would have been different about this proposed series is that the travelers wouldn't have been lost in time as they were in the "Time Tunnel". All in all this was a pretty decent show, too bad it never did make it to series. I would have loved to have seen what interesting stories they would have come up with.

I was really captivated by this wonderful pilot.

I am an enormous fan of the time travel genre, and intelligent sci-fi genre (not the cyber cowboy-cum-Star Wars-action-shoot-em-up kind of sci-fi)...and an avid fan of history and historical chronicles on film.

I should probably give credit where it is due, and that would be to ROD SERLING whose story was the solid germ which inspired this pilot/movie. We can't ever go wrong with SERLING, his was a great and yet in his time, woefully under-appreciated talent. Had the rest of the stories of this potential series been principally from his mind, I would venture to say it would have been a big hit.

I am so disappointed that it never went off the ground and I am perplexed at this fact after seeing this today. Another reviewer said that it would become dull eventually. I disagree vehemently. Was Quantum Leap dull? It was not and never jumped the shark! I am writing this just because the industry really needs to revisit this genre in a big way. We are bombarded all the time with time travel movies these days...and there must be a writer out there with deep knowledge of this genre and its foibles-to-avoid enough to make for intelligent television! We need MORE INTELLIGENT SCI-FI around. Not what the present SYFY garbage channel churns out in the past few years. SCI-FI is being DUMBED DOWN instead of lifting us up like the greatest OUTER LIMITS, TWILIGHT ZONE, OUT OF THE UNKNOWN, JOURNEY TO THE UNKNOWN, SCIENCE FICTION THEATER, TALES OF TOMORROW, ONE STEP BEYOND and a few others.

We need more INTELLIGENT TV, period! I recommend this movie for all ages.

This time travel yarn was well done. The story was compelling and the acting was fine. Sam Groom (an alumnus of the Time Tunnel) plays a doctor drafted by the government to search for a cure to a flu virus that apparently had previously presented itself around the time of the Great Chicago Fire. Research indicated that a doctor (played by Richard Basehart) back then had cured scores of people but this cure was lost to time. (It was also good to see Basehart adding gravitas to the production.) The special effects were understated and the period clothing and sets were serviceable, both were believable. My only quibble with the show was that there did not seem to much to the time travel apparatus itself. There were a few computer flats with blinking lights and a room with a staircase that lead to the past. Adequate, but not awe inspiring like the Time Tunnel. The Time Tunnel set was massive in reality and also in the terms of the show. It created a true sense of wonder. Too bad they could not have married the two concepts. Good show nonetheless.

This review comes to you from the future. Having watched this movie in 2019, I hasten to let you know it's a charming movie and enjoyable to watch.

This message is mainly produced for those fans who watched this movie some 8 years ago and earlier. You might come across some other messages from my era as we are able to time travel without moving at all.

Signing off and going back to my time. Goodbye and good luck!

This film was actually based on a story written by my father, author Charles W. Byrd, not Rod Serling. My father wrote the story in the late 1950s and it without his knowledge it ended up on ABC in 1976. Immediately upon seeing the film my father knew it was actually based on his original story. After some time (and litigation), a financial settlement was reached between ABC, Irwin Allen, and others and my father was given the rights to claim it as his work. Unfortunately, the film was never re-cut to include him as the creator of the story. In retrospect these events probably doomed the pilot from becoming a series. Its a shame my father was not given his due in creating this interesting and entertaining story.