Fantasy Island

Notwithstanding a liberal dose of 70's cheese, I loved and love Fantasy Island--I actually learned a lot from the show, since they would occasionally base plots on Wuthering Heights, The Picture of Dorian Gray, The Most Dangerous Game, and so forth. Mr. Roarke made an interesting God figure, an idea they played up in a few episodes. Most compelling of all is the idea that people go off on vacation to get what they want, and end up instead with what they need. Trite? Yes-- despite the rotating guest stars, it was basically a series of mini-soaps. Mockable points? Bunches, especially if you enjoy that sort of thing. And all those people you just saw goofing about on the Love Boat suddenly turning up and doing something semi- serious for a third of an hour could produce a fair amount of cognitive dissonance. But I maintain the show was still iconic.

I used to love this show as a child. What a wonderful concept, a person pays for a vacation, which acts out his or her "Fantasy". Thankfully this was not part of an adult programming. However, the show had reunions of people meeting loves from high school, and events people wanted. The show's writers had imagination too show what you want can turn into a nightmare. Ricardo mentioned this line in every third show. Ricardo, and Tatoo were well casted. As I matured, I will agree with the other posts that the storylines were thin, the sets cheap, along with rushed directing and scripts. Hard to watch again, but the what kept myself watching for a couple of minutes is some of the neat concepts, and the freshness of having new guests every week. With all television, the ideas became old, and they pushed the series 2 years too long.

As a teenager in the 70's, this was one of my favorite TV shows. I thought it had a truly unique and amazing idea for a show and there was nothing else like it on TV. I remember being instantly hooked on the show and looked forward to seeing the different guest stars each week fulfill their fantasies or dreams. Each fantasy was like a different show within that hour long period and each fantasy never seemed to turn out the way you thought it would which made the show even more interesting. Ricardo Montalban and (Da Plane!, Da Plane!) Herve Villachaize were great in their roles as hosts of Fantasy Island. I still love watching it and see it has fun and nostalgic. And in my opinion I still think it holds up well for that unique style all its own. After all it must've been a little special to last seven seasons and I hope eventually they all make their way to DVD!

In my final two years of high school one of the local broadcast broadcast station was re-airing various 70s shows at 6AM, they'd run every episode back to back over the course of a few weeks then switch to another. One of them was Fantasy Island. While I never caught every episode of those runs I caught a few. The fantasies of the guests could border on ridiculous, petty, strange etc. Mr. Roarke, the ever mysterious proprietor would fulfill their wishes with his trusty employee Tattoo. To them it was the business and they'd often share some humorous exchanges. Sometimes there'd be a twist or lesson for the guest, sometimes a happy ending. Many stars cameo in guest roles on the show. Recently the series has popped up on streaming with almost every episode in 16x9 Widescreen HD and gone are the scratchy old syndication copies replaced with crisp almost Technicolor prints dripping with color that almost makes things seem all most like a fantasy captured in time. Not the greatest show ever produced but an odd endearing quality about it which no doubt spurned the reboots.

Originally, this show had a dark side to it which quickly disappeared. The dark side was replaced with silly problems brought on by it's "guest stars." Think of any washed up movie star and they made an appearance on this show. The exotic locale helped, with the plane bringing that week's stars to the island, flying over waterfalls, and mountains along the way. Mr. Roarke would always greet his guests and then turn to Tattoo and say something ominous to him about one of this weeks fantasies, just so we'd stay tuned. This was essentially a landlocked "Love Boat." It was harmless fluff and part of my formative years...how scary is that?