Land Of The Lost - Season Three!

By the time Land of the Lost got to Season Three, things had changed quite a bit. For one thing Spencer Milligan who had played the father Rick Marshall is written out. According to some reports he had lobbied for more money for himself and his fellow actors, especially in regard to merchandising. His reward for two years of hard work was to be summarily dismissed and sent home, both literally and symbolically. In the new opening credits of the show, we see Rick (from the back only since a stand in was used) sent back to Earth leaving his two children to deal with the shock of that loss and to contemplate life on their own in the "Land of the Lost". They even had to write a new opening theme song:

Will and Holly Marshall

As the earth beneath them trembled

Lost their father through the door of time.

Uncle Jack went searching

And found those kids at last

Looking for a way to escape

From the Land of the Lost. 

The same earthquake which had accidentally sent Rick home also drove out most of the Pakuni and the lone remaining member of the tribe is Cha-Ka played by a still young Phillip Paley, who joins Will and Holly. Thank heavens between season two and season three he learned to speak English, or we'd have had more of the tepid interpretation scenes which made personally yearn for episodes of Lassie. But most importantly to the cast is added the kids' Uncle Jack who had been looking for the lost trio when he himself was swept away. He takes Rick's place, and this new quartet becomes our focus for the new season. 

Aside from the substantial cast changes, the biggest change in the Land of the Lost is that it seems to have switched its core focus from science fiction to fantasy. The dinosaurs are still there but rarely seen. More often we see a two-headed sea serpent dubbed "Lulu" and a fire-breathing dragon called "Torchy". Unicorns seem to be the prey of Abominable Snowmen as well. The group get visitors too, at an increased rate, and like that other Swiss Family inspired TV show Lost in Space, the stories seem to derive directly out of these strangers. Among them are Medusa from myth and the Flying Dutchmen from legend. We also get just plain humans such as Roscoe T. Post a balloonist who has designs on Cha-Ka ala P.T. Barnum. One fellow is a friendly chap with immense powers who seems to be a repairman for the Pylons. (Where's he been for all this time.) One chap who does recur is Malak a Cro-Magnon man played by Richard Kiel. The final episode of the series gives us two new humans -- a cavalry officer and an Indian named Lone Wolf. Given my adoration for Turok, it was kind of neat to see a Native American in a lost world.

 

The Sleestak are still around and more aggressive than in previous seasons. They have a speaking leader who is constantly plotting to muck up the natural passage of time so that his brethren can dominate the surface. Enik the Altrusian is on hand to help his Sleestak kin and he proves time and time again to a very unreliable ally for the Marshalls. The clear emphasis in the season was to make the threats more a matter of personal choices of characters and not merely a struggle against the environment. In fact we leave the High Bluff base and the family must live in a renovated temple much closer to the Sleestak which makes their menace all the more immediate. But some of the knowledge gained in previous episodes and seasons is kept and much is forgotten or ignored. 

Land of the Lost is still an entertaining show in this third season but it's given away  so much of its initial potential that a fan of the show cannot but help to be disappointed. It' snice to see an older Holly who by this time actress Kathy Coleman is as tall as her fictional brother Will, though the show doesn't use her as best it should. They insist on making this more mature young woman still operate like a mere kid. In fact I'd say she's left behind on more missions by Uncle Jack and Will in this season than anyone. Will gets to sing in this season, though using a handmade guitar it's a blessing we are only "treated" to one verse. I think he sings at the end of three episodes, so I guess Wesley Eure (known just as "Wesley" in the first two seasons) is still vying for that teen heartthrob market. It would be easy to hate on Uncle Jack but the actor Ron Harper does a pretty good job filling in for Spencer Milligan's Rick. 

Land of the Lost was a nifty little TV show and deserving of a big-screen adaptation. It in fact got one but that was not without problems. More on that next Saturday. 

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Land Of The Lost - Season Two!

The second season of Land of the Lost is still a respectable entertainment. The emphasis on science fiction remains and the threats the Marshalls face are varied but not too cliched. One that does change a lot is the focus on the dinosaurs. There are only a few episodes that focus on that side of the story. Instead, room is made for more speculation about the mysterious Pylons which seem to control the Land of the Lost when they are working correctly. Also we meet a new nemesis for the Marshall family,  a stranger alien named the Zarn. 

The Marshall family itself is still camped in a cave on what they call "High Bluff" which offers them a degree of safety from the more primitive threats in the land. They really have upgraded the living conditions as well. In the first season they made do with sleeping bags and a few makeshift low tables. But now they have made real furniture with a rather sleek looking table and chairs which serves as a center to the cavern home. They have put their sleeping bags on actual beds, albeit made from primitive materials. Basics like water seem easier to find and there is even evidence of actual gardening whereas in the first season they foraged. Their lives seem easier if no less psychological rugged. 

The dinosaurs as mentioned before have fallen into the background and for the most part folks move around the Land of the Lost with little concern for them, though a roar now an again is heard. One thing which has been given a new focus are the "Pakuni", the primitive tribe Cha-Ka  belongs to which is made up two more folks -- Ta (a male) and Sa (a female). It sometimes appears they are family and other times not so much. One thing which does get a bit noisome is the extensive use of their language. Now the show bragged in its first season that the language used by the Pakuni was developed with some care but I'll be frank it sounds more and more like gibberish in this second season which assaults us with long conversations. 

The "Sleestak" appear to be less of a threat and in many episodes are shown to be in hibernation. Enik pops up now and again and he's just as difficult to understand as always, though he does seem to want to work with the Sleestak a bit more. We are introduced in this second season to the Library of Skulls which are an assembly of Sleestak skulls which speak and presumably supply wisdom to this bizarre underworld clan. 

One of the major additions to the story is the Zarn. He is an alien with his own spaceship but he's presented as a human figure of sparkling lights. He has malevolent tendencies and is more directly a threat to the Marshalls than the unpredictable Enik. There are three stories which focus on the Zarn and all of them are pretty decent outings for the show. 

The acting in the show is much mellower this season and that's a decided plus. Spencer Milligan who plays Rick Marshall really performs his part decidedly low key and that seems to affect his young castmates Wesly Eure and Kathy Coleman. The conversations seem a bit more natural and the hyperactive overacting evident in the first season is muted to good effect. 

The series seems to lack the sense of a larger all-encompassing storyline and  is more episodic, but I for the time there is still a remarkable memory of events from show to show. The show does lose a bit of its majestic writing ensemble though still we get scripts by Ted Sturgeon and Don Glut. The latter surprised me quite a bit because it didn't focus on dinosaurs. 

But big changes were in store for Land of the Lost in its third season. More on that next Saturday. 

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Land Of The Lost - Season One!

Land of the Lost is one of my guilty pleasures and always has been. When the show first debuted on NBC in 1974 I was too old to be inside the Saturday morning demographic but that didn't stop me, and this show which showcased a gaggle of science fiction notions was an instant favorite. We effectively have a version of the Swiss Family  Robinson (pared down to a trim three persons) except the land of mystery they are stranded on is a whole close universe filled with dinosaurs, weird aliens, time-lost humans, and a bizarre technology which seems to run the whole show. The show was brilliant in many ways but one of the most clever ideas was having the origin of the characters presented each week in a snappy little song that introduced a new viewer to the complex set-up with few complications. It was not unlike Jed Clampett's Theme which explains why Arkansas country folk are living the high-life in Beverly Hills. Here are the lyrics: 

Marshall, Will, and Holly

On a routine expedition

Met the greatest earthquake ever known.

High on the rapids

It struck their tiny craft.

And plunged them down a thousand feet below.

To the Land of the Lost.

To the Land of the Lost.

To the Land of the Lost.

And here are the lyrics to the tune which closed each episode:

When I look all around

I can't believe the things I've found.

Now I need to find my way

I'm lost, I'm lost, find me

Living in the Land of the Lost,

Living in the Land of the Lost.

So the show was very user friendly for new viewers, who given that it was produced by Sid and Marty Krofft we'd have to assume were younger than not. But Land of the Lost is no H.R. Pufnstuf nor is it Lidsville. It has a bit more heft than those fanciful and flighty offerings with real people in real danger. At the time that was considered heavy weight for youngsters and over the years sadly the little urchins have been increasingly protected from these kinds of fantastic imaginary dangers. 

It must be remembered that in 1974 the world had not been shocked to awareness by the behemoth that was Star Wars and so science fiction was not nearly as ubiquitous as it has become today. I cannot begin to keep up with all the fantastic entertainment available today but back then a fan was able to drink it all up and look for more of the stuff since was relatively rare. And in those days before VHS and DVD we had to make sure we were on time for our meals as they were passing and ephemeral at best. Land of the Lost was a delightful morsel designed by smart people for a smart audience. 

The list of folks who worked on the show is impressive for any show at any time. David Gerrold was key to early scripts. And D.C. Fontana of Star Trek fame added a script, as did Star Trek star Walter Koenig. Two of the most important stories were contributed by science fiction heavyweight Larry Niven. Norman Spinrad and Ben Bova both added scripts to the first season. This show was just what he was good at, world building. Other names associated with scripts are Theodore Sturgeon, though he wouldn't show up until the second season. (More on that next week.) The final episode of the season in fact offers an element of closure for fans though enabling the show to continue. 

As imagined by all these folks and more besides, Land of the Lost presented us a world in which humans from different time periods all seem to be trapped together. The Marshall family encounter a Civil War Confederate and come across evidence of a Revolutionary War era soldier as well. In fact the weird lizard-like creatures who roam the underworld of the land were named "Sleestak" by that very soldier. One of the great mysteries in the show is the sign on a rock "Beware of Sleestak" which is not explained for many episodes. There is also a cranky alien from another time named Enik (originally named "Eneg" by Walter Koenig as an homage to Gene Roddenberry but nipped as being a bit too obvious) who is sometimes reliable as an ally and sometimes not. 

The Marshalls (played by Spencer Milligan as Rick the Dad, Wesley Eure as Will the son, and Kathy Coleman as Holly the young daughter) are a close family with a competent and caring father, a brash quixotic teenager and a young girl just entering her teen years. They have only themselves to cling to in this sometimes terrifying place, but still and all they are a real family with bickering being a common pastime. The show offers up life lessons but unlike so many patronizing shows of the era these are usually well embedded in the narrative. One problem the show does have is an abundance of overacting with both of the kids hamming it up. A softer more restrained style will emerge but not in this first season. 

A key focus of the first season and a major selling point for the show were the dinosaurs. We get a T-Rex nicknamed "Grumpy" who shows up every episode and makes a failed attempt to attack someone. I'm surprised he doesn't starve. There are also an Allosaurus named "Alice", a Brontosaurus named "Emily", a baby Bronto named "Dopey", and a Triceratops named "Spike". Other dinos show up form time to time and there is even a scene of one eating another -- hard sauce for the time period. The writers apparently were intent on balancing dinosaur episodes with pure science fiction ones and for the most part this blend worked well. The dinosaurs are represented by decent stop-motion and less effective puppets. 

Another key to this show's success is one which was all too rare in the 70's, the show was smart and treated its young audience as smart as well. There might a tone here and there which feels a bit like the kiddie show it was also, but mostly it was solid science fiction storytelling. Certainly a show that deserved a better big-screen outing than it received, but more on that later this month. 

If you've never seen it, it's worth a look. Season Two is coming next Saturday and things do change a bit. 

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Lands Of The Lost!

Mankind's fascination with unknown territories is the very stuff of myth and legend and adventure. We are a species not content to live within our established habitats, we have constantly sought out the mysteries of hidden lands and then converted them. if possible, to our use. We even imagine it is our right to do so as the dominant species on this planet, either by dint of a god's imprimatur or

seeming evolutionary superiority. With our globe largely settled now (at least the terrestrial parts) we feel an impulse to push into space or beneath the waves to find yet more "lands of the lost". What we will find in these hidden territories we don't really know, but as often as not thanks to our popular literature we suspect we'll find dinosaurs.

Land of the Lost was a terrifically entertaining television show by Sid and Marty Krofft productions. It hails from those halcyon days of the 1970's, an era much put upon by modern opinion the days. 
the show concerned itself with a family of a father, a son and a daughter who fall into a strange land by a means unexplained and have to not only survive but use their wits and strengths to solve the abounding mysteries so that perhaps one day they can return home. And they do find dinosaurs. It was a very entertaining show in a cascade of Saturday morning fair that had often lost its luster in the 70's. It was also a show that had some fascinating science fiction at its core, a commodity all too common in popular entertainment today but rare and of great price back then.  So look for a Land of the Lost review each Saturday this month. 

Hanna-Barbera got in on this kind of story with Valley of the Dinosaurs. This cartoon series was about yet another family which became stranded in a prehistoric world. Given the freedom of animation and a lighter tone we get a different kind of interaction. Also, the prehistoric people in this one are bit more designed along traditional caveman tropes. There was also a Charlton Comics series developed from this show. 

Another Saturday morning offering about a Stone-Age family was Korg:70,000 B.C. which was live action despite also being a Hanna-Barbera offering. This was a surprisingly relaxed and serious presentation which attempted to show a Neanderthal family dealing with the rigors of their dangerous world. The narration by Burgess Meredith is warm and friendly and does much to make the show enjoyable. Bronson Canyon gets showcased in this TV effort. Charlton Comics produced some dandy work by Pat Boyette in support of his show as well. 

Pellucidar was the creation of Edgar Rice Burroughs and a magnificent world it is. It's at the center of the Earth and operates with entirely different physics than does the world we live in here on the surface. David Innes in At The Earth's Core went to Pellucidar by means of an iron mole and found there the love of his life, the vivacious Dian. DC adapted some of these stories when the picked up the license for ERB's creations in the early 70's. 

Burroughs also created Caspak, another strange land in which evolution is explored with some startling differences. Caspak was presented in a trio of novels beginning with The Land that Time Forgot. Later Russ Manning had Tarzan himself visit the bizarre island in two beautiful adventures. 

One of the earliest Burroughs efforts is a strange story originally titled The Eternal Lover. Given the more robust title of The Eternal Savage it and its companion story Nu of the Neocene tell how an ancient caveman came to live in modern times on the Tarzan estate in Africa. 

More Tarzan thrills as I wrap up my look at Burne Hogarth's spin on the Lord of the Jungle. We'll look at his final comic strips as well as the lush 70's work he did on the Ape Man. 

Skull the Slayer is an oddball little item from Marvel's hectic Bronze Age. It's a vintage lost world story with the obligatory dinosaurs but loaded up with much more, including aliens, deadly Incans, and the Black Knight to boot. 

One of my favorite Indy books was Mark Schultz's Xenozoic Tales (also known as Cadillacs and Dinosaurs) for Kitchen Sink. This black and white beauty showcased Schultz's developing art and takes the reader on a grand tour of a world which has survived an apocalypse but with some startling changes. 

And dinosaurs are also on the schedule for Showcase Presents: The War that Time Forgot. This series became a mainstay of Star-Spangled War Stories with many tales of dumfounded G.I.s battling an astonishing array of prehistoric monstrosities. This volume doesn't quite have all of the stories, but it has quite a lot. Catch it in this month's "Showcase Corner". 

And The War that Time Forgot was too good a concept to ignore and so DC has brushed it off and brought it forward a few more times over the decades, often blending it with their other creations. In this version by Bruce Jones we see a clutch of DC's vintage heroes from many periods of time come together to stand up to the dinosaur menace. 

And no look at lost worlds would be complete without including Turok Son of Stone who with his staunch ally Andar was stranded in the Lost Valley fighting cavemen and "Honkers" for several decades in those Dell and Gold Key classics. "Sundays of Stone" will return this month. 

All this and even more exciting prehistoric ephemera in this first full month of Spring. Keep your head on a swivel for deadly dinosaurs amigos. 

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Bugaloos!

During the 70's there's no doubt that Sid and Marty Krofft Productions ruled the Saturday morning scene with shows like H.R. Pufunstuff, Lidsville, Sigmund and the Seamonsters, and my favorite Land of the Lost. And then there's The Bugaloos. An attempt to recreate The Monkees phenomenon, this ill-fated conundrum of a show offered up four fresh-faced Brits who gyred and gimbled on the tube with an easy aplomb and dreadful costumes which purported to make them resemble insects who live in..ahem... "Tranquility Forest".

I.Q., Courage, Harmony, and Joy

The obligatory girl "Joy" was a butterfly, "Harmony" was a bumblebee, "I.Q." was a grasshopper and most weirdly (or not really I guess) "Courage" was a ladybug.  And then there was "Sparky", a nasty looking little firefly critter, and one of the few Krofft creations which I truly found repulsive. This gang are pursued (as was de rigueur in Krofft shows) by a cruel "Benita Bizarre" played to the usual hilt by Martha Raye. Somehow Charlton got the comic book rights to his series and kicked out four issues. The talent is unidentified save for Frank Roberge who signed the debut cover. Alas The Bugaloos was a low point for the Krofft brothers as well as Charlton. Like many productions of this era, it's possible it might work better if you're high, though I've never tried that approach.

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