MR. TOBE'S WILD SLIDES

From last week's 'Fringe' episode, "Peter":

Back in 1986, Dr. Walter Bishop showed off the results of the funding he was getting from the military - he and his partners, including William Bell, had developed a window that would let them see into a parallel dimension. In order to prove that they were seeing an alternate reality, Walter held the demonstration on a rooftop in Manhattan where the window was trained on the Empire State Building. And the generals were able to see a dirigible tethered to the top of the building, which was one of the original functions planned for it.
This could mean that this particular alternate dimension was the same as that found in the two-part 'Doctor Who' story "The Age Of Steel" and "The Rise Of The Cybermen".
As we know from 'Sliders', there are an infinite number of parallel worlds, but Dr. Bishop operates as though there is only the one other one. The breakthroughs made by Quinn Mallory would not happen for another few years after Walter made his historic crossing over into that other world. Walter had his dimensional mirror attuned to only that one interdimensional frequency and may not have thought to explore any others.

The way that Walter crossed over caused a crack in the wall between worlds, which the Doctor warned would happen if this method was utilized to cross over to another dimension. And that has been weakening the barrier with every crossing, by FBI Agent Olivia Dunham, Dr. Bell, super-soldiers from the other side, as well as by the Cybermen and Rose Tyler and Mickey Smith.
But that didn't happen when the Gallifreyan Time Lords traveled between dimensions, utilizing the feature of the TARDIS that allowed passage through the "relative dimensions of space". And it was this capability which Quinn Mallory, "Q-Ball", was able to tap into with his hand-held device on 'Sliders'.
In the futile hope to prevent Rose from ever trying to cross over back and forth between the dimensions, the Doctor once again lied, this time saying that such travel could never be attempted again. But that warning really only applies to the parallel world of John Lumic's Cybermen, and now 'Fringe' is showing the truth in that declaration.....

BCnU!

Presented as a birthday present to one of my best friends, Michael Cleary.

AS SEEN ON TV: JESSE MARCEL

JESSE MARCEL

AS SEEN IN:
"Roswell"*

AS PLAYED BY:
Kyle MacLachlan

Major Jesse Marcel was the head intelligence officer, or A-2, at Roswell Army Air Field during the famous Roswell events of July 1947. He was the first to investigate the crash material found by rancher Mac Brazel on his ranch 75 miles northwest of Roswell.

From Wikipedia:
Jesse Marcel was approached by researchers in 1978 and he recounted details suggesting the debris Brazel had led him to was exotic. He believed the true nature of the debris was being suppressed by the military. His accounts were featured in the 1979 documentary UFOs are Real, and in a 1980 National Enquirer article, which are largely responsible for making the Roswell incident famous by sparking renewed interest.
"There was all kinds of stuff — small beams about three eighths or a half inch square with some sort of hieroglyphics on them that nobody could decipher. These looked something like balsa wood, and were about the same weight, except that they were not wood at all. They were very hard, although flexible, and would not burn…. One thing that impressed me about the debris was the fact that a lot of it looked like parchment. It had little numbers with symbols that we had to call hieroglyphics because I could not understand them. They could not be read, they were just like symbols, something that meant something, and they were not all the same, but the same general pattern, I would say. They were pink and purple. They looked like they were painted on. These little numbers could not be broken, could not be burned. I even took my cigarette lighter and tried to burn the material we found that resembled parchment and balsa, but it would not burn - wouldn't even smoke. But something that is even more astonishing is that the pieces of metal that we brought back were so thin, just like tinfoil in a pack of cigarettes. I didn't pay too much attention to that at first, until one of the boys came to me and said: 'You know that metal that was in there? I tried to bend the stuff and it won't bend. I even tried it with a sledgehammer. You can't make a dent on it,'" Marcel said.

BCnU!

*This refers to the TV movie, not the TV series.

ROBERT CULP, DOGGIE-STYLE

It's not what you think.....

Clarke's Third Law
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

'Conan' was one of many TV series over the years that just slipped past my notice. As big a fan of fantasy literature as I am, I was never that interested in the sword and sorcery, thud and blunder, variant made most popular by this hulking He-Man creation of Robert E. Howard. (I think the closest I came to the style would be Fritz Lieber's stories about Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser and the comic book series about Cerebus the Earth-Pig.)

As a TV series, 'Conan' seems to hold more to the spirit of the Schwarzenegger films than to Howard's stories, which would be even more of a reason for me to skip the show.

But via Hulu, I just watched an episode which featured the distaff version of Conan, "Red Sonja". And that's only because the guest villain that episode was Robert Culp as King Vog of Harta.*
Vog kidnapped a young but powerful wizard named Lutai so that he could produce a magic spell that would make the aged king young again. The evil Vog wanted his reign over the Hartans to continue far longer than a normal man's life span, and that would only mean decades more of death and destruction for the Hartan people; perhaps even an eternity if the spell could be perpetuated.

Eventually Lutai agreed to do what Vog requested. Using strangely named plants, he concocted a paste which Vog only had to taste and he would be made young again. Suspecting it might be poison, the king tested it on a dog (on the suggestion of Lutai). The dog transformed into a smaller, younger, version of its former self. Vog then dipped two fingers into the mixture and tasted it. The results were almost instantaneous as Vog clutched at his chest and fell to his knees; with a golden flash of light, he was transformed into... a puppy.
"I never promised I would turn him into a young man," Lutai smirked. (That must have been some magic, to make his robes and crown disappear like that!)

In a way, that felt like an episode of 'The Twilight Zone', especially "What You Need". And even back then, in the age between the fall of Atlantis and the first recording of History (as mentioned in the opening narration), ages before the birth of Rod Serling even, the Twilight Zone would hold sway over Toobworld.

I believe that had Vog tasted the paste first, without letting the dog contaminate the mixture with its slobber, then he may have transformed into a much younger man, even a child. And then had the dog tasted the paste, then it too would have transformed into a young human. I think the paste needed DNA as its catalyst; and whichever DNA first made contact, that would be the form taken by any who tasted it.

So Vog became a dog - but in body only, I'm thinking. I believe his human intelligence would remain intact and perhaps it might even have been handed down to future generations of his new breed. Toobworld Central believes the same thing happened to Red the red squirrel, mistakenly transformed into a human by Martian technology in 'My Favorite Martian'. When he became a squirrel again, he retained that intelligence to be passed down through his lineage. (And even crossed over to the population of grey squirrels through cross-breeding.)

Lutai's transformation paste, although looked upon as a "magic potion", would be nothing more than an application of chemistry and biology. The technology that duplicated these efforts, used by the Martian Exigius 12 1/2 (aka "Uncle Martin O'Hara") was just an energy variant of the compound.

Even though I believe that Vog retained his human intelligence and passed it down to his doggy descendents, this doesn't mean I think all dogs who can think and/or talk are related to Vog. Too many specific species involved when he was transformed into a cute little mutt.

With those other dogs, we look to the unsold pilot of 'Poochinski' for inspiration: when a human dies, their first reincarnationi is into dogs - unless the cosmic powers that be dictate special circumstances, like into an antique car or a toaster or a shopping cart. (Connecticut readers may understand that one....)BCnU!

*I'm still not convinced that 'Conan' should be considered part of Earth Prime-Time. Oh, it belongs in the main TV dimension, but over on Earth's twin, Mondas, on the far side of Earth's orbit around the sun. Just because the narration says that it takes place in the time between the fall of Atlantis and the recording of History, that could just be a Terran frame of reference for us about when it was taking place on that other planet.

One other note, a rare critique: as much a fan of Robert Culp as I am, this was one of his lesser acting jobs. No matter how old he was in real life when he made this, I think he was incapable of acting old. This was almost an exaggerated shadow of how Dick Van Dyke might have played the role.......

PARENTHOOD, PARENTHOOD

The new version of 'Parenthood' that's currently struggling on NBC is one of those rare examples where a remake can remain in the same TV dimension as the original. (And neither one is affected by the presence of the original movie which is in its own universe.)

This is because the families, while sharing the same structural dynamic, have different last names; many of the characters have different first names as well.. They are not the same people. In 1989, Ed Begley, Jr. was the de facto head of the Buchman family (just like in the movie). Today, the family in the Toobworld spotlight is named Braverman. (I can't be certain of this, but I wonder if the powers that be wanted to avoid any connection made to Paul and Jamie Buchman of 'Mad About You'.) I'm not sure if the same plots have resurfaced in the new series, recycled from the 1989 version, but that wouldn't matter either. Characters from one show reliving events that happened in other shows happens all the time in Toobworld. The American version of 'The Office' followed the same plots of the British original until they finally ran out and found their own voice. It even happens within the same show - Captain Amos Burke twice had a murder case in which a magician was shot dead while in a coffin that had been at the bottom of a pool. And that crime was even committed on another series, 'Blacke's Magic'. (The reason why Captain Burke couldn't remember the first case when it happened again was because he was in the early stages of Alzheimer's.....)

So the two versions of 'Parenthood' can remain in Earth Prime-Time, in much the same way as all the variants of 'Ugly Betty' can share the same world....

BCnU!

Γειά σου νοσοκόμα (HELLOOOOO, NURSE!)

There should be an alternate TV dimension out there which is home to the televised adaptations of theatrical plays and musicals, but only those that look to be stage-bound. For instance, the 1990's version of "Bye Bye Birdie" can remain in Toobworld because it inserted itself into the "television reality". On the other hand, the adaptation of "Into The Woods" would belong in that theatrical TV dimension because it remained in the artifice of the stage.

This TV dimension would have entries dating back to the ancient plays of Greece, which were also produced on TV. One of these was Eurypides' "Medea", from 431 BC, and another would be "Antigone", one of Sophocles' most famous plays, which was completed around 442 BC.

In the timeline of this TV Theater World, those two plays are in the same order, but "Antigone" was a few more years later than "Medea". I'm basing that claim on two specific performances - "Medea" produced in 1959 on 'The Play Of The Week', and "Antigone" which was shown as part of 'Great Performances' in 1974.

Why did I choose these two productions from any others of the same plays? Because they can be linked by a single performance.

Aline McMahon, perhaps most famous nowadays as Trixie Lorraine in "Gold-Diggers of 1933", played the character of "Nurse" in both productions. So Toobworld Central is making the claim that both roles were the same woman, and that after the tragedy in the household of Jason and Medea, she sought new employment in the royal household of Creon.

Not that it was any better there......

The picture here of Aline McMahon is from "Gold-Diggers Of 1933", but 'twill serve.....

BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: AMBASSADOR HOUGHTON

AMBASSADOR ALANSON HOUGHTON

AS SEEN IN:
'The Lord Peter Wimsey Mysteries'
("Clouds Of Witness")

AS PLAYED BY:
Stuart Nichol

From Wikipedia:
Alanson Bigelow Houghton (October 10, 1863– September 15, 1941) was an American businessman, politician, and diplomat who served as a Congressman and Ambassador. He was a member of the Republican Party.

On February 24, 1925, President Calvin Coolidge appointed Houghton as the U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain. Houghton assumed the post on April 6, 1925 and served until April 27, 1929. Houghton’s service in both Germany and England gave him a unique ability to address the issue of the war reparations Germany owed to its World War I opponents, England being one of them. Houghton laid some of the ground work for the Dawes Plan, named after then U.S. Vice President Charles G. Dawes, who would be Houghton’s successor as Ambassador to Great Britain.

Houghton became the American Ambassador to Great Britain 85 years ago yesterday. He was not identified by name in the Wimsey mystery......

BCnU!

BIG SCREEN CHARLIE

It's because of John Forsythe that Toobworld Central feels comfortable about bringing the movies "Charlie's Angels" and "Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle" into the TV Universe, like other movies before them. ("Maverick", "Batman 1966", the "Star Trek" franchise) Without his participation as the voice of Charlie Townsend over that intercom, those films would have just been remakes with no connection to Earth Prime-Time. (Like "The Addams Family" and "Sgt. Bilko")

As such, Charles Townsed could conceivably gain entry to the TV Crossover Hall of Fame on the Birthday Honors list. (Plus there's that 'Angels '89' spin-off as well as those crossover episodes with 'The Love Boat' and 'Vega$'. If Charlie was heard on those as well......?) BCnU!

ROBERT CULP IN "THE HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES"

It's amazing how much one can find about the characters played by Robert Culp in Toobworld over his lifetime. There's a forum page out there that declared him the King of the Movies of the Week, and presented plenty of evidence to back that up. So I may not run out of new Toobworld theories and missing links about his characters for some time yet..... These pictures are from the adaptation of "The House Of The Seven Gables" by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It was presented as an episode in the children's anthology series 'Shirley Temple's Storybook' and it stands at the official televersion of that early American classic in the TV Universe. The presentation starred Shirley Temple, Agnes Moorehead, Martin Landau, Jonathan Harris, John Abbott, and Robert Culp as the mysterious Mr. Holgrave. (I believe that it was originally presented in black and white and later colorized for the DVD release.) BCnU!

AS SEEN ON TV: GEORGE V

There's a new book out about the three cousins who basically controlled Europe in the years leading up to World War I:

GEORGE, NICHOLAS AND WILHELM
Three Royal Cousins and the Road to World War I
By Miranda Carter
Illustrated. 498 pages. Alfred A. Knopf. $30.

'KING GEORGE V

AS SEEN IN:
'Edward & Mrs. Simpson'

AS PLAYED BY:
Marius Goering

and....

AS SEEN IN:
"Clouds Of Witness" - a 'Lord Peter Wimsey' mystery

AS PLAYED BY:
George Cormack

From the New York Times review of that book, by Dwight Garner:

George was a dull mediocrity — he feared clever people and intellectuals, calling them “eyebrows” — who spent much of his time as an adult collecting stamps and shooting. He didn’t mix with interesting people, spoke no foreign languages and had what Ms. Carter calls a “barking temper.” He sulked if he was not allowed to win at tennis.

He remained standing far enough in the background in his "Clouds Of Witness" cameo so that we could claim that he was the same man seen in 'Edward & Mrs. Simpson'.

In the Wimsey mystery he was only identified as "The Royal Personage", but who else could he be?
Two for Tuesday!

BCnU!

TVXOHOF, APRIL, 2010: RADAR O'REILLY

Usually, the month of April is traditionally a time when we honor the Fool with the induction into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame. But that doesn't apply this year as we bring Corporal Walter Eugene "Radar" O'Reilly into the fold. Anybody who judged him to be foolish when they met him usually learned to their detriment how wrong they were. In many ways, he was the most clever member of the 4077 M*A*S*H unit in Korea.

For his qualifications you can't argue with the following tally:

181 episodes of "M*A*S*H" (with mentions in three more)

"After MASH"

- It Had to Be You (1984)

- Yours Truly, Max Klinger (1984)

W*A*L*T*E*R (1984)

From Wikipedia:
Corporal “Radar” O’Reilly is a fictional character in the M*A*S*H novels, the film, the television series, the television pilot, W*A*L*T*E*R, and two episodes of the series, After MASH. The character was portrayed by Gary Burghoff in both the film and on television — the only actor from the film to reprise his role on television, aside from G. Wood as General Hammond.

While Radar's full name is never given in the original novel or film, on the TV series it is Walter Eugene O'Reilly. The later novels by Richard Hooker and W.E.B. Griffin give his full name as J. Robespierre O'Reilly.

On television, Radar's character started off worldly and sneaky, a clerk who carried with him at all times a pocketful of passes for any potential scam that might arise. At one point, he tried to mail home a Jeep, piece by piece. (Hawkeye commented that once Radar's mailman found out, he'd have a retroactive hernia.) He was known for his tremendous appetite for heaping portions of food. He was also not averse to drinking Col. Blake's brandy and smoking his cigars when the colonel was off-duty, and he occasionally drank the moonshine liquor that Hawkeye and Capt. Trapper John McIntyre made in their still.

As the series progresses, this worldly version of Radar was apparently not wholly to the writers' liking, and Radar evolved into a naïve farm boy. Cigars and strong liquor made him ill or dizzy (despite him frequently drinking and smoking cigars previously), and despite numerous references to him losing his virginity in earlier episodes, he appeared to have regained it later in the series. His favorite beverage was Grape Nehi. In "The Novocaine Mutiny," it is revealed that Radar won $300 from Sgt. Zale in a poker game. A minor change was that he lost the ability to speak fluent Korean which should have been a blow to the camp as he was the only person who spoke it, even if in later episodes it was only a few halting sentences.

The producers originally planned to end season 7 with Radar leaving, but CBS didn't want to do that. Instead they persuaded Burghoff to come back during season 8 to do a special two-part farewell episode titled "Good-Bye, Radar".

In the episode, Radar was given a hardship discharge after his Uncle Ed died so that he could go home and help out on the farm. When the unit is in dire straits because they have no working generators, Radar decides that the 4077th needs him more than his mother does. Potter unsuccessfully tries to talk him out of staying, and Pierce becomes verbally abusive when he can't convince Radar to leave (he did everything from calling him a jackass to saying he didn't care about his mother). But it takes Corporal Klinger's swindling a generator from supply to convince him that the 4077th will survive without him. Just as a farewell party for Radar is about to start, a helicopter of wounded soldiers arrives, immediately cancelling the party. The unit has no time to waste, but they manage to say their goodbyes to Radar. Among the sendoffs, Colonel Potter wishes him a choked-up "Godspeed, son," and Charles addresses him by his given name, Walter. The only principal colleague he does not get to say goodbye to in person is Hawkeye, who was caught up in the flurry of triaged patients. As Radar looks inside the OR from the window, Hawkeye looks up at him and gives him a farewell salute (a rare military formality from Hawkeye). Radar salutes back, then boards a jeep and leaves the M*A*S*H 4077th for the last time.

As a way of saying that Radar came to Korea as a boy and went home a man, he leaves his teddy bear behind, (as Dr. Sidney Freedman predicted he would in the episode "War of Nerves"), leaving it with Hawkeye. Radar would be mentioned after his departure from the camp in three later episodes. In "Period of Adjustment" (the first episode to air after "Good-Bye, Radar"), it is revealed that Radar met B.J. Hunnicutt's wife and young daughter in San Francisco on his way back home, and that the youngster had mistaken Radar for her father (a revelation that sends Hunnicutt into a bitter depression).

In "The Foresight Saga", the camp gets a letter from Radar describing how well things are going on his Iowa farm; when his mother admits, during a subsequent phone call, that they are suffering hard times and are shorthanded, Col. Potter arranges for an abandoned Korean farm boy to be sent to the States, where Radar and his family will sponsor him as a farmhand.

In the penultimate episode of the series, "As Time Goes By", the 4077th staff includes Radar's teddy bear in a time capsule they're burying, to symbolize those who came of age during the war. Gary Burghoff reprised the Radar character in two 1984 episodes of the M*A*S*H spinoff series, AfterMASH. In the first, he responds to a letter from Klinger concerning the latter's experiences at a stateside VA hospital; in the second, two-part episode, Radar is due to be married but develops cold feet when he suspects his intended of infidelity. In the 1984 television movie W*A*L*T*E*R, which was intended as a pilot for another prospective spinoff show, Radar - having sold the family farm and sent his mother to live with an aunt - moves to St. Louis, Missouri, leaving Iowa and the "Radar" nickname behind (now just being known as Walter O'Reilly), and joins the police department. In St. Louis, his gentle manner and resourcefulness make him good at dealing with the public. W*A*L*T*E*R was never picked up as a series, however, and the movie proved to be the character's final appearance.

Welcome aboard, Radar!
BCnU!