Wednesday, February 25, 2009

"DOCTOR WHO" ZONKS "CHEYENNE"

In 1966, an Alabama tourist named Morton Dill was visiting the top of the Empire State Building when he met the Gallifreyan Time Lord known only as the Doctor (first incarnation) and his three Companions: Barbara, Ian, and Vicki. Because they had materialized out of thin air, and were all "cramped" into such a small space, Morton assumed that they were movie people from Hollywood.

And so the first thing he wanted to know was if they knew Cheyenne Bodie.

For us, as mentioned in this blog about two weeks ago, Cheyenne Bodie was played by Clint Walker in the 1950's TV Western 'Cheyenne'. So it looks on the surface to the casual viewer that he was asking if they knew the actor. However, Morton Dill also supplied us with a splainin to disable this Zonk.

He thought that they were movie folk, not people in the television business. So for him, "Cheyenne Bodie" would be a reference to 'Cheyenne' as a movie, not a TV series. Conceivably, it could still star Clint Walker, who would have been playing a fictionalized version of the tele-historical figure of the real Bodie.

And even if it was the TV series he was talking about (just in case the show got referenced in some other TV series), the same reasoning would apply.

And so this Zonk is exterminated. Exterminate! Exterminate! Yee-hah!

BCnU!
Toby O'B

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Have you ever thought of having a Toobworld FAQ somewhere? I know what a "zonk" is, but I'll bet anyone who stumbles in here by accident (or design) doesn't. Just askin'...

Toby O'B said...

I was just discussing this with Rob Buckley of "The Medium Is Not Enough" earlier today. I should have a LOT of Toobworld items permanently housed on the web somewhere.

Markienyc said...

Well Done!

Anonymous said...

Well, I don't know what a zonk is, though you've used it as a verb, so perhaps I should say: "I don't know what it is to zonk."

Toby O'B said...

Zonk is a noun and a verb! It comes from 'Let's Make A Deal' - it was the graphic you'd see when somebody got the goat behind door number two or whatever.

The Zonk would be the discrepancy and to zonk would be making the discrepancy.

see? easy as pie.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.... pie!

Anonymous said...

Joan Plowright's character in 'Avalon' said it best:



"That's television. You can only watch for so long."