Past Tense - Girl Power Part II




Just wait until these dissident discover the 1984 movie, "Blind Date". Joseph Bottoms, plays a blind man given experimental surgery, cranial implants which give outlines of shapes, no color or surface details. *Bionic sight* based on echo location which bats use. The main hardware is outside of his head, the device is disguised as a Walkman with headphones. The headphones has the sonic transceiver - which sends the data reflected back to the not-Walkman to be signaled to his implants as forms.

So? Actor Bottoms isn't blind. It's a decent, low budget flick, remember most for the car chase; a blind man behind the wheel, highly motivated - chasing the murderer who kidnapped his girlfriend... and he's gaining. It's on DVD and BD. The serial killer aspect was a subplot which became the dominate plot towards the end. And it co-stars a pre-bonkers and pre-obese, Kristie Alley.

Anyhow, people pointed out CBS' production of "Jericho" (2006) had hired a real deaf actress, Shoshannah Stern for the role of Bonnie Richmond. I don't really care. I just don't. Just be believable in the part. Does not have to be genuine; neither Christopher Reeve, Dean Cain, Tom Welling, Henry Cavill nor Brandon Routh could fly - to play Superman. This is all fiction, not real. It's Hollywood, make-believe land, all pretend. Stressing that, it's all pretend.

Summer of 2007; San Diego, Comic Con, the pilot was altered, no new reshoots then. It was now cut down to half an hour and screened for attendees. This version completely cut out Whitman's Becca to avoid more woes. Did not help, made some folks even more angry.

For the later broadcast, the pilot was reworked and had various reshoots to include the new actress and revamped character, not deaf. Neither of these previous iterations are included on Volume One; they probably wish it didn't happen. I am curious to see Whitman in the role.



Lucy Hale would later gain fame playing Aria Montgomery on "Pretty Little Liars" (2010). She now has a TV and theatrical career and currently co-host the yearly "Dick Clark's Rockin' New Years Eve" on ABC.

The next woe came from creative differences - where the series would go. Early on, one of the excitements was getting Glen Morgan as one of the show runners. For those who are not genre fans, Morgan is a big deal. He was a writer and producer on such fan favorites as "The X-Files" (1993) and "Space: Above And Beyond" (1995). He even married star, Kristen Cloke from SAB in 1998. He was a producer who started the "Final Destination" horror franchise. And the producer of the well received, remake of "Willard" (2003).

He was not happy with the story line co-show runner David Eick was pursuing. Eick was at the time, best known as the co-show runner on Ron Moore's reboot of "Battlestar Galactica" (Sci-Fi Channel). So Morgan dropped out. Leaving Eick as prime runner, the others were Kaeta Kalogridis and Jason Smilovic. The series template is credited to Morgan, well he got paid.

It is Eick hands on what is Volume One. His vision presented in those eight episodes. He was building a conspiracy, a surreptitious group is trying to stop further cybernetic research... unless it is for them. Plus the back burner story line with Sarah Corvus, played by Katee Sackhoff - the first bionic woman who went unhinged. Both she and Jaime are dying, not from the obvious. Unlike the original series, Corvus and Sommers have nanomachines in their blood for regeneration called anthrocytes. A nice workaround, so they don't have to deal with bruises when they gets into skirmishes.

The interface for their brains and the hardware wasn't perfected. They're generating noise which is manifesting in pain, headaches. This will grow and grown until it is all consuming, nothing will ease it; go mad or suicide to make it stop. There is no solution... at least at this point. A price of being reborn - more time alive; Jaime would've died at a hospital, too severe were her injuries. But this conclusion is years away, a slow build-up and probably minor patches could come available later. Corvus is actively seeking her own resolution.

Before the strike, NBC made it known they were not happy with what was seen, the show's direction. He got fired. A replacement was announced, Jason Cahill would now take the helm for the rest of season. But it was too late. The strike took too long, resulting in the show getting canceled.

Why is that?

The show premiered on September 26th (aired Wednesdays at 9 pm) running for eight weeks, all aired - stopped in November. As mentioned earlier, the strike ended in February, the following year. It would take weeks to get new scripts since Cahill could not work with writers or even hire new ones to revamp/mend the show until the walkout was done. Then add to that time - weeks more to film episodes and post production effects, then ready for broadcast. It was struggling in the ratings, not that well known.

For the network, having to resume production was a headache to gain momentum when they would need to reacquire the public's attention.

Too much time had passed. Too much time to get more episodes. Too much time to attract new viewers. So much easier to start from scratch with a fresh show. Where would this had gone with Cahill? A good question. Don't know - it wasn't meant to be.

It was suppose to be a network hit. It had sci-fi for fanboys, an attractive lead for guys and mixed martial arts, an empowered girl for women and a love story mixed in. All the demographics were touched on - along with the nostalgia for the original 1976 series on top of that. How could this not be a hit?

During the early weeks of the strike came another problem. *shakes head* There were some serious confusion if Sackhoff was written off the show. Corvus was going to be a reoccurring villain. What happened here is all about scheduling, not fired. Sackhoff was still working on "Battlestar Galactica", her participation in "Bionic Woman" was filmed during her downtime.



Sackhoff made it clear, signed a five year contract and wasn't leaving the show. This was about future scheduling once TV production resumed. Galactica would get her main attention, her character Starbuck was one of the leads. There were juvenile rumors that she and co-star Ryan had bad blood and would not work together. Nope, fiction.

I enjoyed Ferrer as Bledsoe, leader of the secret government black project, the "Berkut Group" (the new OSI, Office of Scientific Intelligence from the 1976 series). The operation done to save Sommers from a fatal car crash was not approved by him. It was done by her boyfriend, Dr. Will Anthros (Bowers). The San Francisco, nightclub bartender got two bionic legs, right arm, right ear and right eye.

It was also good give her training. Fellow agent (not bionic), Kim was teaching her how to defend and be proactive in fights. That makes 100% sense, she's not a spy as said before, Jamie was a bartender before this happened. There were both good and bad decisions made.

Oh yeah, she had no idea Will was leading a secret double life. Jamie knew him as a college professor, not a government scientist. She is a college dropout, folks died, had to get a job to survive and to raise her little sister. Not helping is her second life, spy - Jamie is absent more than before which creates clashes at home.