The Bionic Woman 2007

The much anticipated fall series, "Bionic Woman" (NBC) have been making a few bold casting announcements this week, with two new prominent personalities (Isaiah Washington - formerly of Grey's Anatomy and Battlestar Galactica's Katee Sackhoff).

Although my general interests as of late are all things Reality (with the exception of a movie or two), for this sci fi/action show, I have a particular childhood fondness and interest in the show.

Forget Cartoons!
As a kid, I absolutely loved this show - Charlie's Angels, Chips (On occasion - Parents thought it promoted reckless driving habits), The Six Million Dollar (That amount seems laughable now) Man and The Bionic Woman. These were 'my' shows that I would watch in my early childhood and undoubtedly, established my career path at an early age. Ah yes, even back then I knew my career would have something to do with television and everything in between was simply a stepping stone.

"We Have The Technology"
I had a lunch box for every show, dolls, backpacks, and a Bionic costume for Halloween - it was quite the collection of 'stuff'. Merchandising was a premium commodity for these super shows -which today is virtually non-existent for most prime-time shows (with the exception of a t-shirt or key chain). Kids are not taking CSI lunch boxes to school or carrying around Law and Order backpacks - we are way too serious, where are the fun/cheeky shows?

Snap to 2007...
So, this fall we will see a new 're-imagination' of Bionic Woman - a younger, fresh faced version of the show, however also adult and not so much for kids.

What About Bigfoot and the Fembots?
The original creator (Kenneth Johnson) of the late 70's version, has since passed and it will be interesting to see just how closely the new series resembles the original (If at all). From the clips, the show appears to be more for adults (Rather than kids) and of a darker version of spy actioner, "Alias" (J.J. Abrams).

Incidentally, Bigfoot (more on the Six Million Dollar Man series) and the Fembots (without their face plates) scared the -you know what- out of me as child - I could not sleep sometimes.

The Real-Life Convergence of Science:
Back in the late 70's, The Bionic Woman and the Six Million Dollar Man were literally windows into the future of medical advancement including the use of surgical implants, prosthetics, auditory technology and Bio science, which today is the norm.

Medical, biological, and mechanical have been rapidly converging over the past 30 years. Within the next few, we will see intelligent and diagnostic nanotechnology and the addition of cybernetics (Ah, there I go again - don't get me started).

The show is scheduled to air in late September and you can read more about the show on the cool NBC mini-site: http://www.nbc.com/Bionic_Woman/

I need to make a call to TV Land Network to get the re-runs back on the air!

P.S. The picture above (The Bionic Woman, starring Lindsay Wagner as Jaime Sommers) is from the 1970's version of the television series (Courtesy of NBC).