Oh the 1970's, who can forget this era when life was less complicated and we moved at a slower pace. People had face to face conversations when seated at a table instead of staring into a cell phone.Producers in the 1970's could still captivate their audiences without relying upon unrealistic CGI generated explosions and long drawn out finale battles.I'm referring to shows such as Rockford Files, CHiPs, Knight Rider, Charlie's Angels, Bionic Woman, Dukes of Hazzard and of course The Six Million Dollar Man.Filmed in everyday cities in every day buildings, no computer generated effects, these shows riveted youths such as myself. These were shows that the entire family could sit down and watch and of course youths could discuss at school the next day.Today's trashy reality fake-reality shows just don't compare. I am so grateful to the producers of these golden era shows for influencing my childhood.Who could forget the Death Probe episode? This episode scared the crap out of me. For years I've wondered what they used to power it - it moved so fast. And who could forget the Bigfoot episode? Classic television.I recall asking my parents to buy my brother and I the newest Six Million Dollar Man toys. Those toys provided us with hours of playing time.Thank you Harve Bennett, Lee Majors and Lindsay Wagner for making our childhood just a little more enjoyable.

The Six Million Dollar man was originally a few different made for TV movies. It seemed to do well in the ratings so it was decided to try it as a TV series. The very first of the "tv" episodes was called "Population Zero"...this one episode is by far the best of the entire series, he actually had a bionic eye that zoomed without the stupid sound or superimposed view finder and additionally there were NO stupid bionic sounds used in this episode, he also showed he was a sort of a Mcgyver character but unlike Mcgyver, Steve Austin not only got away from a very near death situation (in a very clever way) but also tracked his foes down and saw to it that they died horribly- one was crushed to death by a 500 pound door while the others burned alive as punishment for their attempts at trying to kill him earlier. Overall this particular episode is a very good well written story with an excellent climax, its too bad the episodes that followed became very lame and geared towards 6 year olds.

Okay, let's forget for a moment that the show degraded to cybernetic Sasquaches, Astral Projection and a Death Probe that looked like a cross between a Dalek and an SUV. The first three seasons of this series, and the pilot movie in particular were truly engaging and well written. Lee Majors, who had previously starred in The Big Valley and the movie Will Penny with Charleton Heston, got his big break in 1973 with a TV adaptation of Martin Caidin's ground-breaking novel, Cyborg. It was his first starring role, and as far as television was concerned, one of the most unique characters ever to grace the screen. Broken down to its most simple (bionic?) components, it was James Bond meets Frankenstein's Monster. The film did so well that ABC green-lighted a series of TV movies, that, in turn, garnered enough support to make a series. That's a monumental feat, considering that at that same time, Gene Roddenberry was enduring multiple failures with Questor (who, one might say. later evolved into commander Data), Earth II and a revival of Star Trek. Ironically, the series started off slow, with a minimal budget and a shifting schedule. By the time "Six Mil" found it's niche, the good writing was being rejected in favor of grabbing ratings by signing B-list guest starts like Sonny Bono and George Foreman. The rest... unfortunately, is TV In-Joke history... not too unlike Knight Rider and Quantum Leap. Let's hope Stargate SG1 and Angel fare better in the annals of TV History.

This pretty much was the highlight of my Sundays as I was growing up. The character of Steve Austin was one of the few superheroes that made it on television during the 1970's and within a couple of years of its debut similar shows were also premiering all over television. However, Steve Austin will always be the prototype for all television super-heroes.