Sep 06 2009
Retro DVDs
Every once in a while I feel like watching something an older movie or tv show and last week I popped the first two DVDs of season one of MacGyver in my DVD player and was instantly taken back to the 80s, a time which looks makes things so much more simple than they are today. I was born in the eighties so I likely didn’t see the first few seasons when they originally aired, but I do remember watching this show as a kid, waiting for Mondays to come around.
It’s unclear what it was exactly that I liked about the show… probably the action because as a kid, I also enjoyed Dukes of Hazzard and professional wrestling, so it goes hand in hand with the action on those shows.
However, as I grew up, I think one of the attractive things about the show is the fact that one man can use his mind to overcome just about any obstacle. Sure, it can be said that many of Mac’s creations were completely fake or greatly exaggerated as to their effectiveness, but many of his creations were real.
The show is quite tame to today’s standards. The blood and gore was much more family friendly.
And then there’s the simplicity of life. Imagine a time when having an unlisted number actually meant you wouldn’t be called all day by the robo-telemarketers. MacGyver show does a great job of showing how far we’ve come with the advancements in computing power.
I hope MacGyver creator Lee David Zlotoff doesn’t go through with his plan for a movie if Richard Dean Anderson isn’t involved. RDA was everything to this show. I can’t imagine watching Mac being played by anyone else. Burn Notice is darn close to a modern successor. There’s no need for a “MacGyver II” series featuring his son or something silly like that.
On a side note, can we not let the “MacGruber” finish filming. It’s ridiculous that SNL has allowed that sketch to go beyond the first two or three. They aren’t funny anymore and I can’t imagine what they’re doing turning MacGruber into a feature film. Keep them as terrible SNL sketches, not a bad feature film.