Shark Bytes

Casey Jones,

As to your question about Kelly Ripa appearing on LOTL, the answer is YES. She simply was given incorrect billing in the credits -- the producers put her name in the credits as Philip Paley. She, in fact, was Chaka and she played him without any makeup at all!

It jumped 3 times.

Time one: Will left

Time two: 90's tv series

Time three: the movie

I wasn't even born in the 70's and I love this show. Very original. And I actually like the special effects- come on people, this is the 70's we're talking about!

The original series definitely jumped after the second season when Rick left. It was just getting really interesting and then, bam -- it disintegrates.

It would have been much better for Rick to have stayed on another season, finally given into the love triangle that Holly had been so hungry for, and then for Carol Brady to suddenly appear with Alice and set up housekeeping in the cave.

I wasn't born when the original LOTL was on but I did get to see the early 90's version. I really liked the newer version but I'm eager to see the original one. I will say the 90's version jts when the thought they made it back home. It was so heart breaking. The minute they got settled at their old home their Dad opened the garage and T-Rex popped out. I remember my brother and I being pissed off. I missed the pilot also. Where was the family going in the beginning of the newer version? All I remember was there Jeep Cherokee falling down a pit.

In yesterday's USA Today Life section, there was a front page report detailing a Land of the Lost motion picture starring Will Ferrell, which will be classified as a comedy and released by Universal Studios next year. The original NBC version was the best of all the incarnations of this series--don't play it for laughs! What's next--Jessica and Ashlee Simpson starring as Electra Woman & DynaGirl?

One more point! Has anyone thought Kelly Ripa was on this show? Cause in the rather deep ep "Album" Will and Holly see a vision of their late mom and the actress playing her looks just like Kelly Ripa from Live with Regis and Kelly! Check it out on DVD if you have it (course Kelly was only 4 when this was made).

Different points follow!
1)Saw the show as a kid in the 70's, had one ep on videotape in 2002, rented the first season dvd from the library recently (that is my viewing history)! 2)Now, I found the father Rick to be played by an actor who reminded me a little of Judd Hirsch (Alex on Taxi). 3)Chaka was not played by Clint Howard (Opie Cunningham's reallife bro)but by a kid named Phil Paley!
4) David Gerrold, who wrote Trouble With Tribble on ST:TOS, wrote a couple of eps on this show and he ticked me off with his fautlty thinking both on this ep's dvd with his commentary and on Star Trek:The Sci-Fi Channel Special Edition back on Scifi Channel in 1998 (but the details to this ST-ticking off bit is another story). Gerrold claims Grumpy the Tyrannosaur, was grumpy cause he never got anything to eat. We only see this dino-character a couple of minutes an ep, Gerrold, he could well be successful in catching prey in moments we don't see him!
5)I found Holly to be written to be a monster in a sense in her own right! She almost throws something hard at her brother Will in the ep The Stranger, just to get him back at him for teasing her harmlessly!
6) I only remember one ep from my seventies viewing with Uncle Jack in it(the one about the lady who could freeze people by looking at them)! But since he probably went looking for them on the same path they originally took it is not that ultra-super farfetched that he finds them!

PS I think that was what the Star Trek edition on Sci-Fi was called! And Ron Harper, who played Uncle Jack, said he preferred this show to the Planet of the Apes tv show he'd previously been on! He said POTA was more boring!

I don't really remember Uncle Jack when I was watching LOTL first run. But I just recently got the season 3 DVDs and was surprised. Season 2 ended with such a good feeling. Chacka poised on the edge of evolution into something more than Paku. And then season 3... Uncle Jack??? WTF! There were so man plot points they could have linked into from seasons 1 and 2 and they just went off on a complete tangent. At least Enik was still there. I loved that old Altrusian. Ya so if Mac is the Knife, then Jack is the Shark.

If I had been put in charge of the show, I would have replaced Spencer Milligan with another actor, the character would have stayed the same.

I would have picked up where "The Musician" episode left off, we would have seen more of the beings and their plans for Cha-Ka. I would also feature the Zorn.

I would NOT have made the changes whoever was put in charge of the third season made. I know I would have been more qualified - I watched the series!!!

Actually I have been thinking of buying the DVD collection of the original "Land of the Lost" tv series. I was hooked on it and I had to watch it every Saturday that I could. However, I did miss many episodes including those after the father went back to his time. I wish I never was in boy scouts (sorry I shared that bad mental note) because I enjoyed "Land of the Lost" and I liked watching Wesley Eure on "Days of Our Lives" too. I have seen the "Dopey" episode in recent years and its "whine" does get on one's nerves. The man of lights was irratating too. I never did see the last episode of "Land of the Lost", and I will thanks to DVD.
I hope the proposed "Land of the Lost" movie will do justice and not be made into a comedy with Will Farrell. It should be an adventure/action film instead.

I actually preferred Uncle Jack to Rick Marshall. Rick was a hothead, always losing his temper with the kids. Jack was calm, caring, and understanding.

The dinosaurs never scared me, but the Sleestaks gave me nightmares. And how many times do you have to get electrocuted before you stop playing with those pylons and colored rocks?

i used to LOVE this show (granted i was like 7 at the time) i had nightmares about the sleestack --until the "uncle jack was searching" crap --even as a preteen i just couldnt buy that....

I want to say it never jumped, but clearly the 3rd season would be the jump ,because the actor playing the dad had left by then. That's not a slag on Uncle Jack, because he was played well, but it was too hard to accept that he and the father had switched places (especially when there is an actual last episode at the end of season 1,which explains some kind of time loop). Great show that people who grew up during the years it was on(and even those that saw it in reruns) still remember fondly. They did a remake of the show (in the late 80's or early 90's) that failed miserably. I haven't heard anyone say anything good about that. I have the first 2 seasons on dvd and love them,but have yet been able to convince myself to buy season 3 as I think it would just spoil it some for me. Great show with a great theme song(and a great closing theme song as well)!

Seems like the Krofft shows began with the relatively unsophisticated HR Pufnstuf back in 1969, peaked with the Bugaloos, then began descending the other side of the hill with Lidsville and Sigmund And The Sea Monsters. Even by Sigmund standards LOTL was a pretty big stumble on a long way down (The Lost Saucer, anyone? Bigfoot And Wild Boy?). In comparison with the 'live cartoon' quality of the preceding Krofft shows, this one was set in a rather grim, slowly-paced (alternate) reality. A distinct lack of the usual Krofft wacky charm notwithstanding, LOTL's faults are many. Firstly, no sci-fi show theme should ever feature a banjo, and nor should its incidental music. Also, shooting the show on ***** made it look home-made, and those cheesy blue-screen effects looked like the cheapo-cheapo substitutes for real sets and direction they were. As it is, the painfully cramped sets themselves were pretty minimal, too; all sparse foliage and painted backdrops. The acting was fine by all bar Holly, who did let the side down just a bit. The Sleestaks looked a bit 'Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea' slow-moving man-in-a-rubber-suit, but as the regular villains they were acceptable. Not enough to save the lamest Krofft effort in the series (until Far Out Space Nuts made it look like classic TV comparison), however. All in all, Day One for this show's Jump.

The Citizen Kane of Saturday morning shows. It was well crafted science fiction
and it never jumped. It was hardly the
fault of the Krofts that they didn't have
21st century special effects. Besides, it
is Philistine to imagine that special effects are what make science fiction.