Cyborgs: A Bionic Podcast

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Steve Austin is accused of the murder of an OSI lab technician. In addition, some of his bionic technical specs have gone missing. Has Steve gone rogue or is this an elaborate plan of an evil genius? It's really neither as we'll find out in this week's discussion. This episode is the final episode of the second season of The Six Million Dollar Man. It is also the premiere episode for Jennifer Darling as Oscar's secretary, Callahan. Paul and John are joined by author, musician, and podcaster, Keith R.A. DeCandido to discuss this episode, a sequel to "Eyewitness to Murder".

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Rating:

Bionic Wiki entry

The Six Million Dollar Blog entry

(coming soon)

Keith R.A. DeCandido has been, at various times, an author, editor, critic, book packager, musician, television personality, and probably some other things, too, but he can't remember due to the lack of sleep.

On the fiction-writing side, he has more than thirty novels to his credit, along with short stories, eBooks, comic books, novellas, and nonfiction. Most of his work has been in various media tie-in universes, ranging from TV shows (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, CSI: NY, Doctor Who, Farscape, Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda, Star Trek, Supernatural, Xena, Young Hercules) to comic books (the Hulk, Spider-Man, the Silver Surfer, X-Men) to games (Classic BattleTech, Command and Conquer, Magic: the Gathering, StarCraft, World of Warcraft). He also wrote the novelizations of Joss Whedon's Serenityand all three Resident Evil films. Most of his non-tie-in work is in the milieu of his 2004 novel Dragon Precinct, a high-fantasy police procedural.

As an editor, Keith has put together twenty anthologies (some behind-the-scenes, some credited), was the editorial director of the Marvel Comics novels published in the 1990s by Boulevard Books, supervised the monthly Star Trek eBook line from 2001-2008, and edited dozens of books.

Keith is also a professional percussionist—currently a member of the parody band, Boogie Knights, and having also played with the Don't Quit Your Day Job Players, Steve Rosenhaus, the late David Honigsberg, and the Randy Bandits—and a brown belt in Kenshikai karate. Find out less at his web site at www.DeCandido.net or read his inane ramblings at kradical.livejournal.com.

Case File will be a series of interviews with those who made our two bionic shows possible in the 70s — actors, directors, etc. First up is an interview with actor/writer Jim McMullan (SMDM: "The Thunderbird Connection" and BW: "Kill Oscar 3" & "The Martians Are Coming, The Martians Are Coming")

Growing up in Long Beach, Long Island, NY during the 1950's was a magical time for Jim McMullan. His fondest memories revolved around his friends, sports and making things. He was always creating something, inventing something, building something. That explains why he went off to college to learn more about art, design and architecture. He studied Industrial Design at New York University and Parsons School of Design for a year before enrolling in Kansas University's School of Architecture. For five years he involved himself in the arts: design, sculpture, art history and even theatre. After a girlfriend coaxed him into playing the lead in a college production of "Desire Under The Elms" by Eugene O'Neill, he spent much of his free time learning the craft of acting.

Jim graduated from the University of Kansas in 1961 with a Bachelor of Architecture degree. On a whim he went to Hollywood in 1961 to visit a friend and, through a chance meeting with playwright William Inge, he was given a screen test for Sam Peckinpah's Ride the High Country (1962) (Peckinpah directed the screen test). The test was sent to Universal Pictures, which put him under a seven-year contract, the start of a successful 40-year film career. During his four-year stay at Universal he made many TV pilots and starred opposite James Stewart as his son in the classic Shenandoah (1965). After leaving Universal he was given the co-lead for eight weeks opposite Vince Edwards in the series "Ben Casey" (1961). Jim has had the lead in a few series, such as "Chopper One" (1974), "Beyond Westworld" (1980), "The Young and the Restless" (1973) and most notably had a recurring role on the popular nighttime soap "Dallas" (1978) as Sen. Dowling, a part that lasted for 18 weeks. In 1970 he co-starred with Robert Redford and Gene Hackman in "Downhill Racer" (1969).

Jim has been a respected and highly recognizable actor for the past 40 years and has appeared in hundreds of TV series, movies and commercials. His many feature film credits include "The Incredible Shrinking Woman" (1981) and "Extreme Close-Up" (1973). He has guest-starred in over 150 TV shows including "MacGyver" (1985), "Doogie Howser, M.D." (1989), "The Six Million Dollar Man" (1974), "The F.B.I." (1965), "The Rockford Files" (1974), "Hart to Hart" (1979), "The A-Team" (1983), "9 to 5" (1986), "Stowaway to the Moon" (1975) (TV), "Father Knows Best: Home for Christmas" (1977) (TV), "Centennial" (1978) and "The Taking of Flight 847: The Uli Derickson Story" (1988) (TV).

A few years ago Jim's career expanded into book writing. Since then he has published nine books... Actors as Artists, Musicians As Artists, This Face You Got, Instant Zen, Happily Ever After, Hail To The Chief, Cheatin’Hearts, Broken Dreams & Stompted on Love, Do it Now Book & Clock and Flocks, Herds, Litters & Schools. In 2002, Jim returned from France after playing the role of Buffalo Bill for four years (1998-2002) in the "Buffalo Bill Wild West Show", a 1000-seat dinner theater production, just outside of Disneyland Paris. - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaJ599XK6Jo

He and his wife Helene have been married 40 years. She is a Life Coach and Jewelry Artist. They have two sons who live in California. Sky is an advertising agency producer and Tysun is a filmmaker/editor. Jim & Helene split their time between their cabin in the Sequoia National Forest, near their boys, and a small town on the New Jersey shore where they sail & meditate. They recently completed a 4,000-mile, nine-month sailing adventure, from New Jersey to Key West, Florida, and back.

Official Website - http://jimmcmullan.com/

Artwork (under Harry Kovair) - http://www.harrykovair.com/Harry_Kovair/HOME.html

YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/senatordowling

http://www.youtube.com/buffalojimbo

http://www.youtube.com/buffalojimbo13

IMDb - http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0573401/

BOOKS:

Flocks, Herds, Litters, and Schools - http://amzn.com/1450793614

http://www.aerodalepress.com/component/content/article/1/38-flocks-herds-litters-a-schools

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John Perry is a world famous entertainer and an old college friend of Steve's. Oscar suspects him of being a traitor, selling government secrets to foreign agents. Perry hands the secret material to the agents at various locales on his concert tour. Steve joins the tour in order to prove Perry's innocence, but the more time he spends with his old friend, the more suspicions he begins to have. Is John Perry a traitor?

Joining John and Paul to discuss this episode is The Six Million Dollar Blog author Alex Green.

Special thanks to Robin Spanell for supplying us with the audio for the television ad for this episode featured at the start of the podcast. Check out Robin's music, some which has also been featured on the podcast, at his homepage.

Purchase the season three Universal DVD release of The Six Million Dollar Man. In doing so, you help support the podcast.

Alex Green was born in San Diego where he has lived his whole life, rarely venturing outside the safe confines of Southern California. Growing up, his parents tried to persuade him that the funny man running in slow motion on the television wasn't worth watching, but he knew better. He knew much, much better.

A lifelong fan of The Six Million Dollar Man and The Bionic Woman, Alex hadn't been an adult for very long (some would say he still isn't) when he started making several trips a month up to Los Angeles to attend toy and collectibles shows in order to amass a huge collection of Bionic memorabilia. A vast collection that he no longer possesses due to an accident involving a pencil, a rabid weasel and a rapidly descending elevator (Actually, the advent of eBay in the late 90's took the thrill of the hunt out of it for him, so he gave it up).

Currently working out of his modest two-bedroom apartment (or twelve-bedroom mansion as he refers to it when describing his digs to people who’ve never visited him at home), Alex is a free-lance web designer and the webmaster of The Six Million Dollar Blog. The newest Bionic site on the web except for all the others that have come after. He hopes one day to meet his hero Lee Majors in person and his biggest regret in life is that he no longer fits into his Six Million Dollar Man jammies.

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Steve is sent to recover a missing nuclear device on a remote island in the South Pacific. There, he must deal with a Japanese solider who thinks that his country is still at war with the United States. But this isn't the typical crazed solider thinks the war is still ongoing. Writer Judy Burns crafts a story that far surpasses people's expectations of this type of story. Joining John and Paul is science fiction author Robert J. Sawyer.

Rating:

Bionic Wiki entry

The Six Million Dollar Blog entry(coming soon)

Robert J. Sawyer has won the Hugo, Nebula, John W. Campbell Memorial, Aurora, Hal Clement, and Audie Awards, all for best novel of the year, as well as the top SF awards in Japan, China, France, and Spain. According to the Locus Index to Science Fiction Awards, he is the #1 all-time worldwide leader in number of award wins as a science fiction or fantasy novelist. His 21st novel,Triggers, a 2012 title from Penguin Canada, was a Globe and Mail, Maclean’s, and Locus bestseller, and he’s hit #1 on the Amazon.com Technothrillers bestsellers list. Rob’s previous novels are all in print, including The Terminal Experiment; Calculating God; Hominids; Mindscan; Rollback; FlashForward (basis for the ABC TV series); and the WWW trilogy of Wake, Watch, and Wonder(each of which separately won the Aurora Award for Best Novel of the Year). His website is at sfwriter.com.

Strange lights in the sky on the eve of a rocket launch prompts Steve to investigate. When he discovers that the lights were from a UFO that crashed leaving its inhabitants stranded on Earth, it's up to Steve to make sure they find a way home while avoiding the authorities, including Oscar. Joining John and Paul is James Sherrard — webmaster of the The Bionic Woman Files.

Our rating: 4/5 Bionic Limbs.

Learn more about this episode at the Bionic Fandom WIKI.

More about James Sherrard:

James Sherrard is a first generation fan of The Six Million Dollar Man and The Bionic Woman. A collector of all things Bionic as a child, his interest in the shows was reignited when the first Bionic reunion movie was produced in 1987. The following year he met stars Lindsay Wagner and Richard Anderson for the first time through Lindsay Wagner’s Official Fan Club. In 1998, James reworked the Bionic Woman episode guide booklet that he had produced for the club into The Bionic Woman Files website — the longest running Bionic Woman site on the web! Over the years, James has contributed his Bionic knowledge to various books, articles, websites, and television productions. He has also amassed an amazing collection of Bionic memorabilia, from common toys to one-of-a-kind production items. Most recently, James has contributed to the 2010 DVD releases of The Bionic Woman Season One and The Six Million Dollar Man: The Complete Collection. James resides in New York where he is employed by a non-profit organization.