The Wild Wild West (TV series): Difference between revisions

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A'''''The Wild Wild West''''' is a 1960s TV series which combined two then-popular genres: [[The Western]] and the [[Spy Drama]], following the anachronistic adventures of two Secret Service agents roaming the western United States during the Ulysses S. Grant administration. James West (Robert Conrad) was a borderline [[The Ace|Ace]], the ladykilling man of action, while his partner Artemus Gordon (Ross Martin) was a [[Gadgeteer Genius]] and [[Master of Disguise]]. (Based on his work in this series, Martin the actor easily qualifies as a ''[[Real Life]]'' example of the latter.) The duo battled a wild assortment of [[Mad Scientist|mad scientists]] and criminal masterminds, their most persistent foe being the evil-genius dwarf Dr. Miguelito Loveless (Michael Dunn). Depending on how exacting a person's definition of "[[Steampunk]]" is, this series could be said to be the highest-profile example of the genre ever to appear on American live-action TV. It's certainly the [[Ur Example]] of [[Cattle Punk]], predating the coining of the term "steampunk" by nearly two decades.

Following the show's cancellation, two [[Reunion Show|reunion movies]] were produced in the early 1980's1980s. In 1999 a big-budgeted [[The Film of the Series|feature film]] was released starring [[Will Smith]] as West and Kevin Kline as Gordon (see ''[[Wild Wild West (film)|Wild Wild West]]''). This film is generally considered to be very bad (or [[So Bad It's Good]] to some), except by fans of the original, who think it was much much worse.

* [[Acting for Two]]: "The Night of the Torture Chamber" (the governor is kidnapped and replaced with a double) and "The Night of the Puppeteer" {{spoiler|(the title villain turns out to be a lifesize lookalike puppet manipulated by the real (and now disfigured) thing)}}. In the tag scenes for "The Night of the Bottomless Pit" and "The Night of the Plague" the [[Girl of the Week]] introduces our heroes to her fiancé, who in the former episode is played by {{spoiler|the same actor who played the episode's [[Big Bad]]/her husband and was last seen sinking in quicksand}} and in the latter is played by {{spoiler|Robert Conrad with a moustache}}.

* [[Breakout Villain]]: Dr. Miguelito Loveless debuted in the third episode, where he was caught (as he was in his second episode - from his third episode onward he was never captured again). But he was so popular (and was a good friend of Robert Conrad's in [[Real Life]]), that he returned several times a year for the first two seasons and [[Commuting on a Bus|once a year after that]] for the rest of the series.

* [[Creative Differences]] / [[God Does Not Own This World]]: CBS did ''not'' want the show's creator Michael Garrison to be overseeing the show because of how much the pilot had cost, which led to Garrison having a legal battle with the Eye throughout season one while the show went through ''seven'' producers - some of whom never even got to do one episode - before Garrison got control back. Eventually, Garrison did get in a producer to his liking (besides Fred Freiberger, under whose reign Loveless was created - in fact, the first episode to be shown after the pilot was a Freiberger-produced one) in the form of Bruce Lansbury... but CBS still got a Garrison-less show in the end, [[Author Existence Failure|though not in the manner anyone would have preferred]].

[[Category:TheTV Wild Wild WestWesterns]]

[[Category:TVPages Serieswith working Wikipedia tabs]]

[[Category:{{PAGENAME}}Steampunk Works]]