Six Million Dollar Adulthood

Last Friday, I wrote about the Six Million Dollar Man and my childhood memories of the TV show. I threw in some thoughts comparing the ideas of watching TV shows together as a family in the seventies and watching them separately today. I fretted and hemmed and hawed about what effect this 'in house cultural difference' would have on the kids. But I neglected to tell you that there are some shows that we watch together with the kids. With ALL the kids. For instance...

...we watch the Six Million Dollar Man.


I'm sure none of you regular readers of this blog are surprised by this plot twist. But yes, I did acquire the complete series and I did take the pains to load them up on the Apple TV. So that any episode is readily available with a couple clicks of the beautiful silvery remote.


The kids and I have been watching the show on and off for years. We started it when Lorie was working at Best Buy in the evenings and we were on our own. These days when we watch an episode, it's together as a family and under Lorie's extreme protest. During any given episode, she can be found to be playing Sims or Jurassic Park on her iPad mini.

The kids love the show, of course. Alex is six now, which as I mentioned before was my age during the show's original heyday. So there's some symmetry here. When we first started watching the show, all three kids would play bionics. With youngest Alex calling it 'bionic Steve' or 'the six dollar man'. They would run in slow motion in the yard or in the hallway and fight each other, sometimes arguing over who was 'Good Steve' and who was 'Bad Steve' and who was mind controlled and who wasn't and even which arm was bionic and which one was normal. I laughed at Katie's reasoning of being a female version of Colonel Steve Austin. I didn't tell her about Jamie Summers until it happened on the show itself. I preferred to keep it a secret and watch things unfold for them as they had for me thirty-some years earlier.


Needless to say, the introduction of Jamie Summers was a big hit. And then the revelation that she had her own show was even more exciting.

It's been sort of a joy for me. And I think this particular feeling at it's root is universal for fathers. The need to share something with your kids that meant so much to you when you were young. With something like Star Wars, which is probably the biggest case of "I gotta share with my kids", our culture gets in the way. There are current day movies and cartoons and playground experiences that can dilute the link between father and son when sharing those characters. Same with Batman or Star Trek. But with something like Six Million Dollar Man or even Lone Ranger, Roy Rogers, or Flash Gordon the pickings are so slim for modern day interpretations that the experience can be a controlled link.

However, sometimes that can backfire.

Our latest viewing happened a few days ago. We watching an episode called 'Nightmare in the Sky'. The original air date was September 26th, 1976, and it was from season four of the show. It guest starred popular character actor Dana Elcar. It also guest starred Farrah Fawcett herself in her second appearance on the show playing the character of Major Kelly Wood. A fellow pilot and semi-love interest for Steve.

Alex watched intently.

Katie was confused. Who was this big-haired woman? What do you mean they were married in real life? What about Jamie? What about Jamie Summers? GET THIS WOMAN AWAY FROM STEVE!!


Ashton was... Ashton was very much a teenager for the whole thing. While years ago he very much enjoyed the show, today he kept making derogatory comments under his breath and unhelpful side slanders. He commented on the special effects and the outfits. He didn't like Steve's cheesy little season four mustache. He made sure we were clear that he would rather watch Eureka, which is a modern day show that we do enjoy together. And I made sure he was clear that if he kept running his mouth I would throw him outside.


He did enjoy Farrah, though. That much was obvious. Some things are eternal.

As I'm setting up my new comic book sanctuary, I have very few things with the Six Million Dollar Man on them. An old Christmas record. And one beat-up toy with missing pieces, no outfit and busted bionic working mechanism. But he's in his old spaceship/bionic monitoring station. I had that when I was a kid. And now I have it again as an adult. Proudly displayed under glass.


Thanks,
DCD