Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (1978-80)

Glen A Larson started production on Buck Rogers in the 25th Century round about the same time as he started on Battlestar Galactica.

Buck Rogers, along with Flash Gordon, had been staples of 1930's TV as well as radio serials, with the original TV part being played by Buster Crabbe.

For some reason, the characters name was slightly changed, the opening narration calls him Captain William 'Buck' Rogers, whereas the original was called Anthony Buck Rogers. This is unusual, and the reason behind it is unknown to me, but it wasn't without precedent as the TV version of the Incredible Hulk had the main character with a slightly different name.

The basic storyline is that Buck is launched in 1987 on board his spacecraft Ranger 3. This will turn out to be NASA's last deep space probe, because for some unexplained reason, shortly afterwards there is a global war that leaves much of the earth as a wasteland. Buck's ship suffers a malfunction in its life support system freezing him for 500 years until the year 2491.

Buck is played by Gil Gerard, Colonel Wilma Deering is played by Erin Gray, an ex model who paraded around in some very tight outfits. Tim O'Conner played the easy going Dr Elias Huer, and the small robot, Twiki was voiced by Mel Blanc in most episodes. Pamala Hensey played the role of Draconian Princess Ardala who always seemed to be chasing Buck and her sidekick, Kane, was played by Michael Ansara.

The storylines had little sense of continuity but ranged from the good to the absurd.

Like Galactica, the 2nd series changed direction, and the action was moved off Earth onto a starship the Searcher. The 2nd series lost the character of Dr Huer, and Princess Ardala. The storylines did not seem to hold up as well, and the effects were not as good. A new character, Hawk was introduced.

There were a number of fairly well known guest stars in the show overall including Cesar Romero, Buster Crabbe, Frank Gorshin, Roddy MacDowall and Jamie Lee Curtis among many others.

Record 273 - universe - Last update 28 Mar 2007, 23:13:53

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