You’re probably asking yourself “who the hell is Erin Grey?”. She came to mind while reading a great blog post about Knight Rider by Sarcomical (a fantastic blog btw).
When I was a kid there were a couple of different programs that I remember fondly - Dukes of Hazzard being one, and Buck Rogers in the 25th Century being the other. At such a young age I of course had no idea why my Dad didn’t complain about us watching such rubbish. Of course looking at them now it’s pretty damn obvious.
After much thought I have decided that Wilma Deering from Buck Rogers would beat Catherine Bach from the Dukes of Hazzard on just about any scale worth inventing (apart from length of legs maybe - but then they didn’t have Daisy Dukes in space. Wilma flew spaceships anyway - Daisy never drove the General Lee).
Being serious for a moment, it’s a bit weird really, isn’t it - remembering old television series with such fondness. I got the DVD box set of the first series of Buck Rogers for my birthday earlier this month. It has not aged well at all - but at the same time, it has a certain charm. Yes - that’s it - it’s so bad it’s charming.
One of the main things that stands out about Buck Rogers is how pretty women were still totally portrayed as sex objects in the early 80s. The pilot episode titles show various panning shots of Wilma in underwear, laid out across huge luminous letters spelling out the show title on the studio floor. Can you imagine an episode of Baywatch starting with Pam & Co smouldering at the camera in their g-strings ? I guess it’s no accident that the titles were changed for the rest of the series. It’s amusing in a way - you can almost predict the “opportunities” that crop up to show more of Wilma in the first couple of episodes… if she has to climb, the camera will be on her ass quicker than you can shout “fwooaarrr” (well… ladies might if they like things like that, otherwise they might roll their eyes - as did W - and say “oh please….”)
While searching around for the picture of Wilma (above) I also discovered the titles of the series on YouTube. Click here to watch!