William Shatner's TekWar

 

William Shatner’s TekWar   Back in the long ago when I was so young I thought William Shatner wrote the books—he didn’t, Ron Goulart did the actual writing—a science fiction novel with a hardboiled edge and criminous plot called TekWar appeared in bookstores under William Shatner’s byline. The year was 1989 and I was an underperforming high schooler—a sophomore, maybe?—with a predilection for reading wonderfully trashy fiction. An ailment that still bothers me, I guess. Anyway, I loved TekWar and anxiously awaited the release of each of the Tek novels. A total of nine were published between 1989 and 1997: TekWar (1989), TekLords (1991), TekLab (1991), Tek Vengeance (1993), Tek Secret (1993), Tek Power (1994), Tek Money (1995), Tek Kill (1996), and Tek Net (1997). I may have missed those last few titles on their original releases but I’m pretty sure I have all of them sitting on a shelf somewhere waiting for me to get back to where I was (or is it where I once belonged?) and read every last one. So you know, the Tek books follow a former cop, Jake Cardigan, turned felon turned private eye as he walks the mean streets of Greater Los Angeles some two hundred years in the future. In 1994, a tv movie was made of the first book, TekWar, starring William Shatner and Greg Evigan, as Cardigan, and while I don’t know if I would still think it was marvelous, wonderful, edgy, cool, I sure did back then. Heck, Sheena Easton had a small role and I thought she was the cat’s meow. TekWar was followed by three more tv movies, all released in 1994—TekLords , TekLab, and TekJustice—and a short-lived tv series (1994-95). Their IMDb ratings range from 5.6 to 6.4; so they may not be quite as good as I remember— This groovy write-up from the January 28, 1994 issue of the Salt Lake Tribune is a fun reminisce of the movies. It was written by Ron Miller, and syndicated by Knight-Ridder. Sorry for the light copy, but it should be readable.

If only I’d seen THIS on my parents’ 19” Magnavox (with the broken tuner knob)

 

If only I’d seen THIS on my parents’ 19” Magnavox (with the broken power knob)

Lucan turned out to be the pilot for a 12-episode series on ABC. It aired May 22, 1977, and starred Kevin Brophy as the wolf boy. The pilot has a stunningly high rating of 7.7 on IMDb and I can only imagine how good it would have looked on that box. Good Against Evil hasn’t aged as well—its 3.8 IMDb rating from a whopping 599 people is probably generous—but it stars a guy named Dack Rambo, and how can you go wrong with a Rambo in the house? But hey, it was written by Jimmy “Touchfeather” Sangster so how bad could it be? It aired on ABC right after Lucan.

Skag. Karl Malden waited his entire career for this role, but no one else had since it lasted only 6 episodes. But 51 people on IMDb gave the pilot episode a smashing 7.3 rating. It aired on January 6, 1980, on NBC.

Amber Waves. That shirtless hunk’a man isn’t Pooty-poot without his horse. Nope, it’s the post-Disney Kurt Russell with a pre-Brat Pack Mare Winningham. And frankly, you can’t go wrong with Dennis Weaver in any role. It aired on March 9, 1980, on ABC and its rating a 7.3 on IMDb, which means it is likely easier to watch than Good Against Evil.

Deadly Encounter. This CBS Sunday Night movie—staring Major Nelson from Bewitched—has everything: a helicopter, a suitcase, and a dashing damsel. Well, everything except Genie and a good IMDb rating since it clocked in at only 5.7. But I’m betting it would have been a slam dunk on my parents’ Magnavox when it aired on December 18, 1982, on CBS.