Kolchak Blogging: "Firefall" (November 8, 1974)

In “Firefall,” Kolchak (Darren McGavin) follows the unusual case of a local symphony conduct, Ryder Bond (Fred Beir), who seems to be the culprit in a series of arson murders.

On further examination, however, the journalist realizes that the murders may actually be a result of spontaneous combustion, or some supernatural attack. Digging deeper, Kolchak learns that a gangster’s death at a local arcade some time earlier may be the key fact explaining the crimes.  When the gangster, Markoff, died, his spirit became a “doppelganger" and began to murder the friends of Bond, in an effort to take over his life. He has selected Bond as his target because his life-long love of the symphony.

Now, alas, the doppelganger is out to kill Kolchak, a task that can only be accomplished outside of a church, and if Kolchak falls asleep. Kolchak seeks the help of a gypsy fortune teller, Marie (Madlyn Rhue), to help him destroy the terrifying doppelganger. He learns that he must take the doppelganger’s corpse to the place of its death, if he wishes to vanquish this foe.

“Firefall” is the best Kolchak: The Night Stalker (1974-1974) episode since “The Zombie,” which is unusual since the monster of the week, a vengeful spirit, is less colorful, perhaps, than a vampire, a werewolf, an alien, or Jack the Ripper. The episode fits the same formula that viewers will detect in all the episodes, from the hostile authority figures (usually police officers) to the local “color” that is on-the-take, here Rhue’s amusing gypsy.  And yet the story works well, for two reasons, primarily.

First, the doppelganger is legitimately scary. There is a scene here in which the spirit peeks inside at Kolchak and Bond through a church window, smiling malevolently. There is a sense from the monster’s expression that he is feeling tremendous joy from torturing Kolchak and Bond. This villain is downright sinister.

Secondly, Kolchak must solve this case without sleeping. While it’s true that all the “stories” on the series eventually come to involve Kolchak himself, since he is the one to slay the monsters, in this case the monster actually targets the news man and makes his life miserable. Kolchak grows exhausted, but knows if he closes his eyes, it is curtains for him.  Worse, he has no real allies. His friends in the INS office never believe his crazy stories, and Marie just wants Kolchak’s money. As she tells him acerbically: “It’s just terrible to be broke and be superstitious at the same time.”

So, in addition to being alone in his quest, Kolchak must battle his own exhaustion as well as the monster of the week. The episode’s finale finds him finally letting down and falling asleep…in the back of a police car as he is hauled off to jail for arson himself.  I would love to know how Kolchak evaded this charge, since he is directly responsible for the fire that destroys the arcade. And speaking of that arcade, as a fan of vintage games, it is a pleasure to watch this episode and see the pinball machines and other attractions at an arcade in America, circa 1974.

The special effects this week depicting the doppelganger's spectral form are about as weak as we've come to expect from the series, but somehow don't take away from the urgency of the narrative.

Finally, “Firefall” seems to take on a slightly Columbo-esque bent this week, as Kolchak develops a closer-than-usual, bicker-some relationship with the would-be victim of the monster, the haughty Bond. In both situations, a crumpled, slightly biarre (but brilliant) character, digs for the truth while hunting the perpetrator of a crime.

Next week: “The Devil’s Platform.”

Kolchak Blogging: "The Vampire" (October 4, 1974)

In “The Vampire,” an old friend of Kolchak’s (Darren McGavin), James “Swede” Brightowsky (Larry Storch) visits Chicago’s INS office and tells Carl about a series of vampire-like killings in Las Vegas.  This piques his interest, and when Kolchak is assigned to interview a Far Eastern transcendental guru in Los Angeles, he makes some side-trips to Las Vegas.

When Vincenzo (Simon Oakland) demands the story about the guru, Kolchak gets a former bush-league journalist-turned-real estate agent, Fay Krueger (Kathleen Nolan) to write it, while he investigates the vampire. In this case, the vampire is a woman, Catherine Rawlins (Suanne Charny), a former show-girl who is now using her job as a call-girl to claim victims.

Although the local police detective working the case, Lt. Mateo (William Daniels) grows enraged with Kolchak’s insistence that a vampire is responsible for the body count. But Carl tracks Catherine down to her baronial estate in the Hollywood hills and plans to drive a stake through her heart.

Relatively early in the series run, Kolchak returns to a rerun monster: the vampire. Here, the “night stalking” takes the journalist back to the very haunts where he killed another vampire, Janos Skorzeny (in the popular TV movie, The Night Stalker).   The story is not particularly memorable in terms of the details, but “The Vampire,” like many episodes of the series, features a lurid, sleazy quality that separates it from most of the homogenized programming of the series’ era.

Here, the vampire is a showgirl turned hooker turned vampire, which is a descent from dreams to nightmares, if I’ve ever witnessed one. In some way, it’s a commentary on Hollywood, Los Angeles, and Las Vegas. These are all places of enormous wealth, and also enormous vice. People like Catherine Rawlins go from pursuing a job in the entertainment industry to using their bodies to satisfy vices. Eventually, they become a bottom-feeding vampire, eking out a meager existence on the periphery, as a vampire.

As we have seen before, the supporting cast can make or break an episode. William Daniels -- the voice of KITT on Knight Rider (1983-1988) -- is Kolchak’s police detective foil this week, Mateo. Daniels is great at playing a slow-boil, and one can practically see the rage taking over his face, a step-at-a-time, as he contends with Kolchak’s wild theories. Kathleen Nolan is also great as Faye Krueger, a real estate agent who traveled west to pursue her dreams of wealth. In her previous life, she was a small-time journalist in North Carolina. Here, Kolchak teams up with Faye to write the article for Vincenzo that he doesn’t have time to write, but Faye sprinkles her news story with the architectural details one might expect of someone trying to sell houses.  Mateo and Faye add a lot of quirky humor to the story, and elevate “The Vampire” above its familiar monster of the week.

Perhaps the biggest disappointment in the casting is that Larry Storch only gets one scene as Kolchak’s slick friend, Swede, and doesn’t play a larger role in the overall adventure.  Storch, of course, would soon have his own supernatural investigations to handle on the Filmation Saturday morning series, The Ghost Busters (1975).

One weird note about “The Vampire:” the episode culminates with Kolchak burning a giant cross on the equivalent of the vampire’s lawn. That’s a loaded image, historically-speaking.  Though it makes a powerful visual, the story doesn’t really merit the use of such a racially-coded visual.

Next week: “The Werewolf.”

Cult-TV Blogging: Kolchak: The Night Stalker: "The Ripper" (September 13, 1974)

From May 25 to June 2^nd 1974, Chicago is terrorized by a brutal murderer of women. A stripper and masseuse are among the victims.

Idiosyncratic INS reporter Carl Kolchak (Darren McGavin) itches to investigate the ripper-style homicides, but has been tasked by his boss, Tony Vincenzo (Simon Oakland) with a different assignment. Kolchak has been ordered to fill in for the vacationing Miss Emily, and answer her “Dear Emily” letters.

Worse, a journalistic competitor, Jane Plum (Beatrice Colen) is reporting on the ripper crimes.

Kolchak disobeys Tony’s orders and begins to investigate the shadowy killer who seems to evade police (and bullet-fire) with ease. 

He soon realizes that over seventy women have been killed in the last 80 years, all over the world.  

They have all been murdered in the exact fashion of the Chicago deaths. Even more disturbingly, they trace their origin to Jack the Ripper, in London.

Oddly enough, Kolchak is able to determine the Ripper’s hide-out from a Dear Emily letter he remembers reading...

The first regular hour-long episode of Kolchak: The Night Stalker (1974 – 1975) is a bit of a disappointment, in part due to the nature of its titular monster.  

The Ripper is a shadowy figure with a cane and cape, who leaps across city roofs like a superhero, evades bullets easily, and isn’t seen to vet any bloody handiwork.  I understand that TV of the 1970’s could not show extreme -- or even moderate -- violence, but this monster comes across, at least visually, as toothless. Energetic, for certain, but toothless.  He’s a running, fighting, indestructible force, but not at all scary. He throws police men and innocent bystanders around, but is never seen to stab or cut, or or gut anyone.

Still, in some way, “The Ripper” is an important influence in TV history, not for re-telling yet another variation of the Jack the Ripper tale, but for anticipating the idea of a killer who lives for decades, and reappears in modern times after a long absence. This facet of the killer forecasts the Tooms monster-of-the-week on The X-Files (1993-2002), though both “Squeeze” and “Tooms” are, frankly, superior to “The Ripper” both in terms of writing and execution. 

In terms of a Jack the Ripper story, Kolchak: The Night Stalker,  in 1974 ,was a late comer to the party. Boris Karloff’s Thriller in 1961 (“Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper,”), The Sixth Sense in 1972 (“With Affection, Jack the Ripper”) and even Star Trek in 1967 (“Wolf in the Fold”) had already featured the murderer, and some supernatural or paranormal element.

Where “The Ripper” shines is in the arena where the series always proves remarkable, frankly: in diagramming the sleaze of the 1970’s urban government and bureaucracy. 

For lack of a better term, one might conclude that Kolchak is reckoning with “The Swamp” as he hunts his monsters, though resolutely unable to drain it. 

Instead, Kolchak must, well, negotiate the swamp.  Watching him do so, week after week, is one of the continual joys of this forty-four year-old series. In “The Ripper,” Kolchak attends a police press conference where he is stonewalled with euphemisms and lies that obfuscate the truth. Sarah Huckabee Sanders would be proud at the way that Captain Warren (Ken Lynch) manages to stand in front of a podium, and provide non-answers to every single question that the public has the right to know the answers about. He denies facts, and spins lies with the best of them. But Kolchak's skills for pushing and prodding, for needling,  are incomparable.

Many weeks on the series, we will see Kolchak bribe civil servants, flatter obsequious gatekeepers, and grapple with politicians and policemen who want to keep him -- and the people -- in the dark.  The quality that makes Kolchak (and indeed, many journalists) so admirable is the fact that he knows what his job is.  

It's reporting the truth, so people will be informed.

His duty is to follow the facts, wherever they lead.  

The spin-artists, liars, and mouthpieces for entrenched power, have forgotten that it is their job to serve the public, not their masters. “The Ripper” diagrams this aspect of Kolchak’s character, and professional life brilliantly.  He speaks truth to Power. And the Powers that be hate him for it.

I also enjoy how the series makes Kolchak a reluctant hero, when it comes to battling monsters not of human nature. Here, he scares himself while in the Ripper’s house, and shrieks with terror. Kolchak is a hero, but not a traditional one. He is brave, but also very fallible, and human. When he faces monsters, it is usually with a keen sense of not just responsibility, but terror.  There's no joy or satisfaction hunting monsters in the dark.  The satisfaction comes from discovering (and at least attempting to...) report the truth about them.

Next week, a look at perhaps the greatest episode of the series: “The Zombie.”

Kolchak Blogging: Series Intro (1974)

A horror TV cult-classic from the 1970s, Kolchak: The Night Stalker remains the great grandfather of the "monster of the week" genre in some crucial ways.  The series follows the adventures of a rumpled reporter, Carl Kolchak (Darren McGavin) as he uncovers evidence of monsters in plain sight. 

But -- because the series was produced concurrently with the Watergate Scandal that felled President Nixon -- there's a strong Man versus City Hall aspect to the series, in addition to the monsters. 

In short, Kolchak the truth-seeking journalist must not only contend with vampires, werewolves, zombies and the like, but politicians and civil servants as well, and that's a key aspect of this series.

Kolchak -- in the spirit of the era's Woodward and Bernstein -- seeks to get the truth to his readership, but is stymied by power and corruption at many turns.  

The series' opening montage is brief, but also beautifully-done.  The following montage captures very nicely Kolchak's singular -- or is it solitary? -- presence, and prepares us for the chills and thrills to come.

Kolchak: The Night Stalker's introductory montage begins, quite literally, with a whisper in the dark. Late at night, Carl enters the office of the INS, the news service he writes for, and whistles a pleasant tune.  At first, as Kolchak enters the office, his space in the frame is abbreviated or cut-off.  On both sides of him are darkness, and this is a crucial metaphor. On one side, monsters.  On the other...avaricious politicians.

After a moment, we see that we are gazing at Kolchak through a book shelf (which accounts for the blackness bracketing him...) and the camera tracks him as he pours himself a cup of coffee.

Next, a pan follows Kolchak as he moves to his desk.  He throws his hat on a rack, and it falls off.  He doesn't notice, and that's a key indicator that his mind is not exactly on what he is doing, but on bigger issues instead.

Next, Kolchak reveals his vocation as a writer or journalist to us.  

After sitting down at his desk, he gets out a blank sheet of paper, inserts it into the typewriter and begins typing.  Importantly, the montage cuts to several insert shots of the type-writer mechanism at this juncture. We see the keys clicking and other details.  

These close-up shots inform us that mechanics are indeed going to be important in the following tales.  We are going to be asking -- like Kolchak the journalist -- who, what, when, where, how and why?

The focus on the typewriter mechanism hints at the actual "mechanisms" Kolchak's reports as he assembles his impossible tales.

Next, we are introduced to our series lead, Darren McGavin.

What remains so intriguing here is that the credit with his name on it is followed up by a close-up of the typewriter keys pounding out the word "victim."  

This seems an almost subconscious indicator of further danger.  In seeking a story, Kolchak could become part of the story, and an unfortunate part as well.

The final section of Kolchak: The Night Stalker's opening montage moves purposefully from the mechanics of Kolchak's vocation to the horror vibe of the series.  to wit, Kolchak looks up from his typewriter as if he has heard something, or as if he is aware of some malevolent presence nearby.

We move quickly from his quizzical face to extreme close-up insert shots of a clock, and then a fan spinning.

There's a definite sense of building momentum here, as a kind of tension-based metronome ticks faster.  

At first, that metronome is the beat of the clacking keys.  

Then it is represented by the pace of the seconds hand on the clock.  

Finally, we are at top speed, watching the spinning blades of a fan.

Suddenly, we zoom in on Kolchak's face, and he pivots towards us, detecting out of the corner of his eyes the previously hidden terror.  

He turns towards us (and we are in the position of that unseen terror), and the image freeze-frames on his inquisitive but terrified orbs.  

As we zoom in on the freeze frame, we fade to black.  The monster is confronted.

Without ever revealing a monster, a crime scene, blood, or any other tell-tale element of the horror genre, Kolchak: The Night Stalker's opening montage (accompanied by Gil Melle's at first pleasant and then driving title composition....) reveals a man alone, in darkness, reckoning with something terrifying and, at least at first unseen.

Commendably, the entire montage plays as a representation of a journalist's life.  He or she walks alone,until a story literally seems to attack, galvanizing the attention.

Cult-TV Blogging: The Night Strangler (1973)

The TV-movie sequel to the 1971 hit The Night Stalker finds our hero, downtrodden reporter Carl Kolchak (Darren McGavin) in Seattle, Washington -- still trying to sell his incredible story about vampires in Las Vegas.

In a dingy bar one night, his former editor Tony Vincenzo hears him making his case, and -- taking pity on the guy -- hires Kolchak as a reporter at Seattle's Daily Chronicle (run by John Carradine!) Of course, (and Vincenzo knows this...) he's just asking for trouble bringing Carl Kolchak aboard.

For before long, Carl has run smack into another bizarre, perhaps even supernatural case. Several beautiful belly dancers have been murdered (strangled...) in the Pioneer Square Area of the city. A little research reveals that women have been attacked there, in that very spot, every 21 years. There were crimes in 1952, 1931, 1910, 1889 and 1868. Interestingly, the murders in 1868 took place before a massive earthquake, in a portion of the town now underground.

Kolchak's quest to find the perpetrator of these horrid crimes leads to a scientist once interviewed by Mark Twain, named Richard Malcolm (Richard Anderson). It seems this man was a Union Soldier in the Civil War and has been keeping himself alive ever since with a home-made "elixir of life" consisting of milk, meat, hair...and blood extracted from the necks of healthy women! 

Karl ventures into the old underground city to confront this nearly immortal (and clearly psychotic...) man, and ends the reign of terror once and for all. Of course, Karl gets fired for interfering with the police; and this time his editor Vincenzo gets fired too. Together, the two bickering friends drive out of Seattle together, hoping for a better future in New York.

The Night Strangler, written by the incomparable Richard Matheson, is not quite in the class of The Night Stalker, perhaps because at times it feels like a note-for-note repetition of the original TV movie, with Kolchak running up against bull-headed, CYA-type authorities (mayors, policemen, bureaucrats...) while he works to solve a supernatural case. 

What's so interesting this time is Matheson's decision to feature a scientific, rather than supernatural explanation for the crimes. The monster is still a vampire (one who strangles his victims), but one who operates via science, not biology. Seen as bookends, the two tele-movies make interesting sides of the same coin, even if the original isn't quite as good as the original.

I also love the idea of a forgotten, subterranean existing beneath a modern one. It's sort of a perfect reflection of Kolchak's world. There's the surface world which appears normal, and the night-time world of monsters.

Watching The Night Strangler, I began to crystallize the reasons I love Darren McGavin's portrayal of Kolchak so much. This reporter wears white sneakers, you may notice if you watch the telefilms and TV episodes. Not much is said about this, but these are running shoes, worn because Kolchak is always running after a story. I just love that small, little detail; that Kolchak wears the same suit and hat, but also the very shoes that help him track down interviewees during an investigation.

The Night Strangler also makes clear just what an influence Kolchak was on The X-Files. 

The story of an immortal killer, needing infusions of new life (by murder...) every twenty one years, reminded me instantly of a first season episode called "Squeeze," the first part of the Tooms saga wherein a strange serial killer needs to eat the livers of healthy humans. The idea of elongating life; of a killer coming out of shadows every few decades; and the skepticism of the police are common features between The Night Strangler and the adventures of Mulder and Scully.

I also got a real kick out of The Night Strangler's humorous finale, with Vincenzo and Kolchak hollering at each other over every little detail. Despite all the yelling, it's clear that they are best buddies. And that, quite nicely, is an element continued in the TV series.

Next week: The series retrospective begins with: "The Ripper."

Cult-TV Blogging: The Night Stalker (1971)

Kolchak: The Night Stalker, written by Richard Matheson (based on an unpublished story by Jeff Rice) originally aired in 1971. It was -- and for many years after, remained -- the highest rated TV movie of a generation.

Our journey begins in Las Vegas in the early 1970s, where down-on-his luck reporter Carl Kolchak (Darren McGavin) is working for a rag called the Daily News under the thumb of editor Tony Vincenzo.

It seems Kolchak was once one of the great journalists of the day, but he's been fired more times than you can count, and is looking for that one earth-shattering story that will catapult him back to the big time in New York City. He shares these dreams with a local prostitute, Gale Foster (Carol Lynley), but she isn't holding out much hope.

In the latter half of May, however, a series of brutal killings are uncovered in Las Vegas. Four women are found dead, their bodies drained entirely of blood. And oddly, the coroner (Larry Linville) has found saliva in their wounds, indicating that an honest-to-goodness vampire might be the culprit...

Kolchak considers this theory but runs into a brick wall erected by the mayor and Las Vegas's chief law enforcement official, Sheriff Butcher (Claude Akins). They refuse to consider Kolchak's theory, and consequently more citizens die. 

Finally, once the culprit is named -- Janos Skorzeny -- the police are unable to stop the 70 year-old man because bullets seem to have no effect on the oddly youthful assailant. 

Realizing it is up to him, Kolchak locates the vampire's house, rescues Skorzeny's latest victim, and finishes off the vampire with a well-placed stake to the heart. 

But in order to keep the story quiet, Butcher prepares to charge Kolchak with murder...unless he leaves Las Vegas for good. Kolchak does so, and also learns that Gale Foster has left town, never to be heard from again.

In this project, writer Richard Matheson provides reporter Carl Kolchak with a real and individual voice, a stirring and interesting first case, and even an unforgettable sense of humor. McGavin does the rest, playing up the role with a rat-a-tat, staccato delivery that remains unmatched to this day. Kolchak is not your typical protagonist, but rather a persistent little irritant with a nose for news, and a penchant for annoying those in power.  The story itself, about a vampire on the loose in Las Vegas, remains more interesting for what it doesn't tell you. Rather than spoon feeding audiences the background information, there's plenty here that is just mentioned in passing.

For instance, late in the story, Kolchak breaks into Skorzeny's house and finds an open traveler's crate. Inside the trunk, we see Skorzeny's disguises, and even some make-up. There's face paint, wigs, etc, and instantly (but importantly, without comment...) we get a sense of the vampire's long history, and his travels from Berlin to London to Canada to the United States (as enumerated in a police press conference.) It's just a nice little touch that acknowledges how a vampire could be immortal, and as a consequence of that life span, be well-traveled to boot.

I also admire the artistic and efficient way this TV film was shot (by director John Llewelyn Moxey). The opening shots are hand-held, on-the-spot views of a busy strip in Vegas at night, and the atmosphere is pure seventies, pure sleaze. 

As a set-up for the first vampire attack (in a dark alley...), it's just perfect how quickly and cogently a sense of atmosphere is mastered with one tool (a shaky cam) and one well-observed location (a crowded street corner.) It's an informative opening shot: the hand-held feel of the camera makes us feel tense immediately, like we're among the street walkers ourselves.

Finally, I should note that it has been about six years since I last saw this tele-film, and I was pleasantly surprised to see how well it holds up today. 

For one thing, the climactic moments of the film are much scarier and much more suspenseful than I remembered. 

Watching it this time, I noticed how the soundtrack goes almost completely silent during Kolchak's long, tense exploration of Skorzeny's house. No mood music to speak of; very few sound effects, even. The result is that the only sound I could hear during this extended sequence was my own heart beating in anticipation and fear. The sequence must have lasted a good four or five minutes, and when the music and sound effects did finally arrive (as Skorzeny returns home...) the transition from silence made the denouement all that more exciting.

One of the things that I will always love about Darren McGavin's Kolchak is the fact that though we say he's a hero, he really isn't a traditional, physical hero. As displayed here, Kolchak's great gift is that he speaks truth and common sense to power. That's a wonderful trait. But it's not exactly something that comes in handy while monster hunting. So he's vulnerable in a very sympathy-provoking way.

There's a great moment in this tele-film when Kolchak walks to his car by pitch of black nighttime. He sits down, starts driving, and then gets a sense -- just a sense -- that there's someone in the car with him. 

He stops the car, jumps out in a panic, and learns that one of his informants has fallen asleep in the back seat. He's pissed off and humiliated that he reacted in such a fashion, and we get a laugh out of his predicament. 

There's absolutely nothing heroic or grand about Kolchak's case of the creeps or jitters (and embarrassment afterwards), but boy is it human, and realistic. Again, we see Richard Matheson's sense of the human, of the ordinary, and we recognize Kolchak in ourselves.  McGavin's humorous, honest and human portrayal greatly enhances the efficacy of the blood-curdling finale. It wouldn't work half-as-well if McGavin were a more traditionally handsome, more physically "capable" kind of action-hero. 

As it is, we breathe a sigh of relief that he made it through the night! (Let alone a TV series...) Next week: The Night Strangler.

Outré Intro #6: Kolchak The Night Stalker (1974-1975)

A horror TV cult-classic from the 1970s, Kolchak: The Night Stalker remains the great grandfather of the "monster of the week" genre in some crucial ways.  The series follows the adventures of a rumpled reporter, Carl Kolchak (Darren McGavin) as he uncovers evidence of monsters in plain sight. 

But -- because the series was produced concurrently with  the Watergate Scandal that felled President Nixon -- there's a strong Man versus City Hall aspect to the series, in addition to the monsters. 

In short, Kolchak the truth-seeking journalist must not only contend with vampires, werewolves, zombies and the like, but politicians and civil servants as well, and that's a key aspect of this series.

Kolchak -- in the spirit of the era's Woodward and Bernstein -- seeks to get the truth to his readership, but is stymied by power and corruption at many turns.  

The series' opening montage is brief, but also beautifully-done.  The following montage captures very nicely Kolchak's singular -- or is it solitary? -- presence, and prepares us for the chills and thrills to come.

Kolchak: The Night Stalker's introductory montage begins, quite literally, with a whisper in the dark. Late at night, Carl enters the office of the INS, the news service he writes for, and whistles a pleasant tune.  At first, as Kolchak enters the office, his space in the frame is abbreviated or cut-off.  On both sides of him are darkness, and this is a crucial metaphor. On one side, monsters.  On the other...avaricious politicians.

After a moment, we see that we are gazing at Kolchak through a book shelf (which accounts for the blackness bracketing him...) and the camera tracks him as he pours himself a cup of coffee.

Next, a pan follows Kolchak as he moves to his desk.  He throws his hat on a rack, and it falls off.  He doesn't notice, and that's a key indicator that his mind is not exactly on what he is doing, but on bigger issues instead.

Next, Kolchak reveals his vocation as a writer or journalist to us.  

After sitting down at his desk, he gets out a blank sheet of paper, inserts it into the typewriter and begins typing.  Importantly, the montage cuts to several insert shots of the type-writer mechanism at this juncture. We see the keys clicking and other details.  

These close-up shots inform us that mechanics are indeed going to be important in the following tales.  We are going to be asking -- like Kolchak the journalist -- who, what, when, where, how and why?

The focus on the typewriter mechanism hints at the actual "mechanisms" Kolchak's reports as he assembles his impossible tales.

Next, we are introduced to our series lead, Darren McGavin.

What remains so intriguing here is that the credit with his name on it is followed up by a close-up of the typewriter keys pounding out the word "victim."  

This seems an almost subconscious indicator of further danger.  In seeking a story, Kolchak could become part of the story, and an unfortunate part as well.

The final section of Kolchak: The Night Stalker's opening montage moves purposefully from the mechanics of Kolchak's vocation to the horror vibe of the series.  to wit, Kolchak looks up from his typewriter as if he has heard something, or as if he is aware of some malevolent presence nearby.

We move quickly from his quizzical face to extreme close-up insert shots of a clock, and then a fan spinning.

There's a definite sense of building momentum here, as a kind of tension-based metronome ticks faster.  

At first, that metronome is the beat of the clacking keys.  

Then it is represented by the pace of the seconds hand on the clock.  

Finally, we are at top speed, watching the spinning blades of a fan.

Suddenly, we zoom in on Kolchak's face, and he pivots towards us, detecting out of the corner of his eyes the previously hidden terror.  

He turns towards us (and we are in the position of that unseen terror), and the image freeze-frames on his inquisitive but terrified orbs.  

As we zoom in on the freeze frame, we fade to black.  The monster is confronted.

Without ever revealing a monster, a crime scene, blood, or any other tell-tale element of the horror genre, Kolchak: The Night Stalker's opening montage (accompanied by Gil Melle's at first pleasant and then driving title composition....) reveals a man alone, in darkness, reckoning with something terrifying and, at least at first unseen.

Commendably, the entire montage plays as a representation of a journalist's life.  He or she walks alone,until a story literally seems to attack, galvanizing the attention.

Next week: The Incredible Hulk (1978 - 1981)