Cult-TV Review: Airwolf - The Movie (1984)

From 1984 to 1986 on CBS, "the attack helicopter of the future," -- dubbed Airwolf -- flew circles against the competition, including a disastrous TV version of Dan O'Bannon's Blue Thunder (1983).

Created by Donald Bellisario (Tales of the Gold Monkey), Airwolf aired at 9:00 pm on Saturday nights, and -- at least during its first season -- featured a dark, brooding quality that distinguished it from run-of-the-mill 1980s TV action-adventure fare. Less jovial than MacGyver, less tongue-in-cheek than The A-Team, this series charted its own distinctive trajectory.

The universe of Airwolf is introduced in "Airwolf: The Movie," the two-hour pilot episode written and directed by Bellisario. A traitorous genius, Dr. Charles Henry Moffet (David Hemmings) steals the futuristic attack helicopter (a re-dressed Bell 222A) from a branch of the C.I.A. called "The Firm." Moffet takes the top-secret craft, which can exceed the speed of sound, to Libya, where he uses it under the employ of America's big enemy of the early 1980s, Colonel Mu‘ammar al-Qaḏāfī.

A high ranking official in the secretive "Firm," code-named Archangel (Alex Cord) attempts to recruit loner and pilot, Stringellow Hawke (Jan-Michael Vincent) to steal Airwolf back from Libya after Moffet uses it to destroy an American naval destroyer at sea. Hawke isn't inclined to help out at first, but the Firm steals all of his priceless art collection (gifted to him by his grandfather) as an incentive. Also, another agent, gorgeous Gabrielle (Belinda Bauer) romances Hawke, and the two fall in love.

With the help of pilot and old family friend, Dominic Santini (Ernest Borgnine), Hawke finally undertakes the mission to recover Airwolf, but in the process loses Gabrielle, whom Moffett tortures in the Libyan desert and leaves for dead.

Using Airwolf's awesome weaponry, Hawke kills Moffett and takes the chopper back to the States. But instead of turning it over to Archangel and the Firm, Stringfellow decides to hide Airwolf in an undisclosed location. He will only return the fearsome weapon of destruction to the government when the Firm reveals to Hawke everything it knows about his M.I.A. brother, St. John, who disappeared in Vietnam.

Archangel suggests that an accommodation can be reached, especially if Hawke occasionally flies important missions in the Firm's interest.

The quality that largely differentiated Airwolf, at least during its first season, from the vast majority of action series on the air at the time (like the immensely enjoyable but cartoonish A-Team), was its melancholy tone and personality. Jan-Michael Vincent portrayed a taciturn, haunted hero who clearly forecasts "the dark age" of such heroes following Tim Burton's Batman in 1989. In its original review of the series, Variety noted Hawke's "intricate background," and much of that personal history is revealed in the pilot movie.

Specifically, Stringfellow's parents died when he was twelve. The love of his life died in a car accident when he was a young adult. And his beloved brother disappeared in Vietnam during the war. And, following the action of the pilot, Gabrielle is also dead and gone. This history explains why Hawke lives the life of a hermit at his log cabin in Big Bear, keeping only a dog and a circling bald eagle as company: he believes he is cursed. Anyone who gets too close to him will die.

Introspective and cynical, Hawke spends his days playing a Stradivarius cello for the aforementioned flying eagle, a lonely serenade from one majestic creature to another, perhaps. As TV Guide's Robert MacKenzie noted, Vincent has a "glum magnetism" in the lead role of Hawke, and "can carry a scene." Indeed he can. The most emoting Vincent ever does is with his cheek muscles. They flex when he's angry. He's the show's unlikely center of gravity, unmovable and mostly unmoved by the destruction surrounding him.

A loner and a musician, Hawke was also presented on Airwolf as something of a serious, independent thinker, at least initially. In the pilot movie, he wonders if there's any real difference between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Archangel's assistant, Mariella answers that the Americans "wear white hats." Stringfellow doesn't look convinced at that distinction. During the height of the Cold War in the 1980s, Stringellow's question about the use of power (and weaponry) was rare on television, if not all together invisible.

Airwolf might have quickly proven a cold, mechanical series about a super helicopter blowing things up, but with the unconventional and downright anti-social Stringellow Hawke as its lead character, the first season boasted the sort of gravitas and humanity that today we associate with modern action characters like 24's Jack Bauer (who has faced his share of personal tragedy too.)

Alas, CBS was apparently baffled by the gloomy, serious tone and burgeoning story arc of Airwolf, and demanded "family friendly" changes for the ensuing seasons. For one thing (in the tradition of Mission: Impossible), the action would shift from foreign to domestic, hopefully to ramp-up audience interest and identification. For another thing, a possible regular love interest for Hawke was added to the series with the outgoing, spicy character of Caitlin O'Shannessy (Jean Bruce Scott). Hawke and Santini also became more willing, less-questioning agents for the Firm.

Still, even these modulations in formula looked great compared to Airwolf's final TV sortie. The series shifted from CBS to the USA Network for its fourth season, ditched Jan-Michael Vincent, and featured an all-new cast (including Barry Dillon as the missing St. John). Even Airwolf herself was MIA: the series now only featured "rerun" stock footage of the amazing chopper (culled from previous episodes). The second and third seasons might have been a corruption of the series' original adult intent, but the fourth season was an out-and-out travesty. In all, 79 episodes of Airwolf were made; 55 of them airing on CBS.

As we all realize, remakes of once-popular properties are arriving hot and heavy these days, so it's likely only a matter of time before someone takes a crack at an Airwolf feature film. While it would be nice to see the further adventures of Stringfellow Hawke, one can only hope that prospective producers recall the program's first season, and the mood of icy introspection, loneliness and melancholy that the series crafted with relative skill. Otherwise, Airwolf is just a show (or movie) about a cool helicopter...and that gets old. Fast.

Cult-TV Review: Penny Dreadful, Season One (2014)

Penny Dreadful, Season One, is all about the most terrifying monsters ever to challenge humanity. 

But if you believe that by that description I refer to Dracula, Dorian Gray, or The Frankenstein Monster, you are mistaken.  

Although the Showtime TV series, created by John Logan, involves those beings, all the series’ real monsters stem directly from human nature, from human psychology.

For instance, spiritualist Vanessa Ives (Eva Green) contends with shame over a past indiscretion and betrayal (“Closer than Sisters”). This shame literally possesses her at points, or paves the way, perhaps, for her spiritual possession (“Possession.”)

Similarly, Egyptologist Sir Malcolm Murray (Timothy Dalton) deals continually with his own guilt and vanity (“Séance”), arising from the death of his son, and the abduction of his daughter, Mina, by a vampire.

Meanwhile, young Victor Frankenstein (Harry Treadaway) deals with irresponsibility regarding his own creation or child (“Resurrection,” “Demimonde.”)

Even Ethan Chandler (Josh Hartnett) -- a gung ho American gunslinger -- grapples, at least after a fashion, with his own flaws.  In this case, the primary foible may be cowardice, since Ethan ran away from his life of wealth and privilege in America (“Night Work.”)

In Victorian England of the Pax Britannia -- the unusual but remarkable historical span that gave us both Jack the Ripper and the works of Charles Darwin -- these conflicted characters serve as our heroes while they battle the monsters imagined by Stoker, Shelley, and Wilde. 

These monsters move in and out of human society, occupying its fringes, but Ives, Murray, Frankenstein and Chandler are grounded or anchored in that society of 1891; as consumed by their personal foibles as they are by their supernatural quarry.

I am just now catching up with the final episodes of the first season as I write this review, though the second season is currently airing on Showtime. But at this stage, I can state that I admire Penny Dreadful’s dedication to character, and its central leitmotif of psychological monsters vs. literal ones. 

At first glance, one might mistakenly believe that this horror-themed series is some League of Extraordinary Gentleman-type pastiche of Victorian literary figures -- a superhero movie, essentially -- when in fact, it is the very opposite. The monsters may be mythic, but the people all possess feet of clay.

Indeed, Penny Dreadful's excavation (or perhaps I should write “exhumation”) of the central protagonists, so flawed and self-destructive, takes narrative precedence over the depiction of the famous monsters, and it is a fascinating idea.  The Frankenstein Monster (Rory Kinnear) and Dorian Gray (Reeve Carney) represent -- much as they do historically -- “othered” horror figures, derided outsiders dwelling beyond the concept of normality. In other words, their physicality or exterior qualities make them “different” and outside of the norm. They are easily pinpointed by others, and derided for their dreaded differences.

But Murray, Ives, Chandler, and Frankenstein, in contrast, showcase the societal norm as sick and faulty.  They may be beautiful to gaze upon (quite unlike Caliban, or Proteus…), but they represent an Establishment and society that is corrupt and decadent to its core, destroying itself with lust and avarice and ambition. 

The nature of the series’ protagonists creates an unusual kind of suspense or tension in the individual stories.  

In the pitched battles with the undead, for example, whether aboard plague ships or beneath opium dens, one is never quite certain if the “heroes” will succeed, or even if they will all be fighting on the same side at the same time. They are each so tortured and obsessed with their own history, we sometimes wonder if they can trust themselves and one another enough to engage the enemy.  Only one character among the protagonists seems dependable, though he remains inscrutable: Sembene (Danny Sapani).

One episode, “Possession,” deals beautifully with this very concept. Murray, Frankenstein and Chandler attempt a multi-week cure/exorcism of the possessed Vanessa Ives, and are committed to their cause. But before those weeks are over, questions of motive and secret agendas are raised. 

The result? Trust among the characters is diminished, not enhanced.  So a story that begins with the openly acknowledged need for “trust” ends instead with a retreat to separate, individual corners because of the acute recognition that at least one of the monster fighters may not be acting out of the purest or most honest motives.  

Trust gives way to bitter accusations and frissons.

And meanwhile, out in the world, the bloody carnage -- possibly a result of the vampire master, possibly a result of the human Ripper -- spreads.

The first season of Penny Dreadful consists of just nine episodes, but there are at least three obvious stand-out segments: the aforementioned “Possession,” “Resurrection,” and “Closer than Sisters.”  

“Possession,” the calm before the storm of the season finale, promises group unity, and then shatters it, delivering more personal chaos. 

“Resurrection” is a story faithful in spirit and execution to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, recounting the birth and life of the monster, here called Caliban. Much of the episode’s action occurs at the Grand Guignol Theater, and involves the Monster finding a place where he calls home, a place where he can find belonging.  

And “Closer than Sisters” is an absolutely haunting hour that reveals Vanessa’s back story. We watch her childhood and friendship with Mina develop, as well as Vanessa’s eventual betrayal, and the cost of that betrayal on her soul.

I would be remiss if I didn't point out that Penny Dreadful is also remarkably cast. Timothy Dalton is a commanding, sometimes heroic, sometimes monstrous, presence. Treadaway is perfect as Victor Frankenstein: fastidious, “bloodless” and at absolutely the right age to play Shelley’s protagonist (unlike, say, Kenneth Branagh in the 1994 film).  

Hartnett is also strong as the brash American gunslinger, yet the character and the actor both evidence surprising, buried depths, particularly in Chandler's interaction with an Irish prostitute (Billie Piper) and the seductive Dorian Gray. 

But all these characters, to one degree or another, seem to pivot off of Vanessa Ives, and Eva Green delivers a fearless, nuanced, sometimes bat-shit crazy set of performances here.  I write “fearless” because Green is, obviously, a beautiful woman, and yet she enthusiastically takes her character to some ugly places, both physically and emotionally in the first season catalog. She delivers performances of astonishing rawness in “Séance,” “Closer than Sisters” and “Possession,” in particular.  In the wrong hands, "Possession" could come off like a knock-off of The Exorcist (1973), but Green makes the story personal and individual to her character, Ives, in a way that makes it feel simultaneously fresh and terrifying.

I’ve encountered some folks online who watched Penny Dreadful and dismissed it as slow or somehow campy, though I believe both of those criticisms are off the mark.  

On the contrary, Penny Dreadful takes its time to establish the psychological “monsters” inside its monster-hunter team, and the series doesn’t so much go over-the-top as it does attempt to embody the inherent contradictions of the Victorian Age.  

Like that epoch in history, the series zooms from Reason and Enlightenment ideas (even in terms, actually, of sex) to the heights of wild Romanticism. Murray is a perfect embodiment of this conflict, himself: a man of science and reason now countenancing an exotic world of monsters and irrationality, and not quite knowing where he stands in it, or even, what he really is.  Is he a hero, or a loathsome, vain monster? 

Ives battles the same surging tides and contradictions. On the surface, she is a chaste, proper lady.  But in “Séance,” “Closer than Sisters” and “Possession” a repressed side literally bursts forth from her, longing for expression and release.

I absolutely love The Walking Dead (2010 - ) and its very contemporary zombie apocalypse, yet I must say that it is a delight to go back to the classic literary monsters and the conflicts of the Victorian Era.  

There’s a place still in the genre, today, for Frankenstein, Dracula, and the other characters of that Age;  characters that embodied, at its beginning, the inescapable contradictions of modernity.  

Penny Dreadful, a Gothic entertainment, returns us to that framework, and does so with remarkable style and complexity.

I’m looking forward to the second season…