Did you hear the one about the 8 million dollar TV movie -- the most expensive ever made (in part by ABC-TV) -- that no one watched? Well, they watched, but forgot all about it, soon after. Then they wracked their brains years later trying to remember the film, scouring the Internet to find it?
Well, it wasn't a tween-teen fever dream. The film is real. And it was made a lot later than you remember, because you're remembering Earth II (1971), itself another, well-made TV movie pilot (and overseas theatrical) produced by MGM-Warner Brothers for ABC-TV. So, yes, in 1990, you really did read an article about Plymouth's production in Starlog Magazine -- complete with that memory-haunting, (now, easily Googled) black and white production still of miners decked out in Alien (1979)-styled miner-space suits exiting a pressure hatch (also, the lead, here isn't Gary Lockwood, but the always likable Dale Midkiff).
Plymouth -- which debuted on Sunday, May 26, 1991 -- was a co-production between ABC-TV, Walt Disney Studios (their Touchstone PIctures arm), and Italy's Rai uno radiotelevisione. As result of Rai's involvement, Plymouth played as a theatrical feature (?) in the Eurasian marketplace. It eventually turned up on European television (in the UK in July 2001), and as a Spanish-language Argentinian VHS. After its stateside debut on ABC-TV, Plymouth replayed once more as part of ABC-TV's "The Wonderful World of Disney" that aired on Sunday nights (which ended production in 1997).
Then, Plymouth vanished from stateside television. It's never been syndicated for UHF-TV nor for the retro-channels, such as the sci-fi-centric Comet. While DVDs are in the market, they're grey market DVDr, since Plymouth has never officially been issued to VHS or DVD in the United States.
During a 1998 interview regarding the 30th anniversary of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), actor Gary Lockwood, who starred in Earth II, said he hated working on the ABC-TV project due to "its complexities." And that's the problem with Plymouth: too complex (expensive) for its own good. Lockwood, of course, was referring to Earth II's plotting -- and Plymouth has its plot complexities. So, yeah, this isn't Gerry Anderson's Space: 1999 or its predecessor, UFO: so no goofy aliens, here. But Plymouth is dangerously close to Battlestar Galactica territory via its plot and character department.
Sure, Plymouth, like Earth II, is a "hard science fiction" piece that deals with the physical and psychological challenges facing the first moon base colony that populated by the citizens of a Northwestern US mining-timber town displaced by a corporation's Chernobyl-Love Canal-styled disaster. UNIDAC, the company responsible, also operates a financially-failing helium-3 mining operation on the moon. A deal is stuck: the citizens of Plymouth, Oregon, will move to the moon and run the operation.
Plymouth completed production in 1990, remained shelved for year, and then was passed over as a series replacement. ABC-TV declined to purchase the series because, "It just didn't meet our needs." (And they probably knew another BSG flop when they saw one.)
While the production values are stellar (Lockheed served as tech advisors), and the writing (from director Lee David Zlotoff of TV's MacGyver fame) and acting are on equal: this is all too "Battlestar Galactica on the moon," with little action and too much human yakity-yak drama: e.g., a UNIDAC worker and Plymouth citizen (the town's female doctor) engage in forbidden love that lead to an outlawed pregnancy, teen-bickering love, a souped-up moon buggy prototype (no, not Brad Pitt's Ad Astra!), and the mischievous son of the town's now pregnant doctor as the series' resident "Boxey," skirting (weekly, if this went to series) security protocols, as he finds himself (and a young Joseph Gordon-Levitt) trapped in construction-mining tunnel. Oh, and a solar flair hits the moon, which increases cancer risks. You see where this is going: no space battles, no aliens. But, eventually: juvenile delinquent moon buggy racing.
If Plymouth did go to series -- as did NBC-TV's 1993 to 1996 Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea reimaging, seaQuest DSV (by producer Steven Spielberg and writer Rockne S. O'Bannon) -- it would have, in order to survive in the ratings, ditch its "hard science" trappings for aliens, etc. (and SQV brought on a talking dolphin!), which caused Roy Scheider quitting that show. Yeah, Plymouth probably would have gone "Daggit," too, for the kids, and brought on the eventual human androids kerfuffles.
Over on B&S About Movies, you can find reviews of Earth II, Space: 1999, and UFO, as part of a "Movies in Outer Space" theme week, if you're looking for those hard-to-find films to watch. You can find each review link under "Critic Reviews," here, on the IMDb.
Well, it wasn't a tween-teen fever dream. The film is real. And it was made a lot later than you remember, because you're remembering Earth II (1971), itself another, well-made TV movie pilot (and overseas theatrical) produced by MGM-Warner Brothers for ABC-TV. So, yes, in 1990, you really did read an article about Plymouth's production in Starlog Magazine -- complete with that memory-haunting, (now, easily Googled) black and white production still of miners decked out in Alien (1979)-styled miner-space suits exiting a pressure hatch (also, the lead, here isn't Gary Lockwood, but the always likable Dale Midkiff).
Plymouth -- which debuted on Sunday, May 26, 1991 -- was a co-production between ABC-TV, Walt Disney Studios (their Touchstone PIctures arm), and Italy's Rai uno radiotelevisione. As result of Rai's involvement, Plymouth played as a theatrical feature (?) in the Eurasian marketplace. It eventually turned up on European television (in the UK in July 2001), and as a Spanish-language Argentinian VHS. After its stateside debut on ABC-TV, Plymouth replayed once more as part of ABC-TV's "The Wonderful World of Disney" that aired on Sunday nights (which ended production in 1997).
Then, Plymouth vanished from stateside television. It's never been syndicated for UHF-TV nor for the retro-channels, such as the sci-fi-centric Comet. While DVDs are in the market, they're grey market DVDr, since Plymouth has never officially been issued to VHS or DVD in the United States.
During a 1998 interview regarding the 30th anniversary of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), actor Gary Lockwood, who starred in Earth II, said he hated working on the ABC-TV project due to "its complexities." And that's the problem with Plymouth: too complex (expensive) for its own good. Lockwood, of course, was referring to Earth II's plotting -- and Plymouth has its plot complexities. So, yeah, this isn't Gerry Anderson's Space: 1999 or its predecessor, UFO: so no goofy aliens, here. But Plymouth is dangerously close to Battlestar Galactica territory via its plot and character department.
Sure, Plymouth, like Earth II, is a "hard science fiction" piece that deals with the physical and psychological challenges facing the first moon base colony that populated by the citizens of a Northwestern US mining-timber town displaced by a corporation's Chernobyl-Love Canal-styled disaster. UNIDAC, the company responsible, also operates a financially-failing helium-3 mining operation on the moon. A deal is stuck: the citizens of Plymouth, Oregon, will move to the moon and run the operation.
Plymouth completed production in 1990, remained shelved for year, and then was passed over as a series replacement. ABC-TV declined to purchase the series because, "It just didn't meet our needs." (And they probably knew another BSG flop when they saw one.)
While the production values are stellar (Lockheed served as tech advisors), and the writing (from director Lee David Zlotoff of TV's MacGyver fame) and acting are on equal: this is all too "Battlestar Galactica on the moon," with little action and too much human yakity-yak drama: e.g., a UNIDAC worker and Plymouth citizen (the town's female doctor) engage in forbidden love that lead to an outlawed pregnancy, teen-bickering love, a souped-up moon buggy prototype (no, not Brad Pitt's Ad Astra!), and the mischievous son of the town's now pregnant doctor as the series' resident "Boxey," skirting (weekly, if this went to series) security protocols, as he finds himself (and a young Joseph Gordon-Levitt) trapped in construction-mining tunnel. Oh, and a solar flair hits the moon, which increases cancer risks. You see where this is going: no space battles, no aliens. But, eventually: juvenile delinquent moon buggy racing.
If Plymouth did go to series -- as did NBC-TV's 1993 to 1996 Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea reimaging, seaQuest DSV (by producer Steven Spielberg and writer Rockne S. O'Bannon) -- it would have, in order to survive in the ratings, ditch its "hard science" trappings for aliens, etc. (and SQV brought on a talking dolphin!), which caused Roy Scheider quitting that show. Yeah, Plymouth probably would have gone "Daggit," too, for the kids, and brought on the eventual human androids kerfuffles.
Over on B&S About Movies, you can find reviews of Earth II, Space: 1999, and UFO, as part of a "Movies in Outer Space" theme week, if you're looking for those hard-to-find films to watch. You can find each review link under "Critic Reviews," here, on the IMDb.