Sheena: Queen of the Jungle

I've enjoyed the exploits of Sheena : Queen of the Jungle in all of her various incarnations over the years. I've had a ball collecting and following Sheena's adventures from the pulps, comic books, the big screen, and TV. Sheena has been entertaining us for close to 70 years now, but you sure wouldn't know it to look at her. Each time I've encountered Sheena she always looks just as beautiful and sexy as ever! I like both Tanya Roberts and Gina Lee Nolan as Sheena, but my favorite Queen of the Jungle is Irish McCalla. McCalla was absolutely perfect in the role of Sheena. I wish they would release the 1955 Sheena TV series on DVD.

Alpha Home Entertainment has several volumes of this great TV show available. There are five separate episodes on each volume. Each volume retails for @ $5.00. That is the good news. The bad news is that the video transfers are terrible. I think these episodes are in the public domain and most look like old kinoscopes as the picture is blurry and has little detail. While none of the episodes has great audio several of them have terrible audio. When I run these episodes through my sound system I have to turn the bass completely off and adjust the treble just to be able to understand the dialog. Be aware that some episodes have an audio stutter that comes and goes during the episodes. Watching these old episodes from television's infancy is fun but the buyer should beware when it comes to quality.

Excellent show, already released on DVD. There are 3 volumes. At the moment, they're only available through dvdboxoffice from Canada or eBay! I hope, they will release the show with Gena Lee Nolin also. And there should be a better treatment for the DVD version of Tanya Roberts' Sheena. I liked all three, Tanya, Gena Lee and Irish. Unfortunately I was forced to buy Irish McCalls's Sheena, because this show wasn't seen in German TV. Maybe it will never be shown here. All versions got their own uniqueness. I don't compare them, because that would be unfair due to financial issues, effects and so on. For me, all three embodiments are different visions. I like them all.

I liked the series because Sheena was much more gentle and nurturing than her Tarzan counterpart. There were morals to every one of her episodes, from liars not benefiting from their exploits, to we should all respect other people's gods. Set in Kenya, the episodes were complete in each segment. Of course, her chimpanzee side-kick "Chim" stole the show on several episodes. I actually have 8 episodes (not 5) on one DVD. These were captured from VCD/TV, but the quality is fair to good, given their age and transition from television to DVD format. Titles are: Forbidden Land; The Renegades; The Test; Magic Bag; Ganyika Kid; Elephant God; Secret of the Temple; The Lash.

Neither the 1984 movie with Tanya Roberts, nor the current TV series with Gena Lee Nolin will ever supplant the original "Sheena" TV series of 1955-56, starring pin-up model Irish McCalla as the jungle queen. McCalla's stunning beauty, along with her wide-eyed innocence and physical prowess (she did all her own stunts for the first half of the series before an accident forced a stuntman in drag to take over) made her create a credible portrayal of Sheena that is totally true to the character from the comic book, just as Lynda Carter was able to do two decades later in the "Wonder Woman" TV series. The stories which featured Sheena and hunter guide Bob Rayburn (her boyfriend in the comics, though not identified as such here) fighting assorted bad guys in the jungle are largely run of the mill stories produced on the cheap, with mostly forgettable guest stars (save the pilot show "The Renegades" which featured John Banner, later of "Hogan's Heroes" and Robert Shayne, Inspector Henderson of "Superman", as the villains) that give the series the feel of a B-movie, but it remains good fun to watch years later (about 17 of 26 episodes can be found on video). And McCalla in her leopardskin outfit, is truly a sight to behold. For most fans of the jungle girl genre, Irish McCalla *is* Sheena, and no one has ever taken her place or ever will.