Remo Williams: The Prophecy

The rating I give, is mainly out of the pleasure I feel, that Chiun finally got his dream. Not only did he make it to Hollywood, but he's a star, as well!! I'm a huge Remo fan, and while I'm happy that there was a movie release, and a series planned & pilot aired, I have to agree with most other comments. I would put a lot of blame on Dick Clark, who was involved with both projects, as producer. Both needed more story-line, to establish who Remo truly is! I don't recall much of the TV pilot, except to say I was very disappointed with the whole plot and story. Can't blame actors, when they're not given much to work with, or given better direction. If I recall, Roddy was wanted for the movie role of Chiun, as well. But, for some reason, he wasn't able to do it, so they had to get Joel (who did a very nice job!!). Hopefully, the new film in the works will stay true to the books, and they'll devote more to the story and plot.

I'm a longtime fan of The Destroyer series. I started reading the books when they first came out and have collected most of them and re-read them often.

The movie "The Adventure Begins" was a worthy effort considering that Hollywood can't leave any successful characters as they are and has to try and make everything P.C. and squeaky clean but this piece is entirely another matter.

Roddy McDowall was an excellent choice for Chiun and did his usual excellent performance. Smith was also done very well. The rest of it makes me wonder if the writers ever even bothered to look at the covers, let alone read any of the series of books this is supposed to be based on. Granted someone did glance through "The Day Remo Died" for the story line.

This is another example of the kind of lifeless writing and lack of imagination that is permeating most of television programming today. It's no wonder that "reality" shows are so common. They take no writing skill.

I remember watching this show when I was on summer vacation in Chicago; Remo gets shot by some lame assassin, is revived by Chiun rubbing on his temples, and Remo also gets to slide out of a (burning building?) on a stream of water from a fire hose. I don't remember much else, except that Remo was a pretty crappy student of Shinanju, whereas in the Destroyer novels, he was hardcore. NOBODY MISSED ANYTHING by not watching this; the pilot came out around the same time as the show pilot for Adventures in Babysitting (and a few others, I think; Weird Science, perhaps?). I figured I was the only person on th planet who liked the movie enough to take time to see the pilot on TV. Looks like there was at least two of us.

The TVM must have been shown somewhere in the US, as I have seen a very poor quality video which came from there - I don't think it's ever been shown in the UK.

The TVM picks up where the movie left off, with McDowall very obviously enjoying himself as the Korean martial arts guru. There is obvious chemistry with Meek, who has sufficient martial arts training to carry the role (I read somewhere it was McDowall who requested he be given the part). Briefly, Chen is about to return to Korea when he realizes Remo fulfills the requirements of a prophecy. His efforts to toughen his difficult pupil, however, nearly lead to disaster.

The finished effort cannot be mistaken for anything but a TVM, although it entertains.

I've never seen this. TO the best of my knowledge, it never actually got shown, and I've never been able to track down anyone who has seen it, let alone anyone who might have a copy.

Why would this be? I can tell you. I was in high school, and had read many of the Destroyer books, and seen the Remo Williams movie (incidentally, the other review in here is about THAT version, not this one, since I'm pretty sure Wilfrid Brimley was not in both), which was fun, so I was DYING to see what they'd done with this semi-pilot for a TV series.

I was poised with my finger on the button to tape the show and WHAM BANG PRESTO - it was pre-empted for a Ronald Reagan speech.

And never shown.

And I'm STILL WAITING!!!!