The Invisible Man

This must have been a wondrous new addition to 1950s Television? Made by ITC who had acquired 'Official Films' and who always managed to produce something a little different.. Its very easy to criticize this series in the 21st century, but if you look at it in the context of the time it was made, It was pretty darn clever. The special effects still look effective and It must have been difficult trying to make a show like this in television time and budget? Certainly this show's effects stand up well against the 1975 'Invisible Man' remake series which used a lot of chroma key overlay for effects and consequently the large amount of blue fuzz, made that one unconvincing.

Although I normally don't watch shows this old, I found this one to be good for the time period. The special effects were pretty good (until that episode where the invisible man was just wearing glasses) and I enjoyed the plots of each episode. The plots are pretty unique and some of them even feel like they could be their own movie. The actors were also good, even the characters who only appear once. I felt like the women were not treated any differently from the men, which was something I was kind of worried about when I started this show, given the time period it was created. Overall, I find this show to be exceptional, with memorable characters and interesting plots.

The British television series, "H. G. Wells' The Invisible Man," may have been based on the character created by Wells but had very little to do with the novel or classic James Whale film from Universal. In direct contradiction to the source material, the hero Dr. Peter Brady, was doing remarkably well as a workaholic scientist employed by the British government. He accidentally becomes invisible (fortunately for him, clothes and all) after a radiation leak interferes with his experiments on optical density and refraction. Naturally, the British authorities are suspicious of Brady, wondering what he'll do with his new-found "powers."

Brady becomes a one man Impossible Missions Force. In subsequent episodes, he's dispatched to one mythical Middle Eastern, Eastern European, or African country after another, to foil the forces of evil threatening the British Empire. Despite supposedly being a secret agent, as the series progressed, Brady's invisibility became public knowledge leading to trouble in some episodes.

The special effects were cheap and downright awful by today's standards. For the most part, the "invisibility" special effects were handled by wires holding various objects such as car keys, test tubes, guns, and the like. Scenes were frequently shot from Brady's point-of-view to limit the use of special effects. Despite these shortcomings the series eventually attracted the interests of US television networks. H.G. Wells' The Invisible Man ran for 39 half hours on the CBS network from November 4, 1958 to September 22, 1960.

Early in my infancy, Richard Greene's Robin Hood was, for me, the real, the only portrait of Robin Hood. At that time, I could not notice the budgetary constraints, especially noticeable today in the minute sets where action took place. In the same way, this 1958 Invisible Man was, for me, the true depiction of the Invisible Man: a type of superhero, always fighting for justice. I was eight years of age at the time, so I was very surprised when I learned, later, that Wells original character was not a hero, but a very troubled man.

I enjoyed the I.M. effects very much and I never spotted a wire; however, quite often, things like telephones, pens and cigarettes behaved strangely when lifted by the invisible man: they tended to somehow oscillate, a movement not to be expected from an object supposedly held by a hand (invisible or otherwise).

Nevertheless, it was good and fun. ALL 26 EPISODES ARE AVAILABLE FOR WATCHING OR DOWNLOADING at Internet Archives dot org (Classic TV Section) or at Uncle Earl's Classic TV web site. Don't miss them.

I also agree with the previous commentator that ITC, very markedly at that time, usually offered products of a superior quality. I'm an admirer of Ralph Smart (the producer of this series), who would be later responsible for the excellent and unsurpassed Danger Man (Secret Agent Man) starring Patrick McGoohan.

Rather provocatively entitled 'H. G. Wells' The Invisible Man', this was the first of two fifties television series based on fictional characters who were originally villains.

Anticipating 'The Third Man' by transforming the title character into a champion of the underdog and righter of wrongs; set against a backdrop of probably a deliberately drably rendered London finally emerging from postwar austerity our hero - his invisibility mainly suggested by wires and with optical effects largely confined to smoking a cigarette but never inhaling - to intervene to remind assorted mercenary meanies to stop their bullying ways and embrace law and order.