Ripley's Believe It or Not!

I enjoyed just about everything in this show. The stories were great, the music was fantastic, and who can beat Jack Palance. It was Must See TV for my entire family. I really like the balance of subjects and the little small factoids before commercial breaks. Hard to find this one now, although I think the Sci-Fi channel did some reruns for awhile. The new Believe it of Not shows don't hold a candle to this one. They only show gross and disgusting stuff. How long will it take tv execs to realize we don't want to watch someone shove red hot needles in their eyes or eat live rats while we're eating dinner. Gross! Why can't they be like the original. I miss you, Ripley!

This was one of the finest show's of the early 1980's. Jack Palance was always one of the scariest actors to grace the motion picture and television screens and this show only added to this mystique. Not only was it educational, but it was fun as well and it showed what a gift Palance had for storytelling. The one segment that really showed that talent was when he related the murder of Rasputin. Not only did he tell the story, but he almost seemed to act it out and made it come alive. Of course balancing things out were his female co-hosts and the best of them was his daughter Holly. She brought a sense of normalcy to the show and really made the show informative as well as bizarre. Too bad the new version couldn't take lessons from this version. While that one seems to delight in shocking people, this version was very enjoyable to watch.

It's too bad they don't have shows like this anymore. I know there's a Ripley's show on today, but that seems to focus more on the strange human stunts like contortion-ism and pulling cinder blocks with your ear lobes. The original Ripley's talked more about History and traditions of other cultures. To me it seemed much more educational.

When this show first came on (I was about 10 years old), it kind of scared me because they showed scenes from "The Elephant Man" and "The Howling", which were brand new movies back then. I was a little squeamish with the effects from those movies, but now I love them and own those movies today. Wish I could own episodes of Ripley's, because after I got over my squeamishness, I really grew to love that show.

Jack Palance made the show. He put a real flare on his presentations that only he could pull off. I liked how he would end a sequence with "Believe it........... Or Not!". He would always put that breathless type of enthusiasm behind his narratives, so that you felt he really loved the subject matter. The female co-hosts did great jobs too. I liked his daughter Holly the best.

I can still see and hear the opening credits in my mind. This was just a quality show that you don't see too much of these days. Forget "reality TV" today, we should go back to these showcase shows like Ripley's, That's Incredible and Real People.

I wish they would bring this version of Ripley's to DVD. Not just a "Best of", but the entire series. Like I said, it was more educational and family oriented and I think we need to bring that back.

Believe it...... Or Not!

Ripley's Believe It or Not with Jack Palance was a quality show. Jack Palance would travel all over the world for his on-site introductions to show segments. It is another of the missing TV shows that belong on DVD. The first season was the best. In season two, when Holly Palance came in as co-host, the writing and production staff was cut, from the credits I saw on the shows I taped from the series. Jimmy Sangster, of Hammer Film Studio fame, was one member of the writing team in season one and part of season two, before the apparent budget cutbacks. The closing credits show the effort that went into this show, credits crammed with the names of professionals who worked on this documentary series. I have read that the budget for this show was $1.5 million per episode, a lot of money in the early 80s. All that money bought a lot of photographers, negative cutters and support staff then. The segments on the shows varied from the serious (the WW2 man who wasn't there) to the goofy (supposedly Jack Palance, in an ape suit, riding around Las Vegas in an open air convertible prior to introducing the Marquis performing chimps). ABC should reissue season one of this show on DVD.

I absolutely love this show! Jack Palance was excellent as the host! I loved it on ABC in the eighties. I last saw this show in 1997 on the SCI-FI Channel and I miss it terribly! I was able to tape many of the episodes off of TV, but I have watched them so much that they are getting worn out. Some tapes from 1984 and 1985 are literally on their last legs! I wish this 1982-1986 version of Ripley's Believe it or Not would get a release on DVD as Season Box Sets. So far, there is only the Dean Cain 2000-2004 version on DVD and it was only released in a BEST OF-style DVD. I did write to Columbia Pictures a while ago, but there has been no response. I urge Ripley's fans to write and beg for this excellent show to be released on DVD! That's my rant! Bodger1.