Night Man

Well, I tuned in to see something very funny and was not disappointed. I laughed till my cheeks were numb and I nearly went into a catatonic state. Only then did I slowly realise that this was supposed to be a serious sci-fi drama! Silly me! The plot was pathetic but what really made my laugh was the costumes! Why it was ever made is a mystery to me.

I will not hold the producers of this series accountable for the drastic changes made to the character of The Night Man. In the comic books all he has is the one power, and though it is a really cool power, it is not extremely valuable on its own. The plot line of a first season episode actually revolves around this somewhat humbling fact. Because of this, The Night Man is not what you might call "made for TV", so I think some changes had to be made so that his character would look good in a Fantasy/SciFi/action genre. On a syndicated budget, this is a very tall order, yielding the cheesy results that have been mentioned in other posts. As far as the acting, it may not have been award-winning, but neither was it career-killing, and the music was excellent, thanks to Marc Bonilla. The writers did do a poor job with continuity, and some of the dialog seems a bit forced, but that just makes it even cheesier and thus much more enjoyable if you are in the mood for it. Syndicated TV series have, for a long time, been providing cheap thrills and guilty pleasures. At this, The Night Man series excels, making it a show well worth watching.

The Chrysler Prowler looks great. I considered buying one, and our local dealership managed to get one. It was a beautiful if impractical car. It wasn't balanced right so taking curves was a little tricky. And getting out of it, that really took effort. It was more of a collector's item than anything. Basically this series is like the car, it has some very pretty people and great scenes in San Francisco but it too is a sort of collectors item.

I figure Earl Holliman was hired to give the series some gravitas, and he was the only real actor in the series. The premise should be a warning to potential viewers, Johnny Domino (Matt McColm) is the son of retired cop Frank Dominus (Holliman) is riding a streetcar when he is struck by lightening and develops certain powers, one allows him to hear what people are thinking. Provided with a super suit, one developed to make American soldiers close to invincible, Johnny Domino becomes crime-fighting hero NightMan.

There aren't many "actors" is this series so don't look for compelling performances unless you like seeing a shirtless Matt McColm. He's a 90s version of Clint Walker, remember Cheyenne? Basically, this is a mindless show but if you can't sleep but enjoy munching popcorn while having a beer, then you can watch this knowing if you fall asleep, you haven't missed anything in this fluffernutter attempt at sci-fi.

I much prefer his master, Day Man, champion of the sun. He is after all a master of karate and friendship for everyone. But I like Night Man's codpiece and his mask is neat.

To all those superheros out there, I ask you this: "Can you play the saxophone and fight crime all in one day?" Director Nick Daniel brings a fresh new look to an overplayed theme of superheroes. Using his sheer brilliance, Daniel created the character Jonny Domino, aka Nightman, who is an amazing saxophone player but is "tuned to the frequency of evil." Domino is able to hear the plans of criminals, so he built a crime fighting suit that makes him look like a cross between Robocop and the Pumaman. I love this show but because it is only showed after 12am, I hardly get to watch it. I give this show a 10!