Controle Remoto

As a brat raised in LA during the mid 60s, I was mad about UNCLE, I Spy, The Avengers, THE Cat, all the good old TV spy and action shows. Returning to Japan in '68 was a big culture change, especially the dull and boring TV shows (not much change in 2006, even worse). It was around '73 that one of the network here aired 5 or 6 episodes of Search. It was called Purobu Sousa Shirei (Probe Criminal Investigations Command). It was dubbed in Japanese (no bilingual TV at that time), and I can't remember any story, but the brilliant titleback and the superb theme music is something that I wish to see and hear again. One scene I recall is a bird's eye view of an orange Nissan Z car driven by one of the Probe agent. I thought it was so cool! Oh, and did I mention Angel Tompkins, she was so beautiful! It seems difficult to see this series even in the USA now, but I am sure that there are thousands of "hidden Search fans" in the world. I will definitely buy the whole series if sold on DVD.

As I recall, this show wasn't given a chance. I know that in the San Francisco Bay Area it was preempted 5 times ( ! ) in it's original run, including for 2 shows on the energy crisis !!

I loved the show, but the best episodes were the one's with Hugh O'Brien and I can still hear Burgess Meredith going practically insane and yelling " Lockwood ! Do you copy ! " and Lockwood ignoring him.

The episodes with Doug McClure, and Franciosa weren't as good.

I had a terrible crush on Angel Tompkins, too.

A guy in Palos Verdes Peninsula was selling copies of the Probe scanner. Wish I still had one but I lost it.

George Senda Martinez, Ca

Whilst the premise of "Search" was interesting, indeed somewhat foreshadowing "The Six Million Dollar Man" by a couple of years, i.e., people with bio-electronic enhancements, the very premise of it limited the show to running out of steam, ultimately. After all, how many things can you search for? Jewels, people, renegade SEARCH-systems scientists, etcetera? Eventually the plot becomes formula, which becomes dull. If they could have done more character development, or given the cast a better chance to act off each other, it might have lasted longer. Still, what was done was done well, until it got boring. Wouldn't mind seeing it in reruns again, though no doubt some things would seem somewhat dated, over thirty years later. Still, it is nice to remember when this show was "cool."

"Search" is a series that failed to find its audience mainly because most of that audience was already in bed (time slot 9 or 10 PM on a school night; it was the first series I got to stay up late for!). It's also a series that could not have existed before the world watched Neil Armstrong set foot on the Moon, since the concept of a room full of specialists monitoring and assisting the agent is, of course, based on the room full of specialists in Houston who monitor and assist our astronauts.

Note that Bob Justman (of Star Trek fame) was involved; undoubtedly it was because of Star Trek's influence that the aforementioned room full of specialists included African-Americans, Asian-Americans and women.

All in all, it's a shame it didn't catch on, but then again, most of the audience had to be in bed early on school nights. Incidentally, the pilot film used to show up on local stations every year or so, though not for quite a few years.

This was one of the great shows that didn't last.

The teamwork shown by the group working behind the scenes was perhaps too "upbeat" for people. You didn't watch the show expecting the good guys to fail, but instead tried to guess which specialist or gadget would get them out of a jam this time.

I don't remember how good the writing and dialog was, but I clearly remember Burgess Meredith's character as a very compelling influence in the "control room". I would love this show to return to the air or come out on DVD, but I suppose it has been gone for so long that any chance of that happening is pretty low.

In any case, it is good to see the show immortalized to some extent by being listed properly here (I searched for "Search" a long time ago and couldn't find it).