Today's HD casts classic TV in a whole new light

A few years ago I was at my friend Andrea's house watching a 1970s "Wonder Woman" episode on DVD. She had just gotten a new wall-mounted flat-screen TV -- big, like 40-some inches. I had seen the episode many times before (I had recently completed my "Superchicks" book that required a few more viewings in addition to watching the show when it originally aired). As I watched the episode now, though, I was struck by what was on the screen. Was that lint on the shoulder of Steve's uniform? I could just about tell what kind of blend that fabric was. And was that something lying on the floor behind them in the scene that a crew member should have picked up, or swept up? I was surprised by the details. It was like seeing a new version of the show. I felt like I was on the set with them, watching the shoot.

Back then it was a golden tiara; nowadays it's a piece of flexible cardstock or plastic covered in a gold-colored metallic fabric like gold lame', or maybe paint.

 

More recently I've been watching the 1979 "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century" series (which airs on MeTV and is also on Tubi) on a 43-inch Samsung QLED TV I received for Christmas. In the second-season episode "Journey to Oasis," I'm seeing the craggy knit of Dr. Goodfellow's blue cardigan as if I could reach out and touch it, maybe try it on. I'm seeing every fold of Buck's billowy, pirate-like, white puffy shirt. I'm seeing Felix Silla as an alien in a pretty bad blue mask with white hair, his eye wells showing in their gap with the rubber.

He'll always be handsome, but somehow Gil Gerard looked younger when we originally watched!

Maybe I'm a tad late to the HD party, but hey, be patient with me -- I tend to use a product until it dies, and I just had to put a chunky '90s TV (working!) out on the curb a couple weeks ago because I knew Goodwill wouldn't take it! But yeah, I have to wonder as I watch the "new" look of these old shows, if the production crews back then knew just how many details America's then-standard-definition television sets were "forgiving." Just how much they could get away with on those plastic and cardboard set pieces, along with any impromptu safety-pin / duct tape / rope / rubber-band / whatever MacGyver fixes that had to be tried between takes. I went to an exhibit of original "Star Trek" props and wardrobe a couple years ago, and yes, that captain's chair and Sulu's console looked like painted foam board. I'm thinking today's technology has issued a much greater challenge to the Hollywood prop master.

Then there's the issue of how much our consumption of television has changed in the past decade or so. The producers of the 1960s "Dark Shadows" gothic daytime soap were planning on one airing -- one and done. So they shot fast, and they made mistakes. If they had a crystal ball they might have seen all those years and years of syndication and reairings, plus the modern on-demand thing, with us viewers watching yet another "mic shadow," as the critique goes, pass by. Or a lamp toppling over in the background of the action. An actor flubbing his words again. They shot that stuff like live TV and they were out. You watch nowadays and you're like ouch, lint and crow's feet notwithstanding.

 

The more detail I see on that ring, the more I want one!

 

None of this, of course, is any deterrent to my watching these beloved classic TV shows. If anything, it could make them even more endearing, even more interesting to watch. Yes, we've come a long way in technology. So queue up the next episode of "Buck"!

Photos: "WW" shot from IMDb, "Buck" shot from NBC, "DS" shot from TVLine / Shutterstock.