# All Sleestak, All The Time...

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [May 1, 2004, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002 "2004-05-01T16:06:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 20\
**Page:** 4

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**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2004, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/61 "2004-05-07T19:10:30Z")

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> [@Lemur866](#):
>
> And y’know, if it were me, I wouldn’t have gone into the Sleestak caves so often, even if the Sleestak were asleep. Cause they might, oh, I don’t know, wake up? And grab you through the cobwebs, hissing and shooting their crossbow thingies? And then you’d be dead?  
> .

What got me is that they never seemed to find a good way of predicting the Sleestak’s hibernation cycle. Enik was in the middle of a Sleestak cave. There were bits of lost technology in the caves.

I’d post more but I have to hurry. I go now to follow my best chum Harry Pots

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**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2004, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/62 "2004-05-07T19:44:54Z")

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Oh god…KORG! Wasn’t the intro narration done by Burgess Meredith?

I was just a wee lad when these shows were out, but not so wee as to miss the sleestak weaponry bore a striking resemlance to the old pencil/rubberband crossbow. Man we had great fun with all that. While the sheer agression of those dudes was terrifying, I always wondered what was so scary about a crossbow that fired with such little velocity that the bolt started to turn sideways almost immediately. Damn things looked dull as sticks and had no range.

What scared me was the creature in the pit. :eek:

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**Author:** ![Master\_Wang-Ka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/master_wang-ka/32/3325_2.png) [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2004, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/63 "2004-05-07T20:11:09Z")

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Yeah, Sleestak crossbows didn’t seem to count for much. Long range seemed to be about four feet, and effective range seemed to actually be closer to the shooter than the end of the crossbow was.

I always wondered why they bothered with the bloody things altogether. What, they didn’t have CLUBS? How much in the way of brains does it take to make a CLUB?

Hell, taking into account the length of your average Sleestak arm, clubs would have had a better range than their crossbows did!

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**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2004, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/64 "2004-05-07T20:16:14Z")

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> [@Inigo Montoya](#):
>
> Oh god…KORG! Wasn’t the intro narration done by Burgess Meredith?

Yep. I think it was illegal to do more than 3 consecutive projects in the 70s or 80s _without_ somehow involving Burgess Meredith. Korg was by Hanna Barbera rather than Kroft.

The Brothers Krofft owned the world’s [largest indoor amusement park](http://members.aol.com/interama/map.htm) for about a year in Atlanta. (It didn’t exactly flop, but it was wayyy overbudget and couldn’t meet mortgage payments.) It was mainly themed on Pufnstuff, but does anybody know if they had any LotL themed items?

Trivia: the Brothers Krofft got their starts by running a nudie puppet show called _Les Poupee de Paris_.

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**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2004, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/65 "2004-05-07T22:22:29Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> Oh, did they ever explain why they moved from the cave on the cliff with dad to the adobe ruin place with Uncle Jack? All I know is that they moved, but I can’t remember why. Probably an earthquake, I guess

Yes, the ‘greaaaaaaaatest earthquake…’ which happened in the third season opener not only knocked their father into the pylon/portal thing, it also collapsed their old cave.

My TiVo lists it as being on **5/14 & 5/15 at midnight EDT on TVLand**. The second episode is supposed to be the Confederate Soldier one!

> [@](#):
>
> Some random remembrances.
> 
> The flyswatter  
> Holly meeting her future self.  
> **Holly Don’t !**  
> Skylons  
> Light Cystals

**Holly Don’t!** God, that brought back a memory! I only ever saw that episode once, but I remember it being really cool. The one where Holly gets stuck in a weird pylon which takes her to all these bizarre places, the last one being back home on Earth (I think it was a park playground), but she doesn’t want to leave her family behind, so she stays inside.

But before that, one of the places sort of looks like Earth, and she starts to get out, but she sees “Holly Don’t” written in the dirt right outside the pylon. Later she asks her father & brother if they wrote that for her and they say no.

So who did?

Didn’t some weird, slinky-creature jump in before that? And then jump out into the ‘Holly don’t’ place? And then sort of disintegrate/explode there?

According to the IMDB a couple Star Trek people (D.C. Fontana & Walter Koenig) wrote episodes as well.

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**Author:** ![Fiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e274bd/32.png) [@Fiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiver)\
**Post date:** [May 7, 2004, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/66 "2004-05-07T23:29:50Z")

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> [@Sampiro](#):
>
> The Brothers Krofft owned the world’s [largest indoor amusement park](http://members.aol.com/interama/map.htm) for about a year in Atlanta. (It didn’t exactly flop, but it was wayyy overbudget and couldn’t meet mortgage payments.) It was mainly themed on Pufnstuff, but does anybody know if they had any LotL themed items?

Not that I remember. The park was more show-based than ride-based; in fact the only ride I can remember is the carousel with “crystal dolphins” instead of horses, which was pretty lame. I visited only once, and remember a performance by the [Rice Twins](http://www.icmi.com.au/speaker.php?speaker_id=142) and not much else.

Later, after the park had failed but before CNN set up shop, I sneaked up the (stilled) escalator one night and wandered through the abandoned park. It was pretty cool. Cooler than the working park had ever been, frankly.

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**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/67 "2004-05-08T02:44:17Z")

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Wow, check out the list of writers for the show on [this](http://www.landofthelost.com/cast.cfm) site. It includes Ben Bova, D.C. Fontana, Bill Keenan and Larry Niven, all of them fairly well known sci-fi novelists and screenwriters.

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**Author:** ![Seven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/68 "2004-05-08T02:57:50Z")

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> [@Hail Ants](#):
>
> Are you sure about this? Cause I just went to [tivo.com](http://tivo.com) to put it on my To Do list via HMO and it says Carol Burnett is on 5/14 at 9am.
> 
> Did a general guide search on the title “Land of the Lost” and didn’t come up with it either. ☹
> 
> Are you sure it isn’t just referring to PufnStuf (i.e. LOTL is in HRPnS’ description as a ‘similar program’) because that’s on later that day.

Well, it was there. It even had the show titles and descriptions. The one on the 14th was to be “chaka” -the very first LOTL.

I just checked, it’s not there anymore.

BUMMER!

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**Author:** ![Seven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/69 "2004-05-08T03:22:36Z")

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> [@Hail Ants](#):
>
> My TiVo lists it as being on **5/14 & 5/15 at midnight EDT on TVLand**. The second episode is supposed to be the Confederate Soldier one!

Does this still show up on your tivo? Both listings are gone in mine now.

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**Author:** ![Wile\_E](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c37758/32.png) [@Wile\_E](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wile_E)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/70 "2004-05-08T03:47:44Z")

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I was in my early teens and I never would admit to watching this show. I knew it was hokey but it was a guilty pleasure for me. I was (am) such a geek that I would watch anything vaguely sci-fi (and Will was rather cute, too). I never realized that so many other people watched this show! I can’t remember as many specifics as most of the other posters here, now I want to get it on dvd and watch it again.

Anytime I hear a reference to Sleestaks I feel some vindication for being such a geek and having watched this show. Was it an episode of Friends where someone accused someone else of sounding like a Sleestak? I couldn’t stop laughing after hearing that.

Also, was it just me or did anyone else think Chaka looked a bit like Clint Howard?

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**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/71 "2004-05-08T03:51:13Z")

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> [@scotandrsn](#):
>
> Why throw something else in, and WHY THE SLEESTAK? And if you’re going to have the Sleestak, why have Enik, the supra-genius fellow lost traveller from the race destined to degenerate into the Sleestak.

Ok. This post has been wrecking my work product all day. Now I’m home and I’m sorry to say that It was working me over in my 45 minute commute as well. But with the aid of the previous posts I might have an answer. Luckily, it appears we have some LOTL nerds in our midst that will be able to complete or refute this thought: It’s not a show about dinosaurs.

A Kid show about dinosaurs is OK. Slam dunk, actually. But put the sci-fi edge on it and you’ll attract a larger, older, more “cerebral” audience. Thus we have the pylons, skylons, dimensional bubble, uh, thing. One more layer is a mysterious wrecked city with subterranean devolved critters (_The Time Machine_, anyone? What were those creepies? Moorlocks?) At this point the dinosaurs are almost coincedental to this place.

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**Author:** ![Master\_Wang-Ka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/master_wang-ka/32/3325_2.png) [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/72 "2004-05-08T13:40:08Z")

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When I was a kid, I thought Chaka WAS Clint Howard; I was familiar with the actor from the old “Gentle Ben” TV show.

Didn’t find out differently until I was an adult.

And as to the Sleestak… well… why not? I mean, it seems like getting chased by dinosaurs day in and day out would get old. This way, you could have Dinosaur episodes, you could have Pakuni episodes, you could have Sleestak episodes, you could have Pylon episodes… you know, variety.

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**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/73 "2004-05-08T18:09:47Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> Holly Don’t! God, that brought back a memory! I only ever saw that episode once, but I remember it being really cool. The one where Holly gets stuck in a weird pylon which takes her to all these bizarre places, the last one being back home on Earth (I think it was a park playground), but she doesn’t want to leave her family behind, so she stays inside.
> 
> But before that, one of the places sort of looks like Earth, and she starts to get out, but she sees “Holly Don’t” written in the dirt right outside the pylon. Later she asks her father & brother if they wrote that for her and they say no.

Oh my golly! That’s practically the first thing anyone has posted on this thread that I actually remember! We used to watch LotL, but I can’t recall much of it. This brought back the strongest images.

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**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/74 "2004-05-08T18:38:48Z")

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You know, I bet they were to make serious remake of this show, with a decent budget, in prime time, for adults (who watched it as a kid), it could really be something.

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**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/75 "2004-05-08T20:44:42Z")

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> [@Tiramisu](#):
>
> Also, was it just me or did anyone else think Chaka looked a bit like Clint Howard?

Moe Howard.

If shaved Curly.

Nyak-yuk-yuk! Soitenly!

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**Author:** ![TommyTutone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c4cdca/32.png) [@TommyTutone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TommyTutone)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2004, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/76 "2004-05-08T21:26:59Z")

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> [@dangermom](#):
>
> Oh my golly! That’s practically the first thing anyone has posted on this thread that I actually remember! We used to watch LotL, but I can’t recall much of it. This brought back the strongest images.

It is funny you mention that because same here. In particular I recall her arriving at some lunar like surface and this bouncing machine approaches and then (I think) blows up in a small explosion.

Very surreal recalling this and I wish I could get the series on DVD, at least the first two seasons.

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**Author:** ![Seven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Seven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Seven)\
**Post date:** [May 9, 2004, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/77 "2004-05-09T05:17:57Z")

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> [@TommyTutone](#):
>
> It is funny you mention that because same here. In particular I recall her arriving at some lunar like surface and this bouncing machine approaches and then (I think) blows up in a small explosion.
> 
> Very surreal recalling this and I wish I could get the series on DVD, at least the first two seasons.

Every episode of the first series will be released in a 3 DVD box set which is due out in a few months.

I’m not sure about the other two seasons.

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**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\
**Post date:** [May 9, 2004, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/78 "2004-05-09T14:19:44Z")

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An old Cinefantastique magazine article about the show is available.

[http://www.linkline.com/personal/enik1138/html/cinefantastique/cine-38.htm](http://www.linkline.com/personal/enik1138/html/cinefantastique/cine-38.htm)

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**Author:** ![rackensack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@rackensack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rackensack)\
**Post date:** [May 11, 2004, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/79 "2004-05-11T02:53:39Z")

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> [@Sampiro](#):
>
> The Brothers Krofft owned the world’s [largest indoor amusement park](http://members.aol.com/interama/map.htm) for about a year in Atlanta. (It didn’t exactly flop, but it was wayyy overbudget and couldn’t meet mortgage payments.) It was mainly themed on Pufnstuff, but does anybody know if they had any LotL themed items?

No evidence of it in [this article](http://atlanta.creativeloafing.com/2003-01-15/feature.html), at any rate.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![scotandrsn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a4c791/32.png) [@scotandrsn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scotandrsn)\
**Post date:** [May 11, 2004, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/all-sleestak-all-the-time/243002/80 "2004-05-11T17:13:44Z")

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> [@rackensack](#):
>
> No evidence of it in [this article](http://atlanta.creativeloafing.com/2003-01-15/feature.html), at any rate.

Great article!

The E! True Hollywood Story of the Kroffts featured some old video footage of a walkthrough of the Pinball Ride. Looked cool.

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