Suppose another producer were to try to do a new Kolchak series which would be an updated version of the original, rather than a complete reconceptualization of it. Essential elements: Kolchak is a crusty reporter at a big-city newspaper. He has no love life or personal life so far as we can tell – at any rate, the show is not about his personal life. The format is episodic – every week, Kolchak investigates (and sometimes defeats) a different supernatural force or being; no episode has any particular connection to any other. (Whether he is able to actually publish any stories about his adventures is never made clear.)
Would that work? Or is the whole concept just too '70s to be updated intact?
I had no problem with the underlying episodic thread to the new series. If you actually look at the old series realistically and not through the mists of time you will see that the monster of the week formula got cheesy very quickly. In fact only the first two TV movies were any good. Where the new series fell apart is by not having Kolchak in a Kolchak series. Kolchak needs to be not only a crusty reporter. He needs to be a crusty smartass.
I didn’t see the new series but I was aware of how it differed from the original. Basically, it sounded more like an “X-Files” retread.
As for how they SHOULD have done it, it’s useless to ask that since the chances anyone would update “Kolchak” for any medium are now nil. Failure has a way of dampening people’s interest.
Anyway, that being said, if I had my way on updating “Kolchak”, it wouldn’t have been as a TV series again but as a movie. Basically, the character of Kolchak would mostly be the same: a cynical middle-aged smartass Chicago reporter. The only change I would consider making would be to have him working for either an “alternative” weekly or a Weekly World News-type tabloid. In either case, nobody would take him seriously and his bosses keep him around because he adds a little color to their publication. The supernatural stories would remain but now they’d be able to be fleshed out more and have better special effects. As for casting the new Kolchak, I think Bill Murray or the underused Michael Keaton would the bill nicely.
Still, if it had to be a TV series, I have no problem with on-going continuous storylines. However, they must not change the personality of the title character. That, to me, is where the new version apparently made its BIG mistake.
One of the big reasons that the show was a success was McGavin. Look, the show was cheesy even back when it was first on the air. McGavin could play on a number of different levels. On one level he plaid it straight, but at the same time you knew it was tongue-in-cheek. And you liked him for it because he let you in on it. The monsters were secondary.
He was an experienced actor when he took the role and definitely no pretty boy. He took that experience and used it. Yeah, Murray could definitely do it, maybe Ted Danson, possibly Keaton.
No, I don’t think an adaquate remake could be made. Look at the stuff being put out these days. A series featuring a middle-age loser who takes on the powers-that-be (and gets beaten by them) every week? Never.
:mad: