VTTBS would have made a great Batman/Wild Wild West Type Series
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea
rockmail — 10 years ago(June 20, 2015 04:17 PM)
Okay, watching the episode "Blow Up" where the crew and particularly Captain Crane allow the impaired Admiral Nelson absolute free reign to give any commands no matter how insane, I can see how the show became just a kids show.
The writing is juvenile beyond belief, with zero understanding of chain of command or what the term "mutiny" even actually means. The plot is simply this: Make the admiral mental, let him try to destroy everything in sight, and have everyone else eventually fight him when it's nearly too late to save anything.
But not all is lost. I began laughing uproariously as this episode progressed. Even though played totally seriously, the content of the script makes it impossible to not be an outright parody of an adventure show.
So I think it would have been cool to just let loose and go over the top with the show. They already had dozens of fictional monsters, impossible aliens, and sci fi gadgets, so why not go all the way and have an ongoing ensemble of guest villians?
The Voyage crew was stuck in their submarine just as surely as Batman and Robin were stuck in Gotham City and their Batcave, so why not adopt some of the same gimmicks?
It would have been great to see some of the great character actors of the day as repeating villians, even goofier traps and weapons, and ultra campy dialogue with loads of double entendre for the adults.
I know Batman was doomed to three seasons by its format, but Wild Wild West lasted four years, and VTTBS could have done 2-3 serious years and then shifted over to 3-4 years of camp.
It's not like the critics would have complained, and the kids audience wouldn't know the difference.
Of course Voyage didn't have a historical movie and comic book canon to pull characters from, but neither did Wild Wild West.
Maybe a future show will attempt this one day - I know the short format animated series Sealab 2021 touched on it, but live action would be a hoot.