 This is the SF Productions podcast network How can't battle of the network stars be considered a legitimate spilt from the pop culture bunker? I'm Mindy and I'm mark you can check out our audio podcast how I got my wife to read comics on iTunes or on our website SF podcast network comm as The broadcast TV industry desperately tries to hold on to their remaining viewers They are going back to tried and true formats. Yes, and that's why ABC has a prime time game show Block that's actually doing pretty well and they're cheap too, right? Right. Yeah, one of those formats is the non-athlete sports competition such as battle the network stars Returning for a summer run on ABC in late June Which I'm sure is based on the success of American Ninja Warrior on NBC. Mm-hmm So there were a group of these shows back in the mid 1970s starting with superstars Combined for ABC NBC and CBS and it premiered in 1973 Professional athletes would compete in sports other than their own Basically a way for pros to get a free holiday to Hawaii or Mexico or where ever in their off season And for weekend sport shows to have something new to broadcast and in the first season Joe Frazier nearly drowned during a swim meet because he couldn't swim. He said after oh, yeah I don't know how to swim and well by you never know to you try it The show always ended of course with the obstacle course Mm-hmm, and there were spinoffs with kids Celebrities and super teams where the world series and Super Bowl teams would compete That would be dangerous because you know, yeah, one of them got injured Yeah, and it's for one of them. It couldn't it can be the offseason for both of them really So this ran on and off through 2003 on three different networks, and it was also resurrected briefly in 2009. I don't remember that In 1976 almost anything goes premiered also on ABC teams of ordinary people from US towns would compete against each other There were silly games like pie throwing contests and an obstacle course Regis Philbin co-hosted the insanity and there was a kid spin-off on Saturday mornings and the show ran for two Seasons and then there's battle of the network stars, which also premiered on ABC in 1976 so series of specials where stars from ABC CBS and NBC remember only three networks then Would compete in various sports One person from each network would be voted as captain and make the call as to who did what sport Because each person was limited to how many sports they could do so even if you had a ringer You couldn't use them that much and you had to use everybody. Yeah now that of course that wasn't set up ahead of time Oh, no, no, no, no And of course the whole thing was just a promotion for their various TV shows Yes, and to give you an idea who who was on it the type of people on it This was the first set of teams for ABC that the the captain was Gabe Kaplan Darlene car now using who's Darlene car because most of these people if you know 70s television, you will recognize What's interesting here is once in a while that I have somebody who was like some fresh new face Who was doing a brand new show, but maybe got canceled by the time that battle the network stars was on? Linda Carter who was on the ABC version of Wonder Woman at the time Farrah Fawcett Richard Hatch Robert Hedges Ron Howard How Lyndon Penny Marshall and John Shuck Okay, the CBS team. Yes. Telly Savales. Yeah Captain right. That's co-jack ears. Yes. Okay Adrienne Barbeau Gary Berghoff Kevin Dobson Pat Harrington, Jr. Bill Macy Lee Maryweather Mackenzie Phillips Loretta Swit and Jimmy Walker. I would hate to be on a team with Jimmy NBC's team included Captain Robert Conrad Melissa Sue Anderson Karen Grassley Tim Matheson Ben Murphy Barbara Parkins. I think another one of those Joanna Pettit Kevin T tie Bobby True and Desdemond Wilson. It's interesting how many of these names as just a few of them You are still on TV today. Yeah. Yeah, but these these were like the big stars of the 1970s Yes, now each team had eye candy. Yes, Linda Carter, Adrienne Barbeau who are always in the swim meets, of course Yes, and SNL even made a parody promo called Celebrity Battle of the T's and A's The third place team would sit out the final competition a tug of war And of course there was an obstacle course in the mix the show ran for 12 years with 19 specials Howard Cosell the Dean of ABC Sports with the host the show got a brief remix in 2003 when NBC did an intermural battle among NBC properties By this point the networks weren't willing to work together Bravo tried something similar in 2005 with the battle of the network reality stars The new version will have themes like cops versus sitcoms with several of the original competitors return. Yeah Now I remember watching the show as a kid It's really the progenitor of reality TV Because captains would throw a fit sometimes after a certain event and I'm sure some of this was staged But I don't think all of it As usual the networks over did things and the format went away for quite a while quite a while Now we've talked about American Ninja Warrior Which began as sasuki in Japan in 1997 an incredibly difficult obstacle course with time rounds to start it followed by even more Difficult completion around you had to get to the end Mm-hmm most seasons end with no actual victor only one person Kazuyiko Akiyama a crab fisherman and massage therapist as ever achieved total victory The host would always treat this as a serious competition which made the show even more bizarre Yes, because you know sometimes people would come on wearing costumes or you know things like that And I was surprised to find out in my research that sasuki is still in the air. Well. I'm off to YouTube. Yeah G4 since out of business started the American version in 2007 and the show of course is now in NBC The American version in my honest opinion has been ruined by way too much up close and personal stories prior to each competitor Which is why if you're gonna watch the show definitely watch it on the DVR single Let's go to the competition. Well, you can definitely see it getting the NBC Olympics treatment Oh, yeah, I mean everybody's got to have a wonderful backstory. Yeah Competitors without a backstory tend to get edited out of the show or It may be our online for a few seconds at the start of a segment even if they win Sorry no backstory So ABC wanted in on this action they wanted in on the ninja bit, but they couldn't really do ninjas So they created wipeout in 2008 this show makes ninja warrior with the messiness of Nickelodeon's double-dare with lots of mud Plus the mocking commentary of America's funniest videos and it ran through 2014 Now in my research, I found another show that came out earlier this year on Netflix I'd never heard of called ultimate Beastmaster, which is clearly based on ninja warrior See and based on the name. I would have thought it was Yeah, yeah, I assumed it was you know, oh you're going back to doing those Beastmaster So for Sylvester Stallone Hosted and produced the 10 episode series which was shot all over the world with different local hosts Now see that would be interesting. So I'm adding that to my list on Netflix Well mark is watching that You can check out our audio podcast how I got my way three comics on iTunes or on our website Sfpodcastnetwork.com. I'm the pop culture bunker. I'm Indy. I'm Mark. Thanks for watching off to YouTube