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Coming together to be a great thread... https://twitter.com/PulpLibrarian/status/1338936189504598019
Masculinity-centric shows on television were changing around this time too. An umbrella program created in 1970 minced no words when it was named after the foe of the counterculture, the eponymous "MAN" who kept down the people:
The trio of programs were "Assignment Vienna," "Jigsaw," and "The Delphi Bureau," the stars of which shared one thing in common -- they were *_MENNNNN_*. The Wikipedia entry has a nice summation:
I've wanted to discuss these shows for along time, because they were an interesting and direct response to the rise of the counter-culture -- these men were rebels, sure, they did things their own way ... but FOR the status quo! The only good way!
Interestingly, the theme for the show was composed by Isaac Hayes (Shaft, etc) and went on to be a disco hit ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
If I had to choose a predecessor to these programs, while it's tempting to describe them as a response to, say, Mod Squad or the hip silliness of spy shows...
If I had to choose a predecessor to these programs, while it's tempting to describe them as a response to, say, Mod Squad or the hip silliness of spy shows...
...I'd say they were the natural outgrowth of the declining presence of the TV Western. With no physical frontier left to claim, these shows shifted their focus from the presumed authority of the pioneer times -- ranchers, settlers, who brought the law with them -- to vague cops.
Basically they traded out the shitty depictions of indigenous Americans for shitty depictions of the counter-culture (which, of course, embraced the Indigenous Rights movement and so therefore continued the racist TV Western bullshit, hooray)
