| TekWar | |
|---|---|
| Also known as | William Shatner's TekWar |
| Genre | Science fiction |
| Created by | William Shatner |
| Developed by | Stephen Roloff |
| Starring |
|
| Theme music composer | Warren Zevon |
| Ending theme | "Real or Not" |
| Composer(s) |
|
| Country of origin | Canada United States |
| Language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 2 |
| No. of episodes | 22 (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) |
|
| Producer(s) |
|
| Editor(s) |
|
| Location(s) | Toronto, Canada |
| Production company(s) |
|
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | |
| Picture format | 4:3 |
| Audio format | Dolby Surround |
| Original run | January 17, 1994 – February 9, 1996 |
TekWar is a North American television series, based on the TekWar novels written by William Shatner, and developed for television by Stephen Roloff. The series followed Jake Cardigan, a former police officer turned private investigator working for Cosmos, a private security firm owned and operated by Walter Bascom.
The series was broadcast in Canada on CTV and in the United States on USA Network and the Sci Fi Channel. The seires, which was a co-production between Atlantis Films and Universal Television premiered on January 17, 1994 and ended on February 9, 1996.
Contents |
Set in the year 2045, the series follows Jake Cardigan, a former police officer who lost his badge after being framed for crimes he did not commit; dealing in "Tek", an ilicit narcotic like substance, and murdering his fellow officers on a bust. Although he was sentenced to fifteen years in cryo-detainment, Jake is released after serving four years, three months and twenty seven days. Shrotly after his release Jake is contacted by Sid Gomez, his former partner from the police force. Sid is now in the private sector, working as an investigator for the large security firm Cosmos. After Sid revelas that it was Cosmos' CEO, Walter Bascom, who arranged to have Jake released early, he agrees to meet the man. At the meeting Jake agrees to go to work for Bascom as a private investigator going after Tek Lords in return for Bascom helping him clear his name.
| Character | Portrayed by | Occupation | Seasons | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | ||||
| Jake Cardigan | Greg Evigan | Private Investigator, Cosmos | Main | ||
| Sid Gomez | Eugene Clark | Private Investigator, Cosmos | Main | ||
| Centra | Catherine Blythe | Assistant to Walter Bascom | Main | ||
| Beth Kittridge | Torri Higginson | Doctor | Main | ||
| Nika | Natalie Radford | Assistant to Walter Bascom | Main | ||
| Sam Houston | Maria del Mar | Private Investigator, Cosmos | Main | ||
| Walter Bascom | William Shatner | President & CEO, Cosmos | Main | ||
| Lieutenant Winger | Maurice Dean Wint | Police Officer | Recurring | ||
| Inspector Winterguild | David Hemblen | Police Officer | Recurring | ||
| Sonny Hokori | Von Flores | Tek Lord | Recurring | ||
| Danny Cardigan | Marc Marut Christian Campbell |
Student | Recurring | ||
| Kate Cardigan | Sonja Smits | Housewife | Recurring | ||
| Benett Sands | Ray Jewers | Businessman | Recurring | ||
| Wiz | Dee McCafferty | Criminal | Recurring | ||
| Cowgirl | Lexa Doig | Hacker | Recurring | ||
| Wildside | Richard Chevolleau | Hacker | Recurring | ||
| Shelley Grout | Dana Brooks | Special Agent, GSS | Recurring | ||
| Spaz | Ernie Grunwald | Hacker | Recurring | ||
| Alessandro Rossi | David Calderisi | CEO, Rossi Enterprises | Recurring | ||
Tekwar began as a series of four television films, largely considered to be the show's first season, which originally aired from January 17, 1994 to May 9, 1994.[1][2][3] The show's second season, consisting of 18 hour-long episodes, aired between December 22, 1994 and February 9, 1996.[4]
| Season | Episodes | Originally aired | DVD release date | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Season premiere | Season finale | Region 1 (US) | Region 1 (CAN) | Region 2 | Region 4 | |||
| 1 | 4 | January 17, 1994[1][3] | May 9, 1994[3][2] | N/A | May 24, 2011[5] | N/A | N/A | |
| 2 | 18 | December 22, 1994[4] | February 9, 1996[4] | June 10, 2008[6] | April 20, 2004[7] | N/A | N/A | |
TekWar was based on the series of "Tek" novels written by William Shatner. The initial idea for the novels occurred to Shatner in the 1980s. Speaking of when he first conceived of the idea, William Shatner said "In the beginning I planned TekWar as a screenplay for myself to star in. I had this idea of putting T.J. Hooker into a futuristic milieu."[8] But it was not until the 1988 Writers Guild of America strike stalled production on Star Trek V: The Final Frontier that he had time to put pen to paper. Recalling when he started writing the "TekWar" novel Shatner said "I'd doodle with a paragraph and it would grow into two pages. Then I'd fiddle with the two pages and that would become 20 pages. Eventually the book sort of evolved by itself."[8]
While the novels followed the same general storyline of what would become the television series, the fact that the novels were set 200 years in the future almost derailed any film or television adaptation.[9] When Shatner went out to various networks and studios to pitch the idea of a TekWar project he was told that given that the series was set 200 years in the future it would simply be too expensive to produce.[9] Seemingly stalled, the solution came when Marvel Comics approached Shatner with the idea of launching a series of TekWar comic books. William Shatner sold the rights to Marvel for a comic book series under one condition: that it be set 50 years in the future rather than 200 years as was the case in the novels.[9]
Following the publication of the first TekWar comic book, Shatner was approached by a number of studios who were interested in producing a TekWar film.[10] Shatner's own production company, Lemli Productions, opted to make a deal with Atlantis Films.[10] Shortly after Shatner and Lemli Productions made the deal with Atlantis Films, veteran producer Steven Roloff was hired to develop the series for television. Roloff explained his role by saying "I was just supposed to sit around and think about how we would actually try to create the future for television on a television budget with thoese resrictions, knowing that we wouldn't be financed like Star Trek, and to put together a pitch book. So, I did that over a period of a few months and put together a pitch document which included a series of images and a kind of written description of our world. That went out and, after a little bit of wheeling and dealing, Atlantis Films struck a deal with Universal."[10]
After Lemli Productions and Atlantis Films made a deal with Universal, Shatner began to have second thoughts about the project as both studio's insisted his name be attached to the project for marketing reasons. At the time he started to think "How would it be received? If it's a failure, it's awful because my name is right there. In fact, they advertised it as William Shatner's TekWar. My God, the responsibility!"[10] Universal and Atlantis green-lit production on four two hour TV movies for the show's first season. If they proved successful an hour-long series would be commissioned to air in both Canada and the United States. Filming of the series took place at Cinevillage Studios in Toronto, Canada and on location in a number of places in Toronto ranging from Eaton Centre to Ontario Place.[11]
The four TV movies, widely considered to be the show's first season, were first broadcast in 1994 on CTV in Canada and in syndication in the United States as part of Universal Television's Action Pack.[3][4] The four TV movies were broadcast in the United States 7 – 10 days ahead of their broadcasts on CTV in Canada, with TekWar premiering in syndication on January 17, 1994 and on CTV on January 25, 1994.[1][4] TekWar proved to be a success in the ratings, with some stations in the United States reporting an increase of 44% in the ratings compared to the same timeslot in November.[12] The ratings success of the four TV movies promopted CTV and Universal to co-commission a second season consisting of eighteen hour-long episodes.[13] While the series would continue to air on CTV in Canada, Universal decided to air the series on USA Network, rather than in syndication.[3][4]
The show's second season premiered on CTV on December 22, 1994 and on the USA Network on January 7, 1995 before moving to its regular timeslot at 10pm on Monday nghts on January 9, 1995.[3][4] The season premiered strongly, scoring a 3.4 rating, which at the time was the highest rated premiere in the history of basic cable.[14] Despite this, as time went on the series saw a decline in viewership in both Canada and the United States with the season's fourth episode ("Promises To Keep") only attracting 600 000 to 700 000 viewers on CTV.[15] Ratings continued to slide over the course of the season, prompting USA Network to relocate the series to a new timeslot at 7pm on Saturday nights as of April 1, 1995.[3][16] The new timeslot did not halt the decline in the ratings and USA Network canceled the series on June 13, 1995. Due to a simulcast agreement that remains in force to this day, both CTV abd USA Network pulled the series from their respective schedules shortly after airing the season's fourteenth episode ("Forget Me Not") on July 1, 1995, leaving four episodes unaired.[3][4]
The Sci Fi Channel, a corporate sibling of USA Network, subsequently purchased the rights to rebroadcast the series and began airing the series in late 1995. In early 1996, as the Sci Fi Channel was about to begin broadcasting the four unaired episodes in the United States, CTV announced they would air the remaining episodes of TekWar. The four unaired episodes began airing on CTV and Sci Fi Channel on January 20, 1996 and concluded on CTV on February 9, 1996 and on the Sci Fi Channel on February 10, 1996.[3][4]
TekWar has received mixed to average reviews. The Los Angeles Times said of the series: "No one will confuse William Shatner's "TekWar" with serious science-fiction. With Greg Evigan as a disgraced ex-cop teaming with another ex-cop, who's black, and a female android, it's a lot like "The Mod Squad Visits Wild Palms."[17] The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette gave a negative review: "Keep the action flowing and the gizmos glowing and maybe no one will notice that your plot lacks the credibility of a politician's promise. It almost works for William Shatner, who has produced and directed the first of four telemovies based on his "TekWar" science-fiction novels."[18] Entertainment Weekly gave Tekwar a grade of "D" saying: "This is basically your average cop show in a post-20th-century setting: Dullbladerunner. In this vision of the future, your house can be invested with enough artificial intelligence to tell you when your wife left to run errands, but society still hasn't found a cure for crime: There are a lot of rotten, poorly-shaven thugs out on those mean streets. Intended to be hard-boiled, the dialogue in TekWar is instead just pitiful: When a policeman tells Jake, 'I play by the rules,' our hero snaps back, 'Then start a band.' Huh?"[19] Matt Roush of USA Today also gave a mixed review:
"TekWar, the first of several futuristic B-thrillers based on William Shatner's genre novels, suggests a cross of Wild Palms with Starsky and Hutch. The gizmos and visual shimmer rarely disguise the fact this is just a gussied-up cop show. TekWar, directed by Shatner, gets the project off to a slick and zippy start, from the moment framed cop Jake Cardigan is revived after four years in cryo-submersion. Since Jake is played by plastic hunk Greg Evigan, awake is merely a relative term."[20]
Koch International released a DVD set titled "TekWar - The Complete First Season (Volumes 1 - 5)" in Canada on April 20, 2004.[21] Despite its title, the set only contained the 18 hour-long episodes which comprise, what is largely considered to be, the show's second season.[4][21] Several years later, on June 10, 2008, Image Entertainment released a DVD set titled "TekWar" in the United States.[22] Much like the set that was released by Koch in Canada back in 2004, the set only included the 18 hour-long episodes that ran from 1994–1996 and not the four TV movies from the show's first season.[22]
In April 2010, it was announced that Alliance Home Entertainment would be releasing a DVD set in Canada titled "TekWar - The Complete Series" on July 13, 2010.[23] At the time of the announcement it was unclear whether or not the set would, for the first time, include the four TV movies from the show's first season.[23] Following the announcement from Alliance, the release was pushed back to August 10, 2010, before being delayed again to August 31, 2010 and then September 28, 2010.[24][25][26] However, despite no further announcement from Alliance, the DVD set was not released on September 28, 2010, as it had been postponed once more, with no clear release date in mind.[27] Several months later, Alliance Home Entertainment announced that the DVD set would be released on May 24, 2011.[28] The DVD set was released on the scheduled date, utilising covert art licensed from Image Entertainment, which they opted not to use on their DVD set in 2008.[29][30][31] It was later reported that Alliance's DVD release did, in fact, include the four TV movies, billed on the set as being "the original 4 part pilot."[29]
The series has yet to be released on DVD in Europe (Region 2) or Australasia (Region 4).
| DVD release | Episodes | Originally aired | DVD release date | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Region 1 (US) | Region 1 (CAN) | Region 2 | Region 4 | ||||
| TekWar - The Complete First Season | 18 | 1994–1996 | N/A | April 20, 2004[7] | N/A | N/A | |
| TekWar | 18 | 1994–1996 | June 10, 2008[6] | N/A | N/A | N/A | |
| TekWar - The Complete Series | 22 | 1994–1996 | N/A | May 24, 2011[5] | N/A | N/A | |
Universal Studios Home Entertainment and CIC Video released the TV movies, comprising the show's first season, on 4 VHS tapes in 1995 in the United Kingdom and the United States. CIC Video also released the first TV movie, TekWar, on VHS in Germany in 1995. The 18 hour-long episodes, which constitute the show's second season, were never released on VHS cassette.
| VHS release | Episodes | Originally aired | VHS release date | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United States (NTSC) | United Kingdom (PAL) | Germany (PAL) | ||||
| TekWar | 1 | January 17, 1994 | February 21, 1995[32] | June 1, 1995[33] | 1995[34] | |
| TekLords | 1 | February 14, 1994 | 1995[35] | June 1, 1995[36] | N/A | |
| TekLab | 1 | February 21, 1994 | 1995[37] | June 1, 1995[38] | N/A | |
| TekJustice | 1 | May 9, 1994 | 1995[39] | June 1, 1995[40] | N/A | |
| Country | Network | Premiere date |
|---|---|---|
| UK | Sky One | Fall 1995[41] |
| Germany | RTL Television | Fall 1995[41] |