Out of This World: Mosquito Man, the Motion Picture

Burt Reynolds

Out of This World: Mosquito Man, the Motion Picture
Syndicated
February 20, 1988
Sitcom
VHS
C+

Mayor Kyle was once the star of the TV show Mosquito Man, which looks like '50s Superman but has a theme that's more '60s Batman.  He's excited that his old series is going to be made into a movie, until he finds out that he's being replaced by "Mosquito Woman."  The cheap trappings of the movie studio make this look like it's a straight to video production anyway.  This episode is corny and hokey even by OoTW standards, yet it is somewhat likable.  Note that we actually hear Troy on the cubic communication device, although, if I remember correctly, he can only hear his daughter (because she's part alien), which makes for odd three-sided conversations when his wife Donna joins in.

This episode features a couple of Evie's friends who were semi-regulars and therefore not on the episode we watched before:  Chris Fuller (Steve Burton) and Lindsay Selkirk (Christina Nigra).  Also, the recurring character of Buzz (played by Buzz Belmondo) appears briefly.  Jonathan Schmock and James Vallely, who play Brad and Greg, were a comedy team, mostly as writers, although I recognize them from the sitcom Double Trouble.  Uncle Beano is absent but mentioned.  Bob Claver, who directed sixty-two episodes of this series, but not the one about Beano's diet clinic, also did a couple for The Bob Newhart Show, twenty for Welcome Back, Kotter, and fifteen for Mork & Mindy.