Before there were Heroes, we had Misfits of Science

Wednesday, May 9, 2007

Misfits of Science was superhero television series that was on from 1985 to 1986. Sure we had had Spider-Man, Batman, Captain America, Wonder Woman, Incredible Hulk, and Superman on the big screen in previous years. Then there was a huge gap period.

The Greatest American Hero came out and was the most popular, but my personal favorite was Misfits. I guess I just like the ensemble of powers.

Dr. Billy Hayes was a scientist and leader of the team, although he had no powers at all. His friend Dr. Elvin “El” Lincoln (Kevin Peter Hall) gave himself injections and was able to shrink to be pocket sized.

My favorite was Johnny Bukowski, a.k.a. Johnny B. (Mark Thomas Miller) who had been in an accident and had the power to shoot lightning and use some limited superspeed. Gloria Dinallo (Courteney Cox) was a telekinetic similar to Jean Grey from the X-men.

It sometimes airs on the SciFi Network, but as far as I know…hasn’t come out on dvd yet.

Oh, and did you know that Tim Kring, executive producer of Heroes actually has credit for writing an episode of Misfits? It’s almost like Misfits is the precursor for Heroes. He also has a writing credit for Knight Rider, which was the first script he ever sold.

See the intro video after the jump.