The year is 1979 and I am a goofy little kid who seemingly has become addicted to science-fiction and horror movies and TV shows. The location is Philadelphia and the station is Channel 17…the Great Entertainer…In the late 1970’s this station was home to Ultraman, the animated Hercules program, King Kong cartoons and, of course, one of the weirder TV adventure programs VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA! This was an oddball program because it mixed adventure with weird monsters and it was quite the surreal program on local syndication. This seemed odd in the 1970’s and that is why the program died in syndication despite having a strong 4 year network run. The once serious program changed its tune to silly fantasy after two seasons due to the escalation of the Vietnam War and its affect on audiences….they wanted to see more escapist fare. This worked well in the 1960’s, but in the 1970’s and 1980’s…audiences rejected the concept. This was similar to the situation with the Six Million Dollar Man as the program died in syndication while the more serious Bionic Woman did much better.

Getting back to 1979 I was a little kid and I remember sitting in the kitchen watching a Voyage episode that really stuck out in my mind. The episode started out with Captain Crane and the Admiral sitting in the “driver’s seat” of the Flying Sub and behind them was an…..Egyptian Sarcophagus! While their backs were turns and they were having an innocuous conversation…the sarcophagus opens and a MUMMY’S ARM slinks out! Whoa! Does this mean that the Mummy from all those Saturday afternoon horror shows was making an appearance? You bet. This crazy episode…while on the surface would seem to be a potentially idiotic episode ala The Werewolf episode…was actually outstanding thanks to the solid writing of William Welch and this is one of the reasons that the episode stands out in my mind even after so many years have passed since I first viewed it. Yes, I did catch it on video tape in the early 1990’s as I had a copy of the Sci-Fi channel airing…but it wasn’t until yesterday when I watched the uncut DVD release of the episode that I realized how solid this particular strange episode was…CONTINUED.