Sci-Fi Storm

Actor Richard Anderson, best known as the head of a secret government organization who oversaw The Six Million Dollar Man and The Bionic Woman, passed away yesterday at the age of 91 at his home in Beverly Hills.

Anderson rose to prominence when he was cast in the 1957 film Paths To Glory by Stanley Kubrick, a year after a smaller role but in the genre classic Forbidden Planet as Chief Engineer Quinn. A character actor who often presented as an authority figure, he played a number of military roles. But it was in 1973 in a series of TV movies and later a series on ABC about an astronaut rebuild with bionic parts after a crash where he became ingrained in our memories. That series then had a spinoff in The Bionic Woman, in which Anderson reprised his role on both series simultaneously. When The Bionic Woman shifted networks to NBC, he was the first actor to play the same role simultaneously on two different networks.

When both series ended in 1978, he was reappear in the role in a series of TV movies through 1994, after which he was largely retired.

Michelle Ryan (Bionic Woman, Jekyll, Doctor Who “Planet of the Dead”) has signed on to star with Harry Treadaway (City of Ember) and Honor Blackman (The Avengers, Goldfinger) for a British zombiepocalypse comedy movie called Cockneys vs. Zombies.

A little old, a little new: for those waiting for old standards, the original [sfs=1042]Bionic Woman: Season One[/sfs] will be released on DVD on October 19th. For the new visitors, the first season of V is available on both [sfs=1043]Blu-ray[/sfs] and [sfs=1044]DVD[/sfs] on November 2nd. And don’t forget to check our Sci-Fi TV Store for the original V or the new Bionic Woman, both available now!