I watched this one faithfully during its prime time run those forty or so years ago (egad!). On our old black and white set of course. I was a senior in high school so my sole purchase of tie in merchandise was the Al Hirt album "The Horn meets the Hornet" with him and Van Williams (in costume) on the cover. As a True Believer I quickly grew tired of "Batman's" campiness, found "The Green Hornet" being played straight a welcome change, and having grown up when the memory of Radio was still very fresh in many people's minds, I had the image of Radio as this magical time that I had missed out on. There was something of a nostalgia and trivia craze in the mid 1960s, "The Green Hornet" was an attempt to cash in on that, and a well executed one too. The show had three stars, Van Williams, Bruce Lee and Black Beauty. And Wende Wagner was mighty appealing too.
I have read various version as to why it wasn't renewed, my one acquaintance who had some contact with the TV world said that studio and network executives are all too often not as clever as we think they are and they think they are, even popular shows are cancelled. And the studio's refusal to release the show on VHS-oops, DVD despite Bruce Lee's cult status is also hard to fathom.
So if you find it you will be seeing a fairly well written well acted adventure/crime fighting program with fairly high production values that IMHO has "classic" status.
I have read various version as to why it wasn't renewed, my one acquaintance who had some contact with the TV world said that studio and network executives are all too often not as clever as we think they are and they think they are, even popular shows are cancelled. And the studio's refusal to release the show on VHS-oops, DVD despite Bruce Lee's cult status is also hard to fathom.
So if you find it you will be seeing a fairly well written well acted adventure/crime fighting program with fairly high production values that IMHO has "classic" status.