The Greatest American Hero Companion: Interview with Author

It only ran for two and a half seasons from 1981 to 1983, but The greatest American hero-starring William Kat as a humble teacher who is given a super-powered suit by aliens and then promptly loses the instructions – has left an indelible mark on pop culture. You probably already have the theme song in your head (“Believe it or not, I’m walking on air…”) after reading the headline of this post.

Why has The greatest American herowhich co-starred Robert Culp as reluctant hero Ralph’s FBI liason, Bill, and Connie Sellecca as Ralph’s girlfriend and attorney, Pam – become such an enduring favorite? The greatest American hero companion, a just-released book by Patrick Jankiewicz, delves into the ABC sci-fi comedy with gusto, profiles the creative team involved, examines individual episodes and the show’s wider impact, and surfaces random trivia that even old fans of may surprise the series. It features a foreword by series star Katt; io9 gets a shout-out thanks our 2018 recap of the show’s “most ridiculous” episodes– which we wrote when we learned it the reboot starring Hannah Simone was not picked up– so it’s no secret goods fans of Ralph’s misadventures. We got on a video chat with Jankiewicz to find out more.

“[Creator Stephen J.] Cannell had some big hits [like The Rockford Files, The A-Team, and 21 Jump Street]but this is 1684458863 the most popular of all his shows, ”said the author. ‘Even he couldn’t figure it out: this is the best-selling on DVD and Blu-ray. You have to run five seasons to go into syndication, and this show didn’t even come close. It’s his only full genre show, the only sci-fi superhero show he’s ever done, and he wasn’t used to all the clichés. The network asked him to do a superhero show, and once he did, he made it [in his own style], like his other shows. It’s a show about personal responsibility, which I find very funny.”

Jankiewicz, who has also published “companion” books about it The Incredible Hulk And Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, accidentally found his next subject, although it is clearly in his wheelhouse. “It was when covid hit. It was a Saturday morning, I had coffee with my brother, flipped through the channels and we came across an episode of the series,” Jankiewicz recalled. “It was from the first season, a great episode called ‘The Best Desk Scenario’, which was based on a real killer of a real reporter, and it was really well written. Cannell’s shows have a very, very big character. [With The Greatest American Hero]they tried to do The Rockford Files with a superhero. It’s a Marvel Comics version of Rockford files. The hero is kind-hearted, but no one really knows; everyone misjudges him. Rockford is a character – you like him, you like his life, you find him interesting. And he happens to be a detective. It’s the same here: Ralph happens to be a superhero. But you love the character, you love his friends, and you love the situation. I had forgotten what a charming, funny show it was!

It’s hard to choose a favorite episode The greatest American hero‘s 45 in all, but Jankiewicz thinks one in particular stands out. “I like the pilot. I think the pilot is really, really smart; you spend about 30 minutes getting to know Ralph as a character before the aliens and everything else happens. The show is very personality driven and since you like the characters, you care about what happens to them,” Jankiewicz said. However, he also admitted that he liked the wackier, more supernatural direction the series took in its later installments. “I love when the show embraces the genre; one week he’s battling a biker gang, another week ninjas, a ghost, aliens. That’s what I like best, where you don’t know who you’ll meet week in, week out.”

As Jankiewicz points out, in 1981, Ralph was a unique character on TV — and in the landscape of superhero-focused entertainment. “One of the interesting ideas in the show is that he gets ruthlessly dumped. Even with the suit on, people don’t appreciate him. People look down on him. The whole show is a kind of marching band for the common man. He’s got this suit and it’s not making his life any better. It makes it worse! It’s very charming, but there’s a cynical edge to the show,” said the author. “It broke the rules in the superhero genre before there were even any rules. You have to remember that when the show started there were no live action superheroes going on. The Incredible Hulk was on his way out. Buck Rogers was about to be cancelled. Superheroes had gone to the movies. The year the show debuted was when we got the first one Indiana Jones, And [in 1982 we got] the second Christopher Reeve Superman. So there were no real superhero rules. If you look at the Greg Berlanti shows—Arrow, super girl, The flash– it’s all about the team around the hero. That [was never part of the] genre until it was founded by Stephen J. Cannell. Pam and Bill are his team. They know everything Ralph knows. That was a huge difference from any superhero that came before it.”

As fans will remember, a reboot – which would have replaced the Ralph character with a tequila-loving Indian American woman named Meera— almost made it to the airwaves a few years ago, but was not picked up by ABC. “I’ll be honest. I tried and tried to take a look, and they wouldn’t even cough up a script for it. William Katt didn’t even see it,” Jankiewicz said. But he hasn’t given up on that yet The greatest American hero will ever fly again. “I feel like Cannell’s daughter Tawnia [McKiernan, a veteran TV producer and director] going to make a movie out of it. It’s going to be huge, especially with the Marvel formula, where people are ready for snarky, funny… the whole show is about there being no more idealists. Ralph is the only idealist on the show. Bill and Pam are cynical and I mean they’ll help him but they think it’s aiming for windmills. The whole show is an idealist surrounded by pessimists and they try to save the world. I think there’s room for that. When [Phil] Lord and [Chris] Miller couldn’t get it going, two of the most creative – you saw what they did with it Jump street. The studio should have gotten down on their knees and begged them to do this. They should have just given these guys carte blanche, but they didn’t. By the time they wanted the property back, they had just won the Oscar for Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse … The terrible thing is, she got channel. If you look at [the Jump Street movies]they celebrate all the cheesiness of a Cannell show then they embrace it and play it out and it’s just, this should be the easiest [decision].”

You cannot end any discussion about it The greatest American hero without mentioning perhaps the greatest and most brutal superpower: the theme song, which, once heard, will stick in your head for a disturbing amount of time. “My sister called me when I was writing the book — she was editing it for me — and she’s like, ‘Damn, I can’t get that song out of my head.’ And then she said she and her family were watching Free guy with Ryan Reynolds [which used the Greatest American Hero song], and she couldn’t stop humming the theme song for the rest of the week,” Jankiewicz laughed. “But for me, that theme song kept the show alive. That song will never, ever go away. It’s not just been used as a cultural touchstone by other genre shows Seinfeld. The theme song spent longer in the top 10 than the Friends theme, which ran for 10 years. I mean, I’m surprised – it was fighting with ‘Bette Davis Eyes’ for number one song of the year!

The greatest American hero is generally available on streaming (including Peacock, Prime Videos, Freevee and YouTube); you can pick up a copy The greatest American hero companion here.

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