TV-movies: 1973
| Nº | Title | Directed by: | Written by: | Air date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Six Million Dollar Man "The Moon and the Desert" |
Richard Irving | Martin Caidin, Henri Simoun |
March 7, 1973 |
| When astronaut Steve Austin tests a new government plane, he is nearly killed after it malfunctions and crashes. To save him he is rebuilt using bionic parts. Having a hard time making the psychological adjustment and feeling depressed, Steve is given a government assignment in the Middle East. | ||||
| 2 | Wine, Women and War | Russ Mayberry | Glen A. Larson | October 20, 1973 |
| Steve is assigned to stop weapons dealer Findletter, who claims to have a Polaris nuclear missile for sale. Along the way, he must deal with Soviet agents Alexi and Katrina and stop Findletter's hijacking of a newly launched submarine. | ||||
| 3 | The Solid Gold Kidnapping | Russ Mayberry | Larry Alexander, Alan Caillou |
November 17, 1973 |
| Steve becomes involved in a series of kidnapping cases culminating in a demand in a billion dollar ransom delivered from Fort Knox. When the ransom is hijacked, Steve must team up with a scientist to extract the information from a dead kidnapper's brain through cell transfer technology. |
Some sources consider these movies to be part of Season 1 of the series, particularly the second and third films, which aired only a couple of months before the weekly series began. All three films were later re-edited into two-part episodes of the regular series, with additional footage added, for the purposes of network reruns and later syndication. In all three cases, the original opening credits are removed and replaced with the standard Six Million Dollar Man opening credits. In the case of "The Moon and the Desert", some of the additional footage consisted of clips from later seasons, including footage of Martin E. Brooks as Rudy Wells, even though Martin Balsam plays the character in the first telefilm, and operation footage from "The Bionic Woman" episode of season 2.
Read more about this topic: List Of The Six Million Dollar Man Episodes