Quick, what’s your favorite episode of The Fall Guy? What, can’t think of which to name offhand? Okay, well at least tell me your favorite character. There were 113 episodes! That’s gotta be easy, right?
Oh, wait, what’s that? You’ve never seen The Fall Guy? How the hell is that possible?!*
Alright, actually, yeah, that makes total sense…
This week sees Universal’s release of the new movie The Fall Guy (review), a big action-comedy spectacle from director David Leitch (Deadpool 2, Bullet Train) starring Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt. It’s based, at least in theory, on the 1981-1986 TV series of the same name, which ran for five seasons and those aforementioned 113 episodes. But The Fall Guy is not a show that has maintained any sort of notable popularity over the years. There are no big retrospectives, it’s had no streaming presence, it hasn’t been meme fodder, there are no out-of-context TikToks using a funny clip from it. It once was popular, sure, but that time was long ago.
Of course, just because people don’t remember something doesn’t mean it has no value, not to mention a good concept remains a good concept. So sure, why not remake The Fall Guy in 2024 and update the story to the modern era? Except the movie version is really not a remake at all. I’m old enough to have actually watched a ton of Fall Guy as a kid, though it’s been so long that I couldn’t recall many specifics of the show beyond its epic theme song. After seeing the silly yet likable new movie, I revisited the show and confirmed what I figured, which is this is pretty much a remake in name only.
The two versions of The Fall Guy share the following in common: They’re about a Hollywood stuntman named Colt Seavers and there is a character named Jody. And that’s pretty much it. The TV series positioned Colt (Lee Majors) as a tough and confident stuntman who moonlights as a bounty hunter, using his stunt skills to help capture his prey each week. The movie is about a funny stuntman (Gosling) asked by a producer to find the missing movie star he’s doubling, who then ends up encountering a larger criminal conspiracy while trying to rekindle the romantic relationship he once had with film director Jody (Blunt). There’s truly no commonality to the show and the film in terms of storyline, tone, or how Colt is portrayed as a character, except in the very broadest sense that they both feature a “stuntman who encounters crime.” So why is this The Fall Guy at all? Why not just call the film (and the lead character) something different and tell your own stuntman story?
The two versions of The Fall Guy share the following: They’re about a Hollywood stuntman named Colt Seavers and there is a character named Jody. And that’s pretty much it.
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Movies based on TV shows are nothing new, though things really escalated in the 1990s, as everything from The Brady Bunch to The Beverly Hillbillies to Lost in Space got their turn on the big screen, with wildly varied results in both quality and box office. Studios love safe bets, and the belief was that since these were proven successes on TV, well then obviously they could be a success in theaters too. But it was clear that at a certain point not much attention was given to just what was being adapted and why it was being adapted, which is why we got something like the 1994 bomb Car 54, Where Are You?, based on the 1961 comedy series of the same name, despite the fact that there was no big lingering fanbase for Car 54 or awareness for it from almost anyone born post-1970 beyond perhaps a tiny glimmer of title recognition.
And yet, IP and the idea/hope of something being pre-sold to an audience is still seen as the almighty, which is why there’s been a Fall Guy movie in development for 14 years and yet the end result doesn’t seem to be about The Fall Guy at all. But hey, it’s got that title! Comparing the film to the series, screenwriter Drew Pearce acknowledged the disparity, saying “it takes the idea of a stuntman as the jumping off point” and that they mostly wanted to echo the show’s look at the unsung hero that is a stuntman. Which is admirable, but again, why not just… make a different story where a stuntman is the hero? If Cliff Booth can help stop the Manson killings, than we can meet Ryan Gosling as Joey Stunts, the endearingly silly stuntman. (Maybe workshop that character name.)
What’s funny is that when this specific movie was first announced with Leitch, Pearce, and Gosling attached, it was described as “Untitled Stuntman Drama.” Somewhere along the line, the tone went from drama to comedy and the film went from an untitled original to becoming The Fall Guy, likely because the studio felt there was at least some pre-sold audience with that title, albeit a notably older one at this point. As someone with a modicum of actual nostalgia for The Fall Guy, was I happy to hear that familiar theme song play over the closing credits? Of course! But the miniscule ties and nods the movie has to the TV show feel completely arbitrary and perfunctory - which is probably why they’re almost all saved for those closing credits. Meanwhile, for the few Fall Guy superfans/purists out there, it’s likely the movie will be a frustrating experience given how different it is. Why is Colt Seavers so bumbling?! Why is he not a professional bounty hunter?! Why is this Jody not a fellow stuntperson?!
It remains to be seen if The Fall Guy will be a hit, but it certainly has strong selling points, from its charismatic leads to its amusing goofiness, meta moments, and fun action setpieces. But I promise, Universal, you could have done it with a different title too and you would have had the same results. You just would have needed a new theme song.
*Yes, we see you, people who actually have watched The Fall Guy TV show. We freely acknowledge that you exist as well.
