Posted by Jonathan Klotz | Published
Go to any streaming service and start scrolling. In less than a minute, you’ll be past the shows you know, the shows you heard someone talk about at three tables in the Olive Garden, and into an endless sea of streaming series you won’t believe exist.
This is not new in the broadcasting age; back in the early 2000s, that’s what it looked like on syndicated television Hercules again Xena closed. That’s why the sci-fi star of the 90s Natasha Henstridge, will always be remembered Specieshe was able to act in 2002 He-Spiesa show that was a complete joke, and not the same Everything is OKthe cast and crew knew it was a joke.
No Budget No Problem
There was nothing original about the foundation of He-Spies: Three criminals work undercover for the United States government to commute sentences. There’s Shane the fighter (Natashia Williams), DD the hacker (Kristen Miller), and Cassie the trickster (Natasha Henstridge), joined by CIA operative Jack Wilde (Carlos Jacott, the 90s “hey it’s that guy” actor). Working together, the three were able to overcome everything from a killer posing as Jack to a thug getting plastic surgery to pretend to be Cassie, and other similar plots that could be filmed without the limited budget of three sets a week.
Season 1 took advantage of the show’s obviously cheap nature with gags that included the trio’s flashbacks through a skylight, except that one window doesn’t give out, and DD is stuck to the glass. Another gag involves Cassie yelling, “Species it’s on TV!” to distract a group of young men. One of the best things, however, was the He-Spies action figures from “Three Women and a Child,” the title of which all syndicated shows must have been legally binding and included, described as “you finish it, and they encourage you to find time for it.”
One Season Hit Two Runs
He-Spies broke the fourth wall frequently, often taking aim at NBC, the network that only picked up the first four episodes before abandoning it in the wilds of sales. Cassie even raised the bills at one point, insisting that the bomb she just swallowed would kill her before they were done. And of course, the show found every possible excuse to stick the spies in skimpy clothes and tie them up, but still, those moments ended up being played as villains. At least for the first season, even the smallest nugget of entertainment available was eliminated as the production company decided that Season 2 should be a serious spy show.
Contractually bound to play 20 episodes, He-Spies Season 2 was a slow moving car crash that no one stopped to watch. The actors tried, especially Natasha Henstridge, who played late-night talk shows to continue promoting the series, including a fun with Conan O’Brien where she put her head in her hands and laughed with the audience, insisting that “it’s a really good show.” Henstridge embraced the absurd slapstick and meta humor of the first season, both of which were absent from every episode of Season 2.
Remember the next time you can’t find anything to watch that there are hundreds of programs you forgot existed that sound like they were created by a drunk AI Chatbot. At least one season, He-Spies it was incredibly fun, which is why it’s a shame it ran twice.
