Review

  • I absolutely adored this TV series, which unfortunately I've not been able to find in recent years on re runs. For me it was much more entertaining than its predecessor, The Six Million Dollar Man, possibly because being female, I identified more with its heroine. Also, I agree with another comment made that Steve Austin (Six Million Dollar Man) is more a comic book figure, while Jamie is a real multi dimensional person.

    The series revolves around a lovely young lady, Jamie Sommers, who suffers severe injuries in an airplane crash and is then rebuilt with bionic legs, one arm, and an ear. This first female cyborg is then sent undercover on spy missions by the Office of Scientific Investigations (OSI), using a high school teacher front as her cover.

    Lindsay Wagner is simply perfect here, charming and endearing as Jamie Sommers. Jamie's bionic colleague, Steve Austin (played by Lee Majors) occasionally joins her on missions. However, the other star I recall best from the series is Max, the wonderful bionic German Shepherd and her frequent companion.

    Jamie uses her special bionic speed, strength, and hearing in each episode to hunt down assorted spies and mad scientists. The episodes feature lots of action adventure and surely one of the most appealing heroines in television history. Jamie is beautiful, intelligent, affable, and compassionate...vulnerable in a sense (despite her powers) but strong and resourceful. Her strength is not simply bionic but strength of character. She would make a wonderful role model for modern young female viewers. In the intervening decades, television has never come up with a female action adventure star to equal her.