The 80's educational epic: Tomes & Talismans

 

It was around 1993 in my 5^th grade where little Robbee Thomas (or then known as Robert H, I had a different last name at the time) when we would go to the library once a week. Back in the day and I’m unsure if it’s the same these days, but you would go to Gym and Music once or twice a week, and the library once a week. Personally, I found the librarians making us sit down and to read to us rather boring. But for thirteen weeks straight, we got to watch this interesting show called Tomes and Talismans.

                T&T was some made for PBS show about the great use of the library, with emphasis of the Dewey Decimal System. Before the internet was popular, all libraries would have a shelf filled with cards in the order of numbers to show book info and where one could find that particular book. Nowadays, you can fit all that Dewey Decimal System info on a little 8GB SD Card, or 16GB? Could somebody tell me how much the whole DDS for a medium-sized library’s info could fit into one of these cards?

                So T&T, sci-fi apocalyptic educational ‘sitcom’ starts in the year 2123 (but somehow it looks more like 1986, the year T&T was released) where we learn that extraterrestrial aliens known as the Wipers are responsible for destroying communication equipment and also all books, therefore having human beings transport out of Earth and to some galaxy, happily surrendering Earth to these Wipers. So, the show starts with the last humans trying to finish off the underground library (which if you watch this, you can notice a hallway that shows some kind of natural light) before they float on to the galaxy. If I remember correctly, the main character conveniently named Ms. Bookhart and three employees are watching the news (which looks like a crappy public access program that nobody really watches) with the newsman warning all people of Earth to get the hell out, this follows by the Wipers interrupting and kicking the newsman’s ass. The Wipers are rather comical because we are told at the beginning of the show that they are aliens trying to cause the end of the world, but obviously the funds of this PBS show are very limited, the Wipers are vicious rednecks causing some havoc in a PG-rated matter, with the dark space pad sound of the keyboard punching it up (I made this kind of music back in 04-06 before and tried to sell it to a b-movie company… epic fail in my part).

                The library is almost finished but an important book is missing, The History of the Wipers III, written by somebody locally. Ms. Bookhart and the three characters are reminded again that they need to get the motherfuck out of Earth very soon by the newsman who is a victim to these evil aliens (or drunken bad actors from the south) actions. Ms. Bookhart emphasis that this book is needed in the underground library and decides to head over to the authors house to get a copy, thus the other three head to the transport and try to stall there exit, but fail and become one of the last to head to the galaxy, leaving Ms. Bookhart as perhaps last human on Earth.

                Ms. Bookhart (not known that she’s pretty much screwed now) drives in a 60’s crapper bookmobile and radios for assistance (wait, are we in 2123 or 1986?) with no one at the other end, but eventually gets to the authors house who has gone bat shit insane and seems to be out of it. Bookhart does find the copy and needs to get out due to Wipers nearby. She drives around in the bookmobile for a bit until it finally dies. While trying to do some maintenance; suddenly, a ghost-like being appears in front of her that does sorta look like Barack Obama. If I saw this, I’d shit my pants and beg for my mom and my aunt (which we are in not-so-good terms as of now) I can just imagine me: “I’m so sorry, I’ll give my aunt a hug and kiss from now on, j-just please go away, you’re scaring me!” This ghost is known as ‘The Universal Being’ and with a strange voice, he sprinkles some dust on Ms. Bookhart and tells her she will sleep for 100 years without the inconvenience of aging.  

Augh shit!

 



                The start of the 2^nd episode tells us that in 2221, a group of folks known as The Users had made a communications base to Earth. And for the next two years, progress is rather limited. The Users (who are mostly children with a few senior citizens as the high-ranking officers, wearing goofy orange suits) are trying to obtain info about the planet Earth and are looking at the difference between a book and a computer. This leads them to head outside to find more books. The four users who perhaps look like twelve-year-olds with the leader appearing to be in his late teens had stumbled upon the dead bookmobile and find a sleeping (or metabolizing) Ms. Bookhart.

The Users

Before the Users could do anything, the same asshole who had knocked her out a hundred years previously (or as the Users call them 100 ‘star cycles’) appears and has a nice convo with them while giving them some valuable info, and giving me the honest interest to drop acid. Judging by his voice, this guy who played this ghost is probably the voiceover that starts each episode of telling the viewers what happen previously with the highly-synthesized T&T theme. Eventually, Ms. Bookhart wakes up just before some Wipers show up, then we see the dark teaser saying ‘to be continued…’ It does this teaser deal for the first twelve episodes of the show, until (WARNING SPOILER ALERT: Ms. Bookhart and the Users destroy the Wipers).

Going beyond episode three is something I won’t be doing. I personally don’t want to watch each episode and give you a play-by-play: “Ms. Bookhart and Col. Horton are going through the computer and shooting info about the underground library!” So, since I’ve spoiled two episodes and the ending, I’ll let you take a look:

 

Otherwise, like I said, T&T (when saying that out loud is TNT… dynomite!) at the time was more interesting than opposed to the librarians reading us a book and boring us to death. Next for me to fall asleep and get a phone call home from school telling my aunt (since I was living with her at the time) that I was caught falling asleep. Next to get home and hear her say, “You been sleeping during class? I’m gonna beat your ass with the belt!”

Ahh, the good ole’ days. I do miss 1993, I was a little 11-year-old dork trying to be cool by getting into grunge music. And my aunt and uncle won’t hesitate in smacking me around when I acted up, this also includes me doing a Beavis and Butthead impression that year.

While we are at it, another thing I hated is after watching a movie in school is when they turned the lights on and the teacher says, “Now, what did we learn about the movie?” I was never interested in discussing the movie. I do remember a time when no one in class was giving out any feedback and she picked me at random. I just said “well, I don’t know.” Which truly meant, “I don’t want to be quizzed about the movie.” That didn’t go well.

Anyways, as you may know, a Youtube user named emjameson had put all episodes of T&T which a few include the starting countdown reel. I suppose he or she didn’t give a shit to edit that out, but then again, I kinda liked hearing that boop…boop…boop, and even a man with a heavy southern accent stating the info on the screen just before it. Tomes and Talismans was made by Mississippi’s Public Broadcasting which would perhaps explain the silliness of the Wipers.

I'm gonna have nightmares tonight

 

Before going on that, I was curious if any of these actors would go on to other passages. After checking the IMDB, all but one (I didn’t check everybody) is still acting to this day. The man playing Col. Horton (named Traber Burns) is out and about. Checking his IMDB, he’s playing in movies I’ve never heard of and has been in an episode of House, Lost, Medium, Grey’s Anatomy, and episode of Miami Vice before the plug was pulled on that show, and a few others.

I’d imagine that the MPB went to a local drama club to get the child actors and some of the adult actors. Traber Burns’ bio states that he has hung around Louisiana for a bit until he moved to Los Angeles somewhere in the 2000s. Looking at his IMDB reminds me of Sara Holden, someone I knew when I was a teen years who worked for my aunt (the same one I was talking about earlier) who has gone on to be an actress, she also played in an episode in House and played a female hostage in CSI: NY. She mainly does stunts now, including an episode of Sons of Anarchy as a stunt double.

That sucks. She out in Hollywood being not-so-famous but still doing cool stuff, and I’m here in Detroit working in the Auto Industry and being stalked by a weird fucker (who happens to be black, being PC here) who thinks I’m part of the Illuminati (true story) and thinks me and my family are very wealthy members of Wall Street and said once we are ‘out to screw black people.’ Yes, sir, we are out to make black people more poorer while fattening our pockets! Oh, I have stories about dealing with this nutjob, lots! Stay tuned to A Walk 2 Aquarius for more info.

Going back to Sara Holden, truth be told is that I haven’t seen Sara Holden since perhaps 2001 or even before and I’m unsure if my aunt has contact with her. I gotta ask. With the nutjob, I think he watched Bowling for Columbine too many times and took Mr. Moore’s words about how cities like Flint, Michigan went down the tube rather easily. And somehow, to this guy; apparently, I’m one of these evil rich white folks who destroyed Flint. Wow, I didn’t know I had that kind of power. Maybe he thinks I’m responsible for 9/11.

With the Wipers? I’d imagine the MPB may’ve walked into a rural Mississippi bar and picked up some drunken folks for recruitment. I could have sworn I’ve seen the actress who played Mrs. Bookhart (Niki Wood) in another movie around the 80s… guess not.

Also, I was curious on who made that fuckin’ strange music (similar to my 2004 New Age/Ambient album ‘Watch the Sky Turn Red’) and ran into the name Obie Atkins, sounds like a name for a country star so I looked around and it appears that wasn’t the case. All I could find is that after T&T, she or he was involved with some Christmas album made somewhere in the early 90s, but I didn’t give a shit to go further down the road with finding out info about Mr. or Mrs. Atkins career, the name piqued my interest.

And for myself, I don’t think I could watch T&T start to finish, I watched both the first and second episodes and went straight to the last one. But if you are interested in some weird 80s educational shit, by all means, T&T may fill your desire.

Now, I’m not attempting to shit all-over T&T. If I was held hostage and had my choice of watching the bullshit you see in the regular morning TV (The View, The Talk) or T&T, I’d take the second choice. Sounds strange, but I did watch The View once in my life (while at an auto shop waiting for the mechanics to fuck up my Ford Taurus) and I seriously thought about walking in front of a moving semi-truck. God, how can people watch that shit?? This is the kind of shit stay-at-home soccer moms watch when they are not travelling around to the mall with Prince Charming’s maxed-out credit card and his two balls in her purse. I can see why divorces are on the rise; and why I’m 31 and never been married or even engaged.