I’ve always been fascinated by cryptozoology and the idea of monsters roaming the Earth. I’ve listened to a few cryptid podcasts and I’ve followed a few blogs. It’s fascinating stuff. I’ve wanted to do an entire month of urban legends and mythical monsters for AWESOME-tober-fest for many years now. I’d planned articles on Bigfoot, Loch Ness Monster, UFOs, the Jersey Devil, and Mothman. There’s an abundance of Sasquatch, Nessie, and UFO material, but the other stuff is a bit thin pop culture wise aside from a movie or TV program here and there. So, I’d sort of sat on it.
Well, now I get to do one. Today, I want to talk about Bigfoot. Specifically, I want to talk about the Bionic Bigfoot from The Six Million Dollar Man. Bigfoot appeared a couple times but I’m going to talk about Season 3, episodes 16-17. The Secret of Bigfoot. His first bionic appearance.
OSI is escorting a couple of scientists to a remote mountain forest to study seismic activity. The scientists are attacked and taken by a beast who turns out to possibly be the Sasquatch of legend. Steve Austin, while looking for the missing scientists, is also taken hostage and gets to meet his strange captors. Meanwhile Oscar is back at base camp facing a level 7 earthquake strike in seven hours to the entire California coast and is planning to detonate a nuclear bomb under the mountain to relive the geologic pressure and prevent the massive quake. Can he find Steve in time?
There really is a lot going on in this one. But it’s a fun episode.
These episodes first aired in 1976. The story is a two parter.
In these two episodes Bigfoot is played by Andre the Giant. Bigfoot would return in season 4 for another two episode story, but that time he’d be played by Lurch himself, Ted Cassidy.
Steve and Oscar escort these scientists into the mountains. The scientists have experimental OSI sensing equipment. While setting up they are attacked by the creature.
Steve finds this footprint and goes after the scientists. He uses his bionics to run and jump all over the forest looking for the missing people. It has been established in previous episodes that Steve is the worst secret keeper when it comes to his bionics.
While Steve is galavanting around the forest showing off his bionics there is a shady group watching his every move. Marveling at his abilities.
Steve encounters Bigfoot and has a pretty epic battle against him. The “trees are picked up and used as baseball bats” kind of epic.
Steve tracks Bigfoot to a cave where it disappears. But Steve TEARS DOWN PART OF THE MOUNTAIN to find a hidden door. How’d he know to look there? Then he has to walk through this amazing gizmo. I’m not even sure what that is. A revolving ice tunnel? As soon as Steve walks in he collapses to the floor. All I know is it looks exactly like the ice tunnel from the Misfits of Science pilot. However, they show that tunnel in this episode several times. You get several LOOOONG looks. I totally get that, they should be proud. It’s an amazing set piece.
Cavalcade of Awesome 
