Talk:The Fugitive (1963 TV series)

message: I agree it would be interesting to briefly cover those series which have borrowed the "X pursued by the law for a crime he/she/they/it didn't commit" premise, but I'm wondering why "Hot Pursuit", a series so obscure I can't even find an episode guide for it, is more worthy of mention than, say, The Littlest Hobo?  -- Antaeus Feldspar 16:18, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I took out the reference to The Littlest Hobo as it was not about a character being pursued by authorities (unlike the other examples). Plus, the Littlest Hobo actually originated as a Lassie variation in 1958, and the series itself started in 1963 (it was later remade in 1979), so it doesn't really fit into this category. 23skidoo 15:44, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmmmm.  We may be onto something interesting here, because I there was a show that had a helpful Lassiesque dog falsely accused of having attacked a human (his trainer, I think?) and wandering from place to place until his name was cleared.  I was fairly sure it was The Littlest Hobo; could it be that this was an element added in for the 1979 remake?  In which case it would be more relevant, not less.  -- Antaeus Feldspar 17:12, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)

text: Found it.  Not an incarnation of Littlest Hobo after all, but it exists. -- Antaeus Feldspar 17:19, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Remakes? 

message: The article says Kimble is traveling via bus to the death house and is involved in a train wreck.  This is from the '93 movie, I think.  On the series, IIRC, Gerard and Kimble are traveling via train and it derails.  No bus in the original series.  Been a while since I've seen the show.  Can someone confirm or deny, and change the article if need be.  Sir Rhosis 17:00, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, you're correct. Harrison Ford's bus was hit by a train, but David Jannsen was on board a train.  Article changed. --Robertkeller 17:41, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: In the 2000 remake, the police van wrecks without aid of a train.Jclinard 15:42, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Method of Travel To Death House

message: While some believe this movie and its success may have started the Hollywood trend of the 1990s for remaking old television series as feature films, this movie eschews the campy approach generally taken by such remakes, and treats its source material with respect.
Anyone else see bias here? If so, how could this be edited to not sound so biased? Darkpower 09:29, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There, I have it fixed, sort of. Had trouble thinking of what to replace it with, but it has WAY less biased than it did before. Darkpower 09:29, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bias? 

message: The first episode was not a special episode. It begins with Kimble, having spent 18 months in prison with appeals before escaping in a train crash on the way to the Death House 6 months previously (so 2 years after the murder). His first alias (on TV) was James Lincoln.
When the last episode was coming up for airing, on both sides of the Atlantic there was speculation in the media and amongst the many people who watched the show whether Kimble was really innocent after all. (193.249.247.220 (talk) 19:01, 21 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: First and Last

message: Despite being on the run for years and despite Gerard and so many other lawmen having seen Kimble, his wanted poster was never updated and continued to show him with grey hair instead of his dyed black hair. (193.250.60.65 (talk) 16:19, 16 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Posters

message: As the show goes on, you see how women are attracted to Kimble, and doctors are even more attractive to many women. Kimble forms relationships with women easily and it is difficult to believe that he stuck with his wife only. Possibly Kimble had a number of affairs and that was what made his wife drink as she did, and heated up the final argument between them. (193.250.59.56 (talk) 17:54, 31 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Womaniser

message: The wanted poster on Kimble was never updated though the Law knew he had blackened his hair. He was instantly recognisable from it, as happened many times. A simple beard and mustache, or a mustache and glasses would probably have been a good disguise but Kimble never tried it. It can only be assumed that he didn't so the viewer would always know it was him. Kimble always wrote his own credentials which were never checked unless he was under suspicion, then they were then found out to be false. He frequently left a place barely one step ahead of the law, having to leave his few belongings behind him. Even after travelling days when he must have had to sleep out in the woods, Kimble always looked fresh, well dressed and clean shaven. His wife was killed 2 weeks after Sept 5, 1961 and had 18 months of appeals, trial, etc. He was then on the run for 4 or 5 years (both figures given in 2-part wind up of the series.) He and Gerrard parted as friends. Gerrard had always believed he was guilty (though Kimble saved his life 3 times in the series) and that the one-armed man was an invention. He came to believe that Kimble had only committed the one murder and would commit no more. He knew that Kimble hated guns. Gerrard was finally forced to realise that Fred Johnson existed and was violent and a liar in the finale where he helped Kimble instead of taking him straight to jail as he should have.  (193.250.59.241 (talk) 10:46, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Is this a suggestion for making improvements, or what? SlowJog (talk) 16:32, 4 June 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: While Kimble, in the second-half of the last episode, did get the 1AM to verbally confess to killing Helen Kimble, Kimble had actually got the 1AM to admit it in an earlier B&W episode called "Wife Killer". It's the one where a reporter finds the 1AM in her town, publishes his photo in the paper to attract Kimble, and in the resulting chase the 1AM nearly is killed driving off a road and Kimble and the reporter have to nurse the 1AM back to health. When the 1AM (I'm to lazy to type his name) first regains consciousness and sees Kimble, Kimble demands to know if he really did kill his wife. The 1AM nods.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.64.15.142 (talk) 23:54, 10 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Some thoughts

message: The list in the "legacy" section is impressive. Is it long enough to create a category that can be used to connect these?  Maybe a "Fugitive genre" category?  That would seem biased toward this program.  Perhaps a more general term for the category could be thought of.  SlowJog (talk) 16:32, 4 June 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Genre category

message: I don't know if this is worthy of inclusion. A writer for TV Guide magazine in the late 1970s or the early to mid 1980s recounted an experience in New Zealand in 1967. At a stadium where a football game was being held, there were television sets set up around the stadium.  The game was suddenly halted, the sets were turned on, and everyone watched the final episode of "The Fugitive".  When the episode was over, the football game resumed. GBC (talk) 07:42, 16 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Zealand and the final episode 

message: Helen Kimble must have been killed twice. In the episode "World's End", the newspaper ad says, 'Must contact R.K. about Sept. 17th'. William Conrad says, Sept. 17th was the night Helen Kimble was killed. In the final episode, Gerard asks Johnson, "Where were you on Sept.19, the day Helen Kimble was murdered."  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.253.222.236 (talk) 07:23, 30 April 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Effect of the Finale 

message: I wanted to take a moment to compliment the person or persons who wrote or contributed to this splendid article.  It is truly superb; replete with factual material and incisive analysis.
This has always been one of my favorite television shows.  When first viewing it in its original airing (as a kid), the appeal was that every week one could tune in and watch someone with worse problems than one had.  Now, watching it in retrospect the appeal is nostalgia for a bygone era; an era a relative eye blink ago in time yet seemingly an eternity away.  It was an era when people conducted themselves with class as exhibited by their attire, manners, work ethic; an age of innocence for children when such things as “passwords” and admonitions such as “Don’t play alone or talk to strangers” were unheard of.  
The series ended in 1967, just the right moment in time for it for 1968 was the year when everything changed and when capital punishment was to enter a long hiatus while being reviewed by the judiciary.  The Fugitive is a crystallized moment in time, a refuge for all who feel as time exiles within a contemporary society alien to their values and tastes; a time when on television everyone smoked (even doctors!)  and no one had sex.
Yes, not unlike Little Lord Fauntleroy, Dr. Richard Kimble, an innocent victim of blind justice, is a character only a writer could dream up.  Every week he has one hour to search for the one-armed man, evade Gerard and capture, and fix everyone else’s problems in his spare time.  No matter what the risk or cost to himself, he always does the right thing.  We can only dream of such individuals of an idealized world within the one of reality that we must inhabit.
I have just one point of contention regarding the article.  It is stated that Lt. Gerard believes Dr. Kimble murdered his wife in cold blood.  The very nature of the crime would seem to belie that contention.  Dr. Kimble’s wife was beaten to death and presumably Gerard and others believe it was in a moment of rage by her husband after an argument.  (Indeed, even in truth it wasn’t a premeditated murder.)  
This is further bolstered when in one episode Gerard is closing in on Dr. Kimble and he encounters a murderer who has already killed more than one victim.  At the conclusion of the episode, Gerard is forced to let Dr. Kimble get away in order to take out the “other” murderer.  When asked by a local police detective why he would have done that after having pursued Kimble for so long, Gerard responds:  “I wanted them both.  But this one was going to kill again while the other [Kimble] has done all the killing he’s going to do.”  
At times, Gerard even seems to entertain moments of doubt concerning Dr. Kimble’s guilt, as nicely noted within the article.  But I don’t think he (or anyone) ever thought that Dr. Kimble murdered his wife in cold blood.  Perhaps this assertion within the article could be deleted as anti-factual?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by HistoryBuff14 (talk • contribs) 16:24, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Gerard belives Kimble killed his wife in "cold blood"?   

message: Quantum Leap is cited as an example of a fugitive on the run stopping to help people.
Helping people is certainly an element, but Sam Beckett (lead character played by Scott Bakula) is not "on the run".  He is unable to control the fact that he is leaping from one figure to another, and must resolve the situation of that person in order to escape and leap into another person.  Kimble and the many other characters are entirely in control, and even have the option to stop running and surrender themselves. GBC (talk) 05:07, 7 December 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quantum Leap doesn't qualify 

message: Which episode was the pilot episode? 209.179.13.132 (talk) 23:09, 24 March 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: "Fear in a Desert City", the first episode in which the train crashes on the way to the Death House. Then it continues six months later. It is a pity that they did not fill in the gap, where Gerard chases him as he escapes the train wreck and his first few weeks on the run. I suppose he must have stolen clothes from someone's washing line and hitched a lift as far away as he could? (80.31.144.16 (talk) 18:50, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pilot Episode 

message: Abbythecat (talk) 23:05, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: Uh, no. Interesting trivia, but I'm guessing it was probably just sloppy reuse of the same set since they were both produced around the same time. Clarityfiend (talk) 02:37, 17 August 2015 (UTC)

text: Abbythecat (talk) 21:36, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  uncle connection 

message: It was never updated. It always showed Kimble with his natural grey hair in a different style. Gerard and so many others had seen Kimble as he became, with his black dyed hair in a different style. Being just 32 years old when the series started, presumably Janssen had to dye his hair grey when playing Kimble, upto the point where he escaped Gerard after a train crash?(80.31.144.16 (talk) 18:44, 29 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: The wanted poster

message: In the eleventh episode, "Nightmare At Northoak", it is revealed that Kimble has a regular nightmare where Gerard corners him and shoots him. Kimble is finally caught and while waiting for the warrant to take him away, Kimble tells Gerard that his nightmare is that after he (Kimble) dies, Gerard will find the one armed man (he had not been able to find). The show ends in another town with the words; "Kimble's only consolation is that somewhere, perhaps here, there is a one armed man who has nightmares of him." (83.37.123.24 (talk) 18:57, 3 November 2015 (UTC)
thread_title: Nightmares

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Should this be included here as it is hardly the only production about this real life case.
 110.33.0.155 (talk) 15:38, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Guilty or Innocent: The Sam Sheppard Murder Case  

message: Kimble is constantly asked by police or sheriff’s deputies to produce a drivers license. He typically complies. Just how in the heck did Kimble get so many apparently official licenses with false names?? 2601:246:4A80:85E0:24BE:4078:F8E9:5B4B (talk) 20:29, 20 December 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Drivers Licenses 

message: My OCD got the better of me just then. Thylacine24 (talk) 16:50, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sorry to keep undoing edit