TV Series

Amazing Stories
1985
   Similar to Night Gallery or Twilight Zone.  Short stories with a quirk thrown in.  With Steven Spielberg involved, you can guess the quality.
    Some are great,others merely adequate. 
    "The Main Attraction" was so funny.  You had no sympathy for the kid who had everything go wrong, since he so richly deserved the humiliation. 
    "The Sitter" was sort of moral, but mostly fun.  We've all known bratty kids you want to spank.  These kids give their sitters heart attacks.  Until Jennifer.  She has magic and an unflappable attitude.  She's more than their match.
    "Dorothy and Ben" is a horse of a different color.  This one is a must-see.  It's sad, but very beautiful and uplifting.  Ben was in a coma for years.  He finally wakes up, but he hears a voice.  When he finds it, it's a little girl in a coma.  He finally convinces her parents that he actually hears her.  But then two strangers arrive in her dreams and want her to go with them.  Ben has to convince her to not go with them, or she'll die.  It sounds very silly, but this was done so brilliantly.  It's quite the most amazing show. 

Kolchak:The Night Stalker
1974
    Kolchak (Darren McGavin) is a reporter who likes to find supernatural stories.  He doesn't respond well to authority and he's not a favorite of the police.
     Kolchak runs into an assortment of strange things.  Some are the obvious: vampire and werewolf.  But the show never repeats a monster, so there's always an element of suspense.  I loved Creature Feature and this one is even better.







Sanctuary
2008
Sanctuary is where anyone who is born different can go and be safe.  It was started by Helen Magnus (Amanda Tapping).  She calls them Abnormals, and understands them quite well.  After all, she's got a few secrets of her own.  She's 157 years old.  Her daughter, Ashley (Emilie Ullerup), is super fast and super strong.
    This gets a lot of its ideas from other shows, like X-Files, Kolchak:the Night Stalker, Psych, Lie to Me and probably others I don't recognize.
     It's not bad.  I love these type of shows, I just got tired of all the copying.  Ashley being controlled and going bad was eerily reminiscent of Claire (Hayden Panettiere from Heroes) in the future hunting her own kind.
    It was fun to watch if you like these shows, but all the hidden secrets got kind of old.