4 Niche Steampunk Shows to Check Out After Penny Dreadful
These are projects about the future that never happened.
Steampunk on screen is a rare and almost extinct genre. However, there are still some worthy examples – even if they often lack scope, budget, or popularity.
We hope these TV shows will satisfy your longing for the world of steam engines and mighty airships.
1. The Wild Wild West, 1965-1969
The author of the idea, Michael Garrison, combined his two greatest passions – Westerns and James Bond novels. The result is a not-at-all-serious story about a pair of secret agents who travel on the Wanderer train, solving crimes.
A ladies' man, James West is used to solving problems with the help of a Colt, and the brilliant inventor Artemus Gordon is ready to assemble a strange but genius contraption for any difficult situation – be it a telegraph cane or a sleeve pistol.
Of course, most of the inventions and plot devices of The Wild Wild West look naive now – but the show is still much more exciting to watch than the 1999 movie of the same name.
2. The Adventures of Brisco County Jr., 1993-1994
The Evil Dead star Bruce Campbell plays Brisco, who heads to the Old West to avenge his father's death. At first, everything follows the canon of a Western – horse chases and duels between good guys and bad guys. But as the story progresses, fantasy elements start to creep in.
The mad scientist supplies Brisco with strange inventions, and the train robbers suddenly turn out to be fugitives from the future.
The show lasted only one season – neither fresh ideas nor original humor could save it from low ratings. But there is a silver lining: director Kim Manners said the Brisco experience helped him work on another brilliant and classic science fiction project, The X-Files.
3. Jack of All Trades, 2000
One steampunk show was apparently not enough for Bruce Campbell. Here he plays Jack Stiles, a secret agent who tries to thwart Napoleon Bonaparte's colonialist plans. The creators make the main characters the culprits of real-world events, pitting them against famous figures like Benjamin Franklin or the pirate Blackbeard.
It's all charming, funny, and a little naive – if you watched Xena: Warrior Princess as a kid, Jack of All Trades will be a heartwarming nostalgia trip.
4. The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne, 2000
The plot revolves around Jules Verne himself and his journey on a flying ship with Passepartout, Phileas Fogg, and his cousin Rebecca.
Young Verne barely has time to turn all of his adventures into stories, but his literary talent soon attracts unwanted attention – and soon he must face the mysterious League of Darkness.
Airships, steam engines with gears, mechanical cyborgs – for the sake of such steampunk variety, you can sometimes tolerate outdated computer graphics. And fans of Jules Verne will especially enjoy searching for references to his works.