Steve Austin. Astronaut. A man barely alive. We all know the intro, the grinding electronic sound effects, and the iconic slow-motion runs that somehow looked faster than a sprint. But looking back at The Six Million Dollar Man episodes today, there’s something more than just 1970s nostalgia at play. It wasn't just a show about a guy with a $6 million price tag on his limbs. It was the birth of the modern superhero procedural.
Lee Majors played Steve Austin with a specific kind of stoicism. He wasn't a wisecracking Marvel hero. He was a government asset. A pilot who crashed a lifting body—the M2-F2, a real-life experimental aircraft—and woke up as a science experiment. Honestly, the show’s legacy is weirdly persistent. You see it in RoboCop, Iron Man, and every "secret agent with a twist" show that followed.
The Pilot Movies That Changed Everything
Before it was a weekly staple, the series started as a trio of TV movies. These weren't the campy adventures people remember from the later seasons. They were gritty. Dark, even. The 1973 pilot, simply titled The Six Million Dollar Man, focused heavily on the psychological trauma of Austin losing his legs, his arm, and an eye. It’s heavy stuff.
The second and third movies, Wine, Women and War and The Solid Gold Kidnapping, felt more like James Bond knockoffs. Producers were trying to find the tone. Should Steve wear a tuxedo? Should he be a reluctant hero or a willing spy? Eventually, they landed on the red tracksuit and the Office of Strategic Intelligence (OSI). That’s where the series truly found its legs—literally.
Why Some Six Million Dollar Man Episodes Defined a Genre
Think about "The Seven Million Dollar Man." This episode introduced Barney Miller (played by Monte Markham), a man who received bionic implants just like Steve but couldn't handle the mental strain. It raised a question we still ask in sci-fi: does the machine break the man? Steve had to fight someone with his own abilities, a trope that is now mandatory in every superhero movie climax.
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Then you have the crossover events. You can’t talk about this show without mentioning Jaime Sommers. "The Bionic Woman" was originally a two-part tragedy. Steve falls in love, she gets bionics, and then her body rejects them. She died. Or so we thought. The fan reaction was so intense—basically a 1970s version of a viral Twitter campaign—that the writers had to bring her back. This led to a spin-off and a shared universe, arguably the first successful one in television history.
The Bigfoot Factor
It sounds ridiculous now. Bigfoot. In a show about high-tech bionics. But "The Secret of Bigfoot" is arguably the most famous of all The Six Million Dollar Man episodes. Why? Because it took a turn into the bizarre.
Bigfoot wasn't a missing link; he was an alien construct. A bionic protector for visitors from another world. Andre the Giant played the beast in his first appearance, and the fight scenes were legendary. They used a specific editing style—quick cuts and heavy foley work—to make the hits feel massive. It was a risk that paid off, turning a serious spy show into a sci-fi fantasy powerhouse.
The Tech That Wasn't Just Fiction
While the show was fantastical, it was rooted in the "white-hot" technology of the era. NASA was the gold standard. In the episodes, Steve often interacted with real-world scientific concepts, even if the execution was pure Hollywood. The bionic eye had an infrared zoom. The legs allowed for 60 mph runs.
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We forget how influential the "bionic sound" was. That ch-ch-ch-ch noise during a jump or a lift. It provided a sensory cue for the audience to understand when the power was being used. Without that, it's just a guy in a jumpsuit jumping over a fence. With it, it's a feat of engineering.
Essential Episodes for a Rewatch
- "The Day of the Dolphin": No, not the movie. Steve has to communicate with a dolphin to stop a nuclear threat. It’s peak 70s weirdness.
- "The Death Probe": A two-part thriller featuring a Soviet Venus probe that lands on Earth. It looks like a giant metallic tank and is virtually indestructible. It’s one of the best "unstoppable force" stories in the series.
- "The Return of the Bionic Woman": Essential for the lore. It fixes the "death" of Jaime Sommers and sets up her own legendary series.
- "Kill Oscar": A massive three-part crossover involving "fembots." These robotic doubles of OSI staff were genuinely creepy for the time.
The Visual Language of the Bionic Age
The cinematography in these episodes was a product of budget constraints that turned into a stylistic choice. Slow motion was cheaper and easier to film than trying to make someone look like they were running 60 mph in real-time. By slowing it down, they emphasized the grace and power. It became the show's signature.
They also loved the "bionic POV." A grid overlay on the screen to show Steve's telescopic vision. It’s a simple trick, but it put the viewer inside his head. You weren't just watching a hero; you were seeing the world through a $6 million lens.
A Legacy of Parts
Most shows from 1974 feel dated, like a time capsule of bad hair and questionable politics. And yeah, Steve Austin’s sideburns are a lot to take in. But the core of the show—the ethics of human enhancement—is more relevant now than it was then. We are currently living in an era of Neuralink and advanced prosthetics. We are actually building the Six Million Dollar Man.
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The show eventually leaned too hard into the "monster of the week" formula toward the end. Season 5 got pretty strange. But those middle seasons? They were tight, focused, and surprisingly human. Steve Austin was a man who lost his identity and had to rebuild it with titanium and wires.
How to Revisit the Series Today
If you're looking to dive back into The Six Million Dollar Man episodes, don't just start at the beginning and binge. It's too episodic for that. Pick the "event" episodes. Look for the ones written by Kenneth Johnson, who had a real knack for the human element before he went on to create V and the Incredible Hulk series.
The show isn't just a relic. It’s a blueprint. It taught Hollywood how to handle a "powered" character on a TV budget. It showed that you could take a ridiculous premise—a bionic astronaut—and make people care about his heart as much as his hydraulic limbs.
Actionable Steps for the Modern Fan
If you want to truly appreciate the impact of the series, start with a curated marathon. Watch the original pilot movie to see the grounded, darker origin. Follow it with "The Secret of Bigfoot" to witness the show at its most imaginative. Finally, watch "The Seven Million Dollar Man" to see the series tackle the dark side of its own premise.
For those interested in the history of the production, seek out the book The Bionic Book by Herbie J. Pilato. It provides deep-dive interviews with the cast and crew that explain how they pulled off the special effects without any digital assistance. Understanding that every "bionic" feat was a practical stunt or a clever camera trick makes the viewing experience significantly more impressive. Don't just watch it for the nostalgia; watch it to see how the foundations of modern sci-fi television were laid down, one slow-motion step at a time.