While reading the trivia page for Batman Returns I saw mention of a show called Prisoners Of Gravity, which flipped a switch in my brain. I remembered seeing something about the show way back in the pre-internet 90s. Can’t remember the details aside from whatever show I was watching saying that POG was essentially a TV show about comics and sci-fi in which the host actually interviewed creators. I was floored. How could something like this even exist? Why can’t I watch it now? I was crazy jealous of our neighbors to the north for having regular access to author and artist interviews. Well, today I read up on the show a little bit on Wiki and then decided to head over to YouTube to see if any of the episodes were posted. Lo and behold, the Jack Kirby episode is up in three parts which is fantastic. Host Rick Green fits the late 80s/early 90s comic geek mold I have in my mind and has a real enthusiasm for the material. These clips include Kirby talking about his own origins as well as some of the real life stories of how various characters were created in addition to interviews with creators about The King. Actually seeing Will Eisner tell the infamous Kirby/towel/mafia story is pretty awesome (it’s in the second clip).

It’s funny watching Prisoners of Gravity now because it’s essentially a podcast. You can see pretty similar interviews and production values on iFanboy every week, though without as much imagination when it comes to the setup (as you can see in the opening of the first clip, the idea is that Green didn’t like the look of the world so he built a rocket, strapped it to his car and left the planet, but got stuck on a space station where he could talk about comics and books). POG shares a lot of similarities with Mystery Science Theatre 3000 which is cool because it shows that these creative types weren’t content to just sit and review their material, they thought they needed to make the proceedings even geekier. There’s something rad about that. It’s too bad the show isn’t on DVD or streaming somewhere because it seems like such an amazing time capsule of a time when most of the comic legends were still alive and new ones like Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman were really doing their things. I just found a full episode guide and hope to do some more searching around on YouTube to see what–and who–else I can find. I’ll keep you posted!