Bigfoot and Wildboy

Lore & Background

The series follows Bigfoot, who finds a young boy lost in the vast wilderness of the Northwestern United States. Bigfoot raises the boy, who becomes known as Wildboy. Eight years later, they fight criminals and help people around their forest home. The show was heavily influenced by the two-part Bigfoot episodes of The Six Million Dollar Man, borrowing the super-powered Bigfoot character, bionic sound effects for running and leaping, and slow motion photography for action scenes.

Reader's Guide

Bigfoot and Wildboy holds a niche place in 1970s children's television as part of the larger Krofft Supershow anthology. Its significance lies in its adaptation of the Bigfoot mythos for a young audience, blending adventure with science fiction elements like aliens. The series' legacy is preserved through syndication on Cox Cable's Retro Saturday Morning in 2003–2004 and later on Amazon Prime as of July 2024. Home media releases were limited: two VHS volumes from Embassy Video in the 1980s, episodes included in Columbia House's The World Of Sid and Marty Krofft series, and a Rhino Video three-DVD set in 2002 containing one episode. The show's use of bionic sound effects and slow motion directly echoed the popular Six Million Dollar Man, reflecting cross-media influence in the era.

Did You Know?

• Each episode was 15 minutes long with cliffhanger endings resolved the following week.
• Only two home video releases were available in the 1980s, both now out of print.
• Cox Cable's Retro Saturday Morning aired the first eight two-part episodes in 2003 and 2004.

Origins & Format Evolution

Bigfoot and Wildboy launched in 1977 as a segment within The Krofft Supershow, airing on Saturday mornings on ABC. In this initial incarnation, each installment ran just fifteen minutes and concluded with a cliffhanger that would be resolved in the following week's broadcast. This serialized, bite-sized structure gave the show a unique rhythm among children's programming of the era. By 1979, the property had earned enough audience attention to graduate into its own standalone series, expanding each episode to a full thirty minutes. The standalone run produced twelve episodes, bringing the total number of installments across both formats to twenty-eight. The transition from a supporting segment to a headliner reflected the show's growing identity and the creative ambitions of the Krofft production team, who had built their reputation on blending live-action spectacle with family-friendly storytelling.

Influences & Production Style

The visual and sonic language of Bigfoot and Wildboy drew a clear line back to the two-part Bigfoot episodes of The Six Million Dollar Man. That earlier series had established a template for a super-powered, giant humanoid figure, and the Krofft team adapted those conventions into their own family-friendly context. Bigfoot's running and leaping were punctuated by distinctive bionic sound effects that echoed the mechanical whooshes audiences had grown to associate with enhanced physical abilities. Action sequences—such as Bigfoot hurling a giant object across a clearing or ripping a large metal fence post clean from the ground—were captured in slow motion, lending a cinematic weight to what were otherwise modest-budget stunts. This combination of inherited audio cues and deliberate camera technique gave the show a sense of spectacle that set it apart from typical live-action children's fare of the late 1970s.

Story & Characters

At the heart of the series is a simple but enduring premise: Bigfoot, the towering forest creature, discovers a young boy wandering lost in the vast wilderness of the Northwestern United States. Taking the child in, Bigfoot raises him, and the boy grows up under the name Wildboy. Eight years after that initial rescue, the two have settled into a life together around their forest home, where they find themselves defending their world against both human criminals and extraterrestrial visitors. The supporting cast shifted between seasons: Monika Ramirez played Susie and Ned Romero appeared as Ranger Lucas during the Krofft Supershow era, while Yvonne Regalado took on the role of Cindy and Al Wyatt Jr. portrayed her father in the standalone 1979 run. Ray Young embodied Bigfoot throughout, and Joseph Butcher brought Wildboy to life, anchoring the show's emotional core.

Legacy & Availability

Bigfoot and Wildboy has enjoyed a steady afterlife on home video and cable since its original broadcast. In the 1980s, Embassy Video issued two VHS compilations: Volume One featured The Secret Invasion and Space Prisoner, while Volume Two collected Outlaw Bigfoot, Eye of the Mummy, and Birth of the Titan. Both titles are now out of print. Columbia House later included the series in its broader The World Of Sid and Marty Krofft collection, and Rhino Video followed with a three-DVD set of the same name in 2002, which added the episode The Return Of The Vampire. On the broadcast side, Cox Cable's Retro Saturday Morning block screened the first eight two-part installments during 2003 and 2004 as part of a second-season Krofft Supershow lineup. As of July 2024, Amazon Prime has made The Krofft Supershow—along with Bigfoot and Wildboy—available for streaming, introducing the series to a new generation of viewers.