Blueghost I have to admit right now that I didn't watch this show too much when it first aired, but I did catch an episode every now and then. And the thing that strikes me the most are the memorable characters.Riding off of Lucas's and Spielberg's reinvention of Hollywood by reintroducing classic serial film making for the masses, Donald Belisario brings us a tale of an Indy Jones aviator flying the south seas in his Grumman "Goose" flying boat. With him are Jack, his canine companion missing one eye, his overweight mechanic with lots of good intentions, a French bar owner of Planet of the Apes fame, and of course a spy in the form of a femme fatal as she keeps tabs on the Japanese fleet for Uncle Sam.The stories are outlandish. The characters over the top. The situation is right out of a 1930's Saturday matinée as we follow the adventures and misadventures of Jake and Jack and their friends. It's not a very well shot series. It comes out of the industrial TV age of the 60s, 70s and 80s, where TV productions were cranked out like Golden Era Hollywood feature films. That is to say this thing was essentially mass produced with a lot of other TV. The stage and sets were predominantly pre-lit, so that all you had to do was setup the props and roll camera.It's not the best TV show around, but if you find yourself liking the characters and situation, then that's all the producers can really expect. The show, had a bit more money been pumped into it, then there would've been money enough to stage and shoot proper flying sequences a- la "Baa-Baa Black Sheep" a fear years before. Ditto with the action sequences. There's a lot of slight of hand with editing going on, but the shots and sequences get their point across, even if those same action sequences are a bit stilted.A proper production would have gone the extra mile as per Lucas's TV series from the 1990's; "The Chronicles of Young Indiana Jones". Lucas's series lasted three full seasons with magnificent production values; battle sequences, chases, gunfights, equestrian theatrics, stunts on trains, and incredible flying sequences. Had Belisario gotten more financing for his show, then "Tales of the Gold Monkey" would have ranked up there as a high-ranking knock off of Lucas's and Spielberg's recreation and homage to afternoon serials of the 30s and 40s.Otherwise, and I hate to say this, but will state so with the best intentions, this show is a mediocre TV series. It's even campy by borrowing from other genres, and incorporating concepts from films. Still, for all that, it is entertaining. But, like I say, had Golden Monkey been filmed on location, with extra money for real flight and proper action sequences, this production could have really shined beyond its current status. Still, it's likable for what it is. Again, still, for all that, the wit injected into the script breath life into the characters, and that makes this show worth watching.A good TV program from an unheralded age of television. Campy, silly, moderately budgeted, but still endearing for all that.Give it a chance.

billk51 Well, Herthh, you're entitled to your long, senseless and mostly incoherent opinion. It's good to see that you're a fan of the eight copy-cat prime time crime dramas currently ruling the fading major networks."Gold Monkey" had a great cast of talented actors who had strong chemistry together. That's why it developed such a strong group of devotees during its short life time. The Kirk, Spock and McCoy characters could have been plunked down into almost any plot and had a hit because of the appealing interaction between them.If you didn't find the relationships between Jake and Corky and Jake and Sarah appealing then you're just not a 30's kind of guy.

Thomas It shows that even a producer of a caliber of one Donald Bellisario can make an awful production, literally insulting intelligence of this viewer. And probably the majority of viewers saw it similarly, when I consider that Studios pulled the plug after one season.This show was made amid of the successful Magnum P.I. Don Bellisario later made the landmark series JAG and the current excellent NCIS. I feel happy that he came to senses, recovered and let his talent and ingenuity flourish.Much of the Magnum cast appears in Monkey's pilot: Jeff McKay, one of our favorite characters from Magnum (Lt. MacReynolds, later returned to Magnum as a "con man extraordinaire Jim Bonnik." Marta DuBois (Magnum's wife Michelle) appears as a Japanese princess of kinds. John Hillerman, main character in Magnum "Jonathan Q. Higgins" appears here also as a vicious gestapo agent "Fritz the Monocle," who as expected will find his untimely death. Alongside appear a series of Asian actors, whom we also saw on more than one occasion in Magnum episodes.Let me briefly summarize the pilot, a good representative of what type of a show this was: Two Germans, of course portrait in a stereotype way of vicious and cowardly, stupider than a regular adult person ever could be, stand at a waterfall and see a huge ape on the other side. Huge Gorilla of sorts, like in a Planet of the Apes, expect for a childish (party?) costume. We know later that the Germans are 'scientists.' For some reason one of the Germans opens fire at the (noble) ape. The ape is not easy to kill, it attacks! It takes a lot of yelling and shooting until the ape finally dies. Other apes appear and make a short process of the Germans. Hurray.In another scene Princess Koji (Marta DuBuis) sits naked in a Japanese Onzen Bath, and a Japanese samurai tries to grab a red cord tied to a neck of a cobra as a test of courage. A German agent visits the princess. The German is extremely cowardly, scared to death of the cobra, sweats and shakes, what amuses everybody. I was not amused, neither was my wife, who said at some time "I am finished with the show," and did not wanted to watch it any longer. Later in the episode we see the German agent pretending to be a local reverend, seducing a local, pretty and yet stereotypically stupid native girl Tiki. So what it is about? Legend wants, on the volcanic Island with the Apes exists a statue, a gold one of course, and that alloy is so resilient to heat that Germans are after it. Fritz the Monocle, who won dog's Jake glass eye in a poker game, worth $100,000 as they said on the table, is dressed as a German navy officer and is on the mission to find the Island of the Apes and get the statue. The rest of the details are kind of irrelevant, get the DVD if you must see. Suffice to say, bad guys die, good guys win, French womanize, but are good otherwise, Germans are bad. Japanese are also bad, but in a knightly "samurai" kind of way, whereas Germans are ridiculous and cowardly. Visual effects are embarrassing, especially the volcanic eruption on the Island of the Apes looked like an apprentice job.Poor Jeff MacKey! For this role of a mechanic Corky his character on Magnum has died in season 3! Corky as a character fades into another stereotype: simple minded, always dirty, unshaven, looking for a bottle and yet a good trusty fellow. Jeff was lucky to return to Magnum in season 5 as Jim Bonnik, and his extraordinary talent showed fully in this role.Monkey seemed to have been filmed in Tahiti and on Oahu, we clearly recognized Bora Bora, called here Gora Bora. Standing joke in the show is that dog Jake makes "woof" for yes, and "woof woof" for no, or is it the other way around? This seem to lead to a never ending series of confusion.

Web-7 I just happened to think of this show one night as I was on the web, and so I decided to look it up. I was SIX years old when this show aired on TV, but I still remember it, ever so hazily. Like the other commentees - I too was captured by it in my youth and would love to see it again. Strange it is that we all seem to have looked it up at about the same time, '98-'99.