Long before Oliver Sacks wrote An Anthropologist on Mars, an anthropologist from Mars visited Earth, courtesy of early-60s TV. Uncle Martin, as he came to be known, crashed his tiny craft on this backward planet and got stuck until he could repair it. In the interval, he parked the vehicle in Mrs Brown's garage, dodged her romantic overtures (and brownies), and taught his adopted nephew, reporter Tim O'Hara, a bit about life.

Ray Walston became a beloved figure to US kids, who thought My Favorite Martian was cool stuff. We particularly liked Uncle Martin's antennae, which opened and closed much like the 'rabbit ears' on our TV sets at home. Bill Bixby, still impossibly young and pre-Hulk, provided support as the naive Tim.

If you have never seen My Favorite Martian, you're in for a treat here. If you have, this pilot episode should be a pleasant trip down memory lane to a time when science fiction, even as comedy, was thoughtful, intelligent, and amusing, if a bit low-tech.