barely remembered, semi-obscure television shows

Richard Benjamin's return to series television seemed like a sure-fire hit. 'Star Wars' was an unparallelled cultural phenomenon in late 1977 and the networks were sure that science-fiction was back for them in a big way. Rather than risk a huge investment on a hour-long serious science-fiction project, NBC wanted a half-hour comedy that was set in outer space. A perfect vehicle to replace the under-performing 'Sanford Arms' that was killing their winning Friday night line-up of Chico, Rockford, and Quincy.

Benjamin was cast a series about a garbage scow in outer space done in 'Star Wars' style. The humor would be broad but reasonably sophisticated, with lots of sardonic asides to make the show palatable to people who didn't care for science fiction - and for those that did, Benjamin had science-fiction "credentials" with his 'Westworld' acting turn. The new show was called Quark.

The cast was a galactically diverse one. Richard Benjamin starred as Adam Quark, commander of the garbage scow for the United Galaxy Sanitation Patrol space station 'Perma One'. His assistants are: Ficus (Richard Kelton), the plant organism science officer, Betty I and Betty II (Trisha and Cyb Barnstable), identical gorgeous cloned twin sisters, and Andy (Bobby Porter), a malfunctioning, cowardly robot that was more trouble than he was worth.

The first mate Gene/Jean (Timothy Thomerson), a half-man half woman person that was constantly fighting with him/herself - making this sitcom a sort of 'He and He/She' in outer space.

Orders for the missions would come from a disembodied head known as 'The Head' (Alan Cailou), that would appear on the ship's video screen, and from Otto Palidrome (Conrad Janis from 'Mork and Mindy'), the ships persnickety architect.

The cast of Quark' worked well together, the scripts were good, and the reviews were excellent. But 'Quark' failed to attract many viewers, so later episodes brought more action, with the garbage scow's crew facing Zorgon the Malevolent and other deadly outer-space adversaries.

This did nothing to lure viewers away from Lynda Carter's boobs bouncing around on CBS and Donny and Marie's pearly whites on ABC. 'Quark' finished dead last on Friday nights despite heavy promotion from NBC and despite the show being the wittiest send-up of science fiction ever attempted on television.

Everyone involved was shocked that 'Quark' didn't catch on, but the network simply fell back on their contention that science-fiction doesn't work on television. This was Richard Benjamin's last series to date.

throb: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090533/

for years i thought i'd imagined it. thank you, google.

"feel the beat, feel the beat, feel the heartbeat...THROB"

http://wiki.d-addicts.com/Oregon_Kara_Ai

I have never met anyone else who recalls seeing this show:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otherworld_%28TV_series%29

Also: AutoMan

Quark, I remember Quark.

Mr. Merlin!

Just Our Luck!

Brother's Keeper is a television series that aired from 1998 to 1999 on ABC. This sitcom was about Porter Waide (William Ragsdale), a single father who raises his son, Oscar (Justin Cooper). At the same time, though, he must keep his brother, Bobby (Sean O'Bryan), a notorious placekicker for the San Fransisco 49ers, out of trouble. It was produced by Axelrod-Widdoes Productions and Donald Todd Productions in association with Studios USA Television.

This was actually pretty funny, esp. the guy who played Bobby.

did anyone else ever see 'Whitney and the Robot'? Early-mid 80's, kind of a semi-educational live action sitcom starring bespectacled Whitney and a really low budget R2D2 looking thing. It came on at like 5 am before saturday morning cartoons, don't know how wide a syndication it got.

Silk Stalkings is a 1990s TV crime drama originally shown on CBS in 1991 as part of the network's late-night Crimetime After Primetime programming package, and rebroadcast on the USA Network. After CBS ended the Crimetime experiment in 1993, the series ran exclusively on USA. The show was created by the prolific crime-show producer Stephen J. Cannell, perhaps best known for The Rockford Files and The A-Team. On the DVD extras, Cannell pointed out that of the 40 or more TV shows he has created, this one had the longest run, eight seasons.

Portraying the daily lives of two detectives who solved sexually-based crimes of passion ("silk stalkings") among the ultra-rich people of Palm Beach, Florida, the tightly-budgeted Silk Stalkings was not actually filmed in Florida. Most episodes were shot in San Diego, California. Some shows were filmed in Scottsdale, Arizona.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Stalkings

"notorious placekicker"?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Doctor_%281989_TV_series%29

haha, yeah! As the series starts, he's fresh out of rehab and the Niners are willing to give him ONE LAST SHOT in the pros. He has a sexy female agent and the brother is a college professor. (xpost)

I remember Doctor Doctor. It starred Max Headroom.

Meego was a short-lived 1997 science fiction comedy that aired on CBS. It starred Bronson Pinchot (Perfect Strangers) in the title role. Meego was a 9,000-year-old shape-shifting alien from the planet "Marmazon 4.0" who winds up living with a human family after his ship crashes. Meego does not want anyone to know that he is extraterrestrial, and tells people he is from Canada instead.

* Bronson Pinchot .... Meego
* Ed Begley Jr. .... Dr. Edward Parker
* Erik von Detten .... Trip Parker #1
* Will Estes .... Trip Parker #2
* Michelle Trachtenberg .... Maggie Parker
* Jonathan Lipnicki .... Alex Parker

o_O

I remember "Mr. Merlin."

How 'bout:

Ohara was an American television police drama series that first aired on the ABC television network from January 17, 1987, until May 7, 1988, starring Pat Morita in the title role of Lt. Ohara. Morita also co-created the series along with Michael Braveman and John A. Kuri. Kevin Conroy, Jon Polito, Rachel Ticotin, and Robert Clohessy also starred in supporting roles. It was notable for being one of the first television series to have a Japanese-American actor in the leading role.

The series focused on a Los Angeles-based Japanese American police lieutenant (played by Pat Morita) who uses spiritual methods such as meditation to solve crimes without the use of a gun or a partner although he would use martial arts if necessary. He often talked in the form of epigrams.

Small Wonder!

i cannot remember any of these shows but i vaguely remember nbc doing this weird thing in 1986 or something where they started their prime-time shows at 6:30/7:30 instead of 7/8, and filled the half-hour slot with crappy sitcoms. does that ring a bell?

is that when "Kate & Allie" aired?

Sledgehammer!

herman's head!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101115/

any Space: Above and Beyond fans up in this piece?

i swear, there was some show starring loni anderson involved. easy money? easy street?

easy street i think

this was my fave show as a kid:

They Came From Outer Space:

I remember lazy Saturday afternoons watching this sitcom.

I already knew it back then ( i think i was a freshman in high school) that this show was never really planned to be anything great. I mean, I recognized half the background locations as Universal Studio Tour backdrops!!! ...but that's what i loved about it! I loved how they always ended up in the dumbest situations, I loved how they ended up with the ladies, and I loved their catchy song they would sing... "Bye, GoodBye, I'll see you...Bye GoodBye I'll See you..." Hahaha...Just thinking about that show brings back so many great memories.

Unfortunately, the actors that played Bo and Abe didn't really "make it" in Hollywood after this show. I believe one of them played Stiles in TeenWolf, and the other was in Mark Harmon's "Summer School", but that's pretty much the last I saw of them.

NBC's original Heroes:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089602/

Plot summary for
Misfits of Science (1985) (TV)

Drs. Hayes and Lincoln are researchers in biological oddities for the Humanidyne company. When they find a man still alive after being frozen for 50 years, their greedy boss fires them and takes the Iceman to use for military experiments. Left without jobs, Hayes and Lincoln decide to get a group of "freaks" (including a telekinetic 17-year-old and a rock guitarist who shoots lightning from his hands) together to rescue the Iceman and stop their boss' reckless experiments.

Filthy Rich, All is Forgiven, and Condo all come to mind right away

i just remembered this crappy 'empty nest' spinoff called 'nurses', which was the last of the 'benson'-style sitcoms.

Okay... this one has been bugging me for years. Anyone remember a very short-lived TV show from the (I believe) late 80s about dudes the rode around in a semi with a helicopter that lifted out of the top of it? I think they also had a car that rolled out of the back. No, it wasn't Airwolf or Knight Rider. The semi was like this sleek, futurustic thing with a curved roof that opened up to let the helicopter out. Also, it wasn't the MASK cartoon either.

maybe this??

The Highwayman was an action-adventure themed television series starring Sam J. Jones, set in "the near future." It was created by Glen A. Larson and Douglas Heyes. The pilot aired in September 1987, and was followed by a short-lived series of nine episodes, with significant changes to the cast and format, that ran from March until May 1988. It was summed up by many reviewers as a cross between Mad Max and Knight Rider (the latter being Larson's previous hi-tech hit).

The movie and subsequent series follow the adventures of "The Highwayman", one of a mysterious group of U.S. Marshals conducting crime-fighting missions and solving bizarre mysteries. Each Highwayman is equipped with a hi-tech, multi-functioned truck.

Opening narration:

"There is a world, just beyond now, where reality runs a razor thin seam between fact and possibility; where the laws of the present collide with the crimes of tomorrow. Patrolling these vast outlands is a new breed of lawman, guarding the fringes of society’s frontiers, they are known simply as "Highwaymen"... and this is their story..."
The 1987 Pilot movie stars Sam Jones, best known—blonde haired—for playing the title role of Flash Gordon in the 1980 movie, and who had appeared in guest roles in series such as The A-Team and Riptide. Playing the lead, only known simply as "The Highwayman" (or "Highway"), he drives a large black computerized truck with a bullet-shaped cabin, which actually belongs to a concealed helicopter (an Aérospatiale Gazelle) which can detach from the rest of the truck. (Also seen in a couple of subsequent episodes, a futuristic sports car also came out of the rear of the truck).

Hahah, wasn't that the series that costarred Jocko from the Energizer ads? TOO RIGHT!

omg jocko!

70's kids PBS shows; Vegatable Soup and Villa Alegre.

Thank you Omar... that's been driving me crazy. Now I know I wasn't crazy. Well, in this regard anyway.

i used to get up really early on saturday mornings and there was this show that confused the fuck out of this irish-catholic kid, yet i would always watch it.

The Magic Door (also known as The Magic Door Television Theatre) was a Jewish educational television series aimed at providing kiruv (outreach) to Jewish children in the Chicago, Illinois metropolitan area. The show was produced by the Jewish Federation of Chicago; and premiered January 1, 1962. The show ran weekly until January 1, 1982 that aired at 7:00 AM every Sunday morning on WBBM-TV.

Background Information

The main characters of the series included "Tiny Tov" (a character "reduced" to appear as a kind of elf), and two hand puppets named "Scrunch" and "Judy". Tiny lived in a house that was made out of an acorn, the entrance was "The Magic Door".

Each week, Tiny Tov would travel back through time riding his Magic Feather. Each week he would educate Jewish children on Jewish history, sharing stories from Torah.

Every episode would include a brief Hebrew lesson, stepping through the Aleph-Bet (Hebrew alphabet).

Tiny Tov was played by Charles Gerber, who also created the song lyrics. Gerber, currently resides in New York.

Chaki! For U:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2RSu9Gw61U

And for everyone, really.

some show in the late 80's with an english actor playing a butler...it was a syndicated sitcom. I can't remember the actor's name, he was tall and blonde and the last time I saw him was on an episode of frasier. it was awful

also, some sitcom based in a supermarket. I think this was canadian. I thought don adams was in it but imdb isn't helping out.

x-post -- Jacko, apparently, being his name.

thx ned! hey la people who remember awesome kids local show THE FROOZLES?!?!

also, "it's your move", starring jason bateman and steve from married with children (I think), about which I remember nothing other than a two part episode with a fake rock band that was made out of skeletons

more remembered sitcoms:

'fm' starring robert hays -- sort of the missing link between wkrp and newsradio, if i recall correctly.

'the powers that be' -- political sitcom w/david hyde pierce and some other dudes.

also, 'out of the blue', a late 70's sitcom about an angel

"War of the Worlds" 1980s TV series (basically "V" tempered by "Aliens")

its your move is classic. the skeletons thing you are thinking of was j batemans recreating the grateful dead video

also, Mr. Sunshine, starring jeffery tambor as a grumpy blind guy

robert hays also starred in a tv version of 'starman'.

oh and 'the untouchables'!! starring william forsythe as al capone, john rhys-davies as 'malone', and some schmuck as eliott ness.

the skeletons on it's your move predated the grateful dead video!

sexydancer - yes i remember that. there were a buncha shows in the same style like friday the 13th. probably same producers.

i think the band name was 'the dregs of humanity'. i could be wrong

"It's Your Move" was great -- pre-Ferris Bueller scheming.

Haha, I remember "Mr. Sunshine" as well. ALL THESE SHOWS DIED SO ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT COULD LIVE. < / obsessive AD fanpeople >

really? also its your move was a silver spoons spinoff. i remember these types of things.

i actually never saw the second half of that two parter, it annoys me to this day! it was pre-empted for something like an earthquake or a war or something else unimportant

The invasion of Grenada

it wasn't a 'silver spoons' spinoff, he played a different character, though he may well have acted the same

also, jason bateman was on 'valerie' with valerie harper. who they killed off one summer and fired and hired sandy duncan to replace her, creating 'valerie's family'. this was on for ages though so i'm not sure it's that obscure

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B000A9QKT6.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg
this show was kind of awesome

xpy: loved Friday the 13th TV show. Basically "13 Ghosts of Scooby Doo" with moon-eyed redhead instead of dog.

im pretty sure he was the same character as in silver spoons.

his character on silver spoons was named derek, the character on it's your move was named matthew.

god i hate you

Valerie's Family then became The Hogan Family.

with glass eye herself

also, silver spoons rick shroeder gossip: rick schroeder had jason bateman fired from silver spoons because bateman got more fan mail than he did. I don't know where I heard this or if it's even true, but that doesn't stop me from spreading it around to the five people who might care

anyway, someone come up with the name of that terrible butler sitcom for me please.

good gossip. bateman blew him away when he was on that show. also rip dexter.

parker lewis cant lose

parker lewis was good! complete ferris beuller rip off

don't forget the tv version of 'ferris bueller' with jennifer aniston in the jennifer grey role.

and some asshole in the title role.

wikipedia, thank you: ""The Dregs of Humanity" episode

Many fans consider the two-part episode "The Dregs of Humanity" to be one of the classic moments of '80s television. [citation needed] In this episode, Matthew crafts the rise and fall of a band--The Dregs of Humanity--posing as their manager, booking them for his high school dance, selling them to MTV, the Palladium, and Rolling Stone magazine, and finally sending them to a watery grave over a cliff into the ocean--all the while never letting on that the "band" in fact consisted of four skeletons stolen from the biology lab."

some show in the late 80's with an english actor playing a butler...it was a syndicated sitcom. I can't remember the actor's name, he was tall and blonde and the last time I saw him was on an episode of frasier. it was awful.

This may be the one with Peter Cook (of Cook and Moore fame) as the butler. It was pretty bad but I watched it anyway because, ya know, Peter Cook. Don't remember the name.

also, some sitcom based in a supermarket. I think this was canadian. I thought don adams was in it but imdb isn't helping out.

There was a decent show, I think called Open All Night, set in a convenience store with a young-ish clerk and his older boss. I see the younger guy in shows now and then. I think it was spun off from a movie of the same name with Gene Hackman and Barbra Streisand.

Otherworld opening sequence

it wasn't the peter cook show, it was before that I think. i definitely remember the butler actor, just not his name.

also, not open all night. it was "check it out!", which was the first google return for 'supermarket sitcom'. from the NYT no less.

anyone remember the sitcom with eric idle as a ghost? it was shit whatever it was.

also, 'happily ever after', featuring snow white in modern day times and some midgets

oh it was actually called 'the charmings'

Parker Lewis was great, I think there's a thread of his own around here somewhere...

That show with Don Rickles as the father of Mr. BoKu himself, Richard Lewis.

He was a cop, and good at his job. But then he committed the ultimate sin, and testified against other cops gone bad. Cops who tried to kill him, but got the woman he loved instead. Framed for murder, now he prowls the badlands. An outlaw hunting outlaws, a bounty hunter, a RENEGADE!

remember YOU AGAIN?!?! starring Stamos and Klugman?

anyway, someone come up with the name of that terrible butler sitcom for me please.

mr. belvedere?

also, did you guys ever get THE EDISON TWINS in the us?

thx ned! hey la people who remember awesome kids local show THE FROOZLES?!?!

-- chaki, Tuesday, November 27, 2007 12:43 PM (26 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

The land of Frooze? That shit was creepy.

oh man that reminds me: there was a failed attempt at a more adult sketch comedy show on nickelodeon (maybe nick at nite) -- i can only remember a bit making fun of mr. belvedere called "why is this englishman in my house?"

mr. b had a pretty rad theme song

i'm twirling my moustache just thinking about it

reenactmentalism:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real_Stories_of_the_Highway_Patrol

mr belvedere wasn't obscure. this wasn't even on network tv, it was syndicated and ran on weekend afternoons and shit. it was probably canadian. it focused on the wacky butler who was cleese-esque in stature and the inept staff of this manor. essentially, fawlty towers in a house, but not funny

Lady Blue

3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful:-
Great Female TV Version of Dirty Harry, 4 January 2007
7/10
Author: alanbobet von New York, NY, USA

This short lived TV action series starred Jamie Rose as a hard hitting Chicago female homicide detective whose methods and police tactics are similar to Harry Callahan aka Dirty Harry. The main character was referred by the TV critics back then in the 80's as "Dirty Harriet", since she also packed a 357 Magnum revolver and took no prisoners. The show was canceled after 1 season not only because of its ratings, but because it was considerable too violent for it's time (the mid 1980's), but Rose's performance as well as Danny Aiello as her boss was great! It was shot on location in Chicago and there were some very good guest stars on the show like Tony Lo Bianco and Katy Jurado.

amazing show. jamie rose would shoot at least two bad guys per episode, ALWAYS sending them crashing through window panes

i found it: Marblehead Manor

it was terrible. now i can rest.

it was "check it out!", which was the first google return for 'supermarket sitcom'.

jesus i remember this, barely

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Npoo1dQlrhU

it's a living:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hM33xzGyHAw&feature=related

Jennifer Slept Here: ghost lives in some house, flirts with. . .Jason Bateman????

Hilarious show!! I still miss it., 18 December 2005

Author: davedavidl from Commonwealth of Virginia

I knew Michael Richards long before Seinfeld was ever thought of, because of Marblehead Manor. Paxton Whitehead was the ever comical butler who's catchphrase "yes...Madam" always stole the scenes he was in. Many of Richards' mannerisms came to light in this series that later made him so famous on Seinfeld, his underlying silliness ever ready to pour out at a moment's notice that would leave you laughing for hours afterward... One scene involved a woman in a skirt who accidentally got into a mishap, revealing her underwear. Richards' character went through the episode chanting "....blue underpants" in sheer amazement. Priceless comedy. Linda Thorson played the ever proper lady of the house that employed everyone, sometimes unaware of the crazy antics that Whitehead and Richards had gotten the Manor into. In short, terrific comedy that deserved a MUCH longer lifespan than the one season it was given. A must-see when it is available on DVD.

everyone loves fat girls

Wendy Jo Sperber RIP

anyone remember the sitcom with eric idle as a ghost? it was shit whatever it was.

I was going to mention this earlier, but I think I mentioned in another ILX thread a while ago. It was called Nearly Departed.

produced by Dolly Parton! I had no idea

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babes

x-post

I thought the butler show was going to be The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer.

get bent, do you know where its a living took place?

more wendie jo sperber: women in prison!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092485/

chaki: i don't remember.

for some reason i thought it took place in dallas

god I fucking hate Michael Richards and am so glad his career has been ruined

It's a Living took place at the Westin Bonaventure Hotel & Suites - 404 S. Figueroa Street,

Filming Locations:
Westin Bonaventure Hotel & Suites - 404 S. Figueroa Street, Downtown, Los Angeles, California, USA

xpost

o_O

thats why i sing the theme song whenever im drunk there

LIFE AINT THE FRENCH RIVIERA!!!

loved "it's your move" for that short time it was on. and the dregs of humanity episode is the only one i remember anything about. didn't he promise michael jackson or some such for the dance but obviously couldn't deliver? there was a classic scene where he interviews prospective musical talent in his apartment. i recall two twin fat dudes who clashed cymbals attached to their bellies or something like that.

when "shades of grey" video appeared, i wondered if they'd ripped off the show.

omg i loved rags to riches!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4D4UShuRUaw

Wow, "It's A Living" looks kind of awesome.

I'm the only one who watched Beggars and Choosers on Showtime, right?

i think "scrubs" is going to be the "it's a living" of its time.

nah. it's a living had some actual lolz.

any Space: Above and Beyond fans up in this piece?

-- bernard snowy, Tuesday, November 27, 2007 8:12 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Link

The new Battlestar Galactica seems to have taken a lot of cues from this show

A few Otherworld eps:

http://www.guba.com/general/search?query=otherworld&set=5&x=0&y=0

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/8f/Earth_2_intro.jpg

xxp it's a living came on before THROB too. there was a hot brunette on there and sheryl lee ralph was hot and crystal bernard was as hot as she's ever been. the piano player was sonny iirc.

Andy Griffith in Salvage 1, the wily junkyard owner who builds a rocketship and flies to the moon

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HODkJABWo08

Wait, "It's A Living" was obscure? Isn't that show the entire reason why Ann Jillian became famous and why it was news when she got a masectomy?

yeah I was gonna say rags to riches is just about the only show that fits the thread title for me, most of these are super-remembered

Ann Jillian was famous before It's a Living

this is more like it, for me anyway:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Trouble_(TV_series)

ilx doesn't like the spaces or something:

http://members.tripod.com/~dspages/dtrouble.html

Hello, Larry

There is only one person on Earth who remembers this show: a singing friend of mine here in Boston. We were convinced he was making it up for YEARS.

i thought that was sorta infamous in a "this is what he left mash for?" kind of way.

I was gonna say -- and I remember that show too.

Because indie bands love their nostalgia, Brooklyn band the XYZ Affair have recruited some folks from Nickelodeon's golden age for their video for "All My Friends."

Check out Nick's biggest redheads, Big Pete from Pete and Pete, Ferguson from Clarissa Explains it All and Budnik from Salute Your Shorts as they help the band take down neighbor Marc Summers who apparently has taken a vacation from showing the world how Funyuns are made on Unwrapped to hang out at home and read the paper and hate fun.

http://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/13872144.html

omg! ferg face is bald and and danny cooksey <3 <3

omg i loved rags to riches!!!!

me too! i remember i was watching it one time, while they were doing a cartwheel routine to "chantilly lace". i was totally enthralled. then, baby jessica decided to fall down the well, and the network news interrupted the show AND THE AWESOME CARTWHEEL ROTINE. i was pissed.

baby jessica show = lame.gif

"Just the Ten of Us" - a Growing Pains spin-off!

http://www.coucoucircus.org/series/images-series/1toitpour10.jpg

featuring nancy from nightmare on elm st = HOTTTT

Re: Whitney and the Robot

When i was nine years old, I played Kurt in a Pasadena City College production of the Sound of Music that was directed by the guy who played Whitney on Whitney and the Robot. I had never heard of the show till one of the stoner stagehands had him sign a picture of him with a robot. Towards the end of rehearsals, he kept very audibly shouting that he would never work with children again. I was a huge pain in the ass.

Also, Night Man, anyone?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zODUowAUHSI

I think I was the only person to watch this regularly: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q.E.D._%28US_TV_series%29

Q.E.D. was a 1982 short-lived adventure series set in Edwardian England, starring Sam Waterston as Professor Quentin Everett Deverill (the series title is the character's initials). The Professor was a scientific detective in the mold of Sherlock Holmes, and the series had a smattering of what would later be known as steampunk. In the show, the lead character used his initials, Q.E.D., as an acronym for "Quite Easily Done."

I remember being absolutely in love with Lil' Bits and nowadays I wish I could watch that and David the Gnome again.

Today's Special

http://img265.imageshack.us/img265/1516/250pxtodaysspecialdc0.jpg

awesome xxxp
apparently he's still drama director at PCC

i still wonder if they showed watr outside of L.A.

Hot Fudge!

http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/8/8e/SagalTwins_M2.jpg
Double Trouble

Love, Sidney w/Tony Randall as a (supposed-to-be, pre-network censors, anyhow) gay man

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lU4NTkEn_0

Marlo and the Magic Movie Machine

Nightingales

Before Pirates of the Carribean, there was....

Disney Presents: The 100 Lives of Black Jack Savage

http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/4962/blackjackfacesmallpt7.jpg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AEUl127RspM

Gigglesnort Hotel

My show "THEY CAME FROM OUTER SPACE" i mention up thread DEFINITELY fits the thread description. It was SO AWESOME#@$ it was about these two alien brothers. One was played by fucking CHAINSAW from Summer School. On Earth, they only felt pain and shit if the other brother got punched. Like the Corsican Brothers. So Chainsaw stoner bro always tried to get nerdy other bro laid!! And they;d end up in wacky situations lol! No one remembers this show when i talk about it out loud and walk away slowly.

omg heres a picture of them http://www.spacecast.com/images/Shows/theycamefromouterspace.jpg

the creator writer also wrote a bunch of episodes for sexyDancer's fave FRIDAY THE 13th the Series

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0173915/

ROFL. I totally forgot about this

this show had potential

TV 101 was an American drama TV series that was first aired in 1988 and lasted until 1989. It was created by Karl Schaefer and starred Sam Robards, Brynn Thayer, Leon Russom and Andrew Cassese. Other notable cast members include Stacey Dash, Teri Polo and Matt LeBlanc. Each show lasted for 60 minutes.

Plot
Kevin Keegan (Robards) is a recently divorced TV news photographer who quits his job and returns to Roosevelt High School to teach the kids how to make a weekly cable TV show. Principal Steadman remembers Kevin as a disruptive former student and this leads to conflict.

lol, i'm so old i remember this, didn't realize it had such a classy pedigree

Hot L Baltimore was a controversial show created by Norman Lear. It's about a hotel that lost the E in hotel. The show was about the lives and loves of its characters. The love between the desk clerk and April the hooker seemed to always take center stage.

The show was based off of Lanford Wilson's award-winning Broadway play.

Yeah, I was going to mention "The Charmings."

Most of these US shows mean nothing to me, so Star Maidens anyone?

Also watched They Came From Outer Space. I apparantly only watched TV late afternoon on Saturdays.

Stingray - I don't remember much about this, other than the guy drove a Corvette "Stingray" and he was some kind of private-eye. According to IMDB it ran for two seasons from 1985-86. Probably an attempt to jump on the "hot car + detective" theme inspired by the hit "Miami Vice".

Was hello Larry the one where he was the single father of two hot identical twins? One of them was really straight-laced, the other one was a little wild. In my memory, it seems like it was on a little later than '79

Greatest American Hero - A show I have only a dim memory of seeing a few times at friends' houses (this was before my parents bought a TV), but I remember finding the premise quite intriguing, and I have a vivid memory of the awkward, stumbling take-offs when the guy would try to use his superpowers and fly. According to IMDB, this ran from 1981-83.

we've done this thread before but i can't remember what it was called

my answer remains "mark the fish man"

What was that live-action space adventure rip-off of Battlestar Galatica that was the last thing on Sat afternoon before sports took over, early 80s?

http://www.cylon.org/images/buck/erin-002.jpg

Buck Rogers?

naw that was on Friday nights.

ah, it was "Jason and the Star Command"
http://www.andymangels.com/HeMan_DVD_Web/JasonOSC_l.jpg

Jason OF Star Command

Greatest American Hero -

Believe it or not
I'm walking on air
I never thought I could feel so free-hee-heeee
Flyin' away on a wing and a prayer
Who could it be?
Believe it or not
It's just me

^^that show was really frustrating for me because that motherfucker could never figure out how the suit worked.

it's the perm

there was a instruction book they somehow got in the last episode but then they accidentally shrank the book . . .??? GRRRRRR.

Was hello Larry the one where he was the single father of two hot identical twins? One of them was really straight-laced, the other one was a little wild. In my memory, it seems like it was on a little later than '79

You might be thinking of Double Trouble, which is just upthread thar a bit. Circa '84-ish...

xp: the goy Mork?

that's it, thanks. I should learn to read better!

xpost

mr. que otm i just wanted to see him kicking ass but that would have cost money i guess.

The Master (1984) is a short-lived ninja-themed action-adventure TV series created by Michael Sloan which aired on NBC. The show focused on the adventures of John Peter McAllister, an aging ninja master, (Lee Van Cleef) and his young pupil, Max Keller (Timothy Van Patten). Most episodes focused on the mismatched pair driving around in a custom van, helping people in need along the way, similar to its more well-known contemporary, The A-Team. The Master lasted only 13 episodes before cancellation.

As made VERY familiar thanks to two classic MST3K episodes.

YouTube clips for more.

I think I saw every episode of The Master. Worst stunt-doubles ever.

http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j117/hombre42/supertrain_031479_ad.jpg

http://www.werewolftv.com/images/presskit/1a.jpg
Werewolf was an American action-adventure television series, and one of the original shows in the Fox Network's broadcast line-up during its inaugural season of 1987-1988.

The show follows the adventures of Eric Cord, a reluctant werewolf on a quest to rid himself of his curse by killing the originator of his "bloodline."

The show aired a 2-hour pilot and 28 half-hour episodes before being cancelled in 1988.

Has anyone mentioned that really short lived live action The Flash on CBS in 1990? Featuring Mark Hamill as The Trickster?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/08/Tv-trickster.jpg

I know we did a thread on Cliff Hangers with Susan Anton once...

"New Twilight Zone" and "New Alfred Hitchcock Presents" were other post-homework late-night faves of teenage I.

Also: AutoMan

-- Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, November 27, 2007 2:32 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

Holly crap!! for so long i thought that i imagined this show! i could never remember the name and trying to describe it to people was impossible. this just made my day

I remember the Flash show - it was pretty bad

Automan and Manimal and Misfits of Science are three of the greatest shows ever made.

The Master (1984) is a short-lived ninja-themed action-adventure TV series created by Michael Sloan which aired on NBC. The show focused on the adventures of John Peter McAllister, an aging ninja master, (Lee Van Cleef) and his young pupil, Max Keller (Timothy Van Patten). Most episodes focused on the mismatched pair driving around in a custom van, helping people in need along the way, similar to its more well-known contemporary, The A-Team. The Master lasted only 13 episodes before cancellation.

I watched this!

i remember the first episode of Misfits of Science had this frozen guy walking around yelling AMELIA--he was dropped after the first episode but he was awesome. i kept waiting for him to reappear

I watched the Master religiously - the white kid from the White Shadow (Salami!) was on it!

Manimal too - how long was that on...? I remember thinking it was lame that he could only turn into two animals, what kinda power is that...

Automan was my shit! the Lamborghini. that crazy bike and helicopter with blue lights. there was that little floating thing that was his buddy

like what their budget couldn't afford the occasional bear or snake or giraffe or whatever

x-post

Okay, you people who actually watched The Master at the time were insane.

there was that little floating thing that was his buddy

CURSOR!

Okay, you people who actually watched The Master at the time were insane.

hey I was 10 years old

Wait, I'm older than you? That disturbs me for some reason.

Thanks Ned; that MST3K stuff is even funnier than I remember it being.

That Supertrain thing looks so weird. But so does the Mark Hamill thing, and half of the stuff mentioned in this thread. I wish that it were easy or even possible to watch a lot of these shows. On occasion I've browsed through some of those books which are basically comprehensive listings of every television series ever, or encyclopedias of sitcoms or whatever, and there is a staggering amount of shows which seem to be based on concepts that are completely batshit. It's kind of a shame that it's relatively easy to download an mp3 of some vanity pressing that some obscure dude made in his basement thirty years ago, but if I want to watch an episode of Supertrain, I'm probably out of luck.

Love, Sydney

Okay, you people who actually watched The Master at the time were insane.

I watched it at the time; I think I was maybe in sixth grade, and obsessed with martial arts.

x-post -- A shame but makes sense -- you can find the vanity pressing as a physical object. But if the show was only broadcast once, nobody taped it and the only copy is sitting in a network vault, *shrug*

(And of course widespread home taping didn't kick in until the eighties anyway, so anything earlier, you're REALLY SOL most of the time.)

I watched it at the time; I think I was maybe in sixth grade, and obsessed with martial arts.

yeah I was reading a lot of Frank Miller Daredevils and watching Shaw Bros movies and had become enamored of all things ninja- and kung-fu-related

xpost
Yeah, and I wonder if the shows even still exist in the fabled network vaults, or if they only held on to copies of the more prestigious series. Is anybody here in "the biz"? How does/did that sort of thing work?

I will bet anything that everyone of these comedies listed had an appearance by Jack Riley in at least one episode. it.

it

No I think that was a very valid and important point.

if they have copies of these things then why not release them? it would be all profit for the networks. so many people buy the crappy DVD's of any old shows they have out now.

Shakey, that sounds pretty much like me, but maybe substitute the comic books with pro wrestling.

Yeah, I'm surprised by some of the seemingly more forgettable shows which have actually gotten proper DVD releases.

Full House: The Definitive Collector's Edition

Hey, they're releasing Perfect Strangers on DVD. Anything's possible.

Of all the shows to pick, why "Full House"? People actually watched and liked that (even though it sucked).

What was the space show that had a kid with blue hair named Loki on it?

Has anyone ever heard Dana Carvey talk about the short-lived eighties sitcom vehicle that he was on with Mickey Rooney? Pretty hilarious, especially the part about how Rooney was convinced (and just kinda assumed) that Carvey was gay, and would try to rib him about it all the time (think Mr. Roper taking shots at Jack Tripper).

Full House: The Definitive Collector's Edition

Assuming you were being sarcastic, this actually exists already. Saw it while shopping over the weekend. It may be titled slightly different, but its a box set of all the seasons.

yes I know it exists.

its existence is completely unnecessary, seeing how heavily syndicated the show was (shit, its probably STILL on somewhere)

i'm sure it is

What was the space show that had a kid with blue hair named Loki on it?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0075585/

Back in 1982, when both were struggling actors, Nathan Lane and Dana Carvey played roommates on the NBC sitcom One of the Boys. Mickey Rooney played Carvey's grandfather.

''Mickey Rooney was a real colorful character, told us great stories. He used to walk around and say, 'I was the No. 1 star in the world, hear me? The world!' And that's when he was alone in his dressing cubicle,'' Carvey said.

Carvey said Rooney rarely appeared on the set, apparently preferring to spend time at the race track. Carvey and Lane had to rehearse with Rooney's stand-in, and the day of taping, Rooney would show up and try to read his lines off cue cards.

If that wasn't nerve-racking enough, Scatman Crothers played Rooney's best friend.

''I remember that Mickey wouldn't learn the lines, and Scatman was always in the bathroom smoking something,'' Lane said. ''When they did a scene together, it was like Waiting for Godot. They would just stare at each other and hope that somehow the dialog would appear in their heads.''

Lane remembered Rooney as an entrepreneur. He tried to sell a cassette tape of acting lessons, and pushed a camp for kids, called Talent Town.

Far fucking out, thanks Hi Dere, I've been trying to remember that for years.

of all the sites for my job to block imdb is probably the only one they do

Scatman Crothers = total bro

I was in New York stuck on a sitcom with Mickey Rooney, Nathan Lane, Meg Ryan and Scatman Crothers called "One of the Boys". Mickey Rooney was always talking- "I was the number one star in the worrrld, you hear me? The worrrld. Bang! The Worrrld! Judy Garland never owned a car. They pumped her so full of drugs they killed her! How long has Robert Redford been in the business, ten years? I've been in the business sixty-one years." He was sixty-two at the time. He would act out entire movies that he thought of, with lines like "How are you Mr Fuck? I'm Mrs. Shit."

Well, Hong Kong Phooey was a total stoner, wasn't he?

He would act out entire movies that he thought of, with lines like "How are you Mr Fuck? I'm Mrs. Shit."

Dude should have taught screenwriting at Virginia Tech.

http://www.supernaturalcrime.com/Art/Ark2.jpg

the crow series on UPN
phenom
look who's talking tv series (so bad)

Scatman Crothers=magic negro

http://www.popgadget.net/images/Isis.jpg

whoops, didnt realize the look who's talking tv series was called "baby talk"...

Phenom! I think I had a crush on that girl.

Isis was cool: "I am...Isis...is...is....is"

The vague memories of Isis are returning.

Saturday mornings. . .I barely remember it

was automan the guy that melted into cars and shit>?

Haha that Phenom girl was in the Comedy Central Porn n Chicken movie.

was automan the guy that melted into cars and shit>?

yes!

xpost
Yeah, I just read that, but I don't remember that movie at all. I was trying to find a picture of her from the time of the Phenom series, but no luck.

Okay, you people who actually watched The Master at the time were insane.

I was nine and loved ninjas. I wanted to be a ninja, so I could kill some of my classmates.

oh god its a pic of the froozles and sally. im going to cry...

http://latvlegends.com/HoboKelly/SBfroozleCR.gif

oh god im tearing up people http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kfty-TZ1uk this is my childhood

http://latvlegends.com/Dustytreehaus/Dustystan4.GIF
Dusty's Treehouse

Whoa, that Froozles thing seems even more psychedelic than most kids' shows of the time were. Also, "The people are puppets, and puppets are people, too!" WTF?

manuel is tweaking

After these messages, we'll be rigggghhhhht back.

Nickleodeon had Pinwheel, Maya The Bee, The Adventures of Kid Koala, and The Noozles (what was the fascination with koala bears). I remember my little sister watching Alegra's Window.

My favorite saturday morning cartoon was King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Swat Kats was dead awesome ass well.

Some short lived people shows: Vacant Lot (canadian sketch comedy), Thunder Alley (fox '94), and Zoe, Duncan, Jack & Jane ('99)

And magic mikey or something was a cartoon about a kid who had magical diapers he used as weapons?

DC Follies

Mickey Rooney was always talking- "I was the number one star in the worrrld, you hear me? The worrrld. Bang! The Worrrld! Judy Garland never owned a car. They pumped her so full of drugs they killed her! How long has Robert Redford been in the business, ten years? I've been in the business sixty-one years."

Didn't Carvey do this as an imitation of Rooney on SNL?

The 70s had cartoons I vaguely remember. Speedy Buggy, Wait Til Your Father Gets Home, The Harlem Globetrotters, and a cartoon about a black kid angel who would go down to earth and help his friends, one of which talked in ryhmes.

gershy are you old enough to remember "We'll Get By," a blue-collar family series created by Alan Alda starring Paul Sorvino that only ran for about five episodes? Or "Busting Loose," which lasted about a season and starred Adam Arkin as a young guy on his own for the first time hosting Odd Couple-style poker games in his batchelor pad and featured Barbara Rhoades as his cute neighbor?

SOME PEOPLE may have watched too much TV as children.

That's for sure.

I wasn't allowed to watch tv, so what tv I did watch was at weird hours and remembered in detail.

Didn't Carvey do this as an imitation of Rooney on SNL?

Yeah, but I've also seen him do it on talk shows, and he goes into more detail about Rooney's behavior on the set of the sitcom. It's much funnier then anything I remember him ever doing on SNL.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/c/c6/ThatsMyMama.jpg/180px-ThatsMyMama.jpg

That's My Mama

http://www.toonopedia.com/uimages/toons/k/kwicky.jpg

Kwicky Koala

ouch

http://www.toonopedia.com/uimages/toons/k/kwicky.jpg

That's My Mama
Yeah, I remember that one. Clifton Davis played a barber. In the middle that's his buddy Earl, the mailman. Often eclipsed in memory by the longer-running, more popular "What's Happening!!"

I loved Isis! She would have crossover episodes with Shazam!
Also- Second Hundred Years, about an unfrozen prospector
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Second_Hundred_Years_%28TV_series%29
and Too Something with Eric Schaeffer (I was ridiculously into this show while it was on. Things are different now)

"In the late '80s a pilot for a revival series called That's My Mama Now! with Ted Lange as the star was produced, but lack of enough stations signing up ensured the death of the revival."

Just like What's Happening Now!!!

wasnt busting loose starring jimmy jj walker based on teh richard pryor movie?

I remember Second Hundred Years!

How about The Good Guys, Bob Denver's post-Gilligan series (with Herb Edelman, as I recall).

Also The New People, a 45-minute drama about a group of college students stranded on a deserted island?

And there was a Laugh-In ripoff in the late 60s that may have lasted only one episode. I saw it and even my 11 or 12 year old self thought it was too tasteless. Can't remember the name or network.

<i>And magic mikey or something was a cartoon about a kid who had magical diapers he used as weapons?</i>

The kid down the street's kid brother watched this, I think it was "Fantastic Max."

Jake's Journey was a show I'd heard about when it was still in development (no idea how, since that was pre-internet days) starring Graham Chapman...I waited in vain for this to appear, but it never did, and then he died.

http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/4063/dbsdelightpr5.jpg

Wow, what is that? ^^^

A game show hosted by an English gentleman puppet?

My Secret Identity

not sure how far outside of st. louis it reached... it was a late 70's kids' variety show/game-show.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D.B.'s_Delight

Cool!

And there was a Laugh-In ripoff in the late 60s that may have lasted only one episode. I saw it and even my 11 or 12 year old self thought it was too tasteless. Can't remember the name or network.

The legendary Turn On -- never knew anyone who actually saw it!

Ah, I was trying to remember the name of that show so that I could google it. I remember reading about it; I think they had a sequence where a "computer" of sorts spat out jokes that the cast would then read...or something like that...

How has nobody named Cop Rock?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cop_Rock

http://img187.imageshack.us/img187/4457/coprocktv2.jpg

Tales of the Gold Monkey!

A total Indy Jones rip off from after the second movie came out. The Gold Monkey was an old, faithful (yet ever on the verge of falling apart) airplane the hero would fly around the pacific in search of exotic locations and corny adventures.

Yes, Turn On it was! My parents (or at least my Mom) I think were watching with me and throughout the whole show I was expecting them to make me change the channel. Maybe she/they weren't paying attention.

Also I remember When Things Were Rotten, Mel Brooks' Robin Hood take-off, starring Dick Gauthier (Hymie the robot from Get Smart).

x-post: I don't think Cop Rock is obscure enough.

Oh crap, there's a fansite!

http://www.goldmonkey.com/

how could anyone forget cop rock

pfft--Sledgehammer and Herman's head were on this list, and those have been in pop culture lore for YEARS

Tales of the Gold Monkey!

Starring Stephen Collins after the first Star Trek movie and before 7th Heaven

But you're the first one to ask why a well-known show hasn't been mentioned yet. We let the earlier unqualified cites slide.

cop rock is not obscure that shit was in the news

That was to BoJo.

problem is the thread title is "semi-obscure", not "obscure".

cop rock aint even semi obscure

gimme a break I've talked to several people who have completely forgotten about that show. it's all subjective.

besides, half this isn't isn't obscure. Silk Stalkings? Small Wonder? Nurses (hell, it lasted three seasons and my parents watched it weekly!), Harlem Globetrotters? Valeries/Hogan's Family?

half this "list" that should say

sorry bro you've been exiled from this thread.

We've Got it Maid -

A jiggle show about a pair of odd couple bachelors and their soopah-sexxxie housekeeper. Kind of like Three's Company but even more lewd, obvious, and stupid.

And although Manimal, the Master, and Misfits of Science have all gotten their props on this thread, it seems to me that there was another show in this lineup that died even faster, with a talking genius orangutan as the presidents closest (and most secret) advisor. Mr. Bananas or something like that.

pfft, I brought the Huggabunch back from the dead.

Pretty sure it was the original source of Homer Simpson's fave "Hail to the Chimp."

Cop Rock was a short-lived Steven Bochco television series on the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) in 1990. It was an attempt to combine musical theater with the police drama, a format in which Bochco had already been very successful with Hill Street Blues. For example, one scene in a courtroom had the jury break into song, proclaiming "He's Guilty" in Gospel style. Another episode had a lineup of Hispanic suspects proclaim in song "We're the local color with the coppertone skin / And you treat us like we're guilty of some terrible sin."

that shit was high-profile, very big news when it aired.

'powerhouse' -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powerhouse_%28TV_series%29

Set in Washington DC, Powerhouse focused on the adventures of a racially and ethnically diverse group of six teenagers and young adults from the inner-city. The basic theme of the series is that every person is a source of creativity and power. "We all have a powerhouse deep down inside," as one line said in the show's theme song. Episodes dealt with significant personal issues such as alcoholism, peer pressure, physical fitness, etc., but combined them with fast-paced action/adventure stories in which the group often had to solve a mystery or prevent a crime. For instance, in one episode they had to uncover the head of a racketeering operation that threatened to put Brenda, and the Powerhouse, out of business. In another episode they try to track down the source of a potentially lethal food-poisoning epidemic, a task that takes on even greater urgency when one of the group becomes infected.

http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/6/6c/200px-Lookwell.jpg

^kind of cheating

that shit was high-profile, very big news when it aired.

So is Cavemen right now, in 20 years people will only remember the commercials.

http://imdb.com/title/tt0085059/plotsummary

Mr. Smith was a talking orangutan with an IQ of 256 that worked as a political advisor in Washington, D.C. Only a small number of people knew Mr. Smith's secret, so while Mr. Smith was trying to solve any number of political problems, his friends were trying to keep his profile low.

Wallace Shawn was originally set to voice Mr. Smith, but changed his mind when he realized, were he to die, that his last project would be that of a talking orangutan.

Janet Dean, Registered Nurse

ezekiel saw the wheel. this is the wheel he said he saw.

CLIFFHANGERS

<quote>"The Curse of Dracula": starring Michael Nouri as Count Dracula, who is living undercover as a college teacher in 1979 San Francisco.</quote>

I give up.

The Show was the best thing I ever saw. He made people feel real about things in life. I have just one wish lift in me and is someday I can see him again. I have a son that I name after him. My wish that someday he could meet my son. My son is now in the U.S. Army now. He never got to see Enos.

cliffhangers was so wacky. wonder what the pitch to the network was like.

In an effort to recreate the movie serial experience, none of the three serials began with the first chapter. "Stop Susan Williams" began with Chapter II, "The Secret Empire" with Chapter III, and "The Curse Of Dracula" with Chapter VI.

how do you misspell "confuse and repel viewers" as "recreate the movie serial experience"?

l.a. blow frenzy, delusions of grandeur, etc.

however it is awesome to watch cowboys wrestle space lizards when you are 8

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y176/edwardiii/nbc_cliffhangers.jpg

also, bath-taking susan anton oddly stirring

Am I the only one who remembers a sitcom called Scorch which was kind of like Alf but with a dragon?

lol

how will we explain to future generations the existence of a show centered on an innuendo-dubbed truck driver and his primate sidekick

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y176/edwardiii/bjbear.jpg

In 1981, when the show returned from hiatus, B.J. had settled down to run Bear Enterprises, a trucking company based in Los Angeles. His nemesis was Rutherford T. Grant (Murray Hamilton), the corrupt head of the state's Special Crimes Action Team, who was a silent partner in a competing trucking company. Because of Grant's harassment, B.J. was unable to hire experienced truckers, and he was forced to hire several beautiful young female truckers, including Grant's daughter Cindy (Sherilyn Wolter), and another busty blond nicknamed "Stacks" (Judy Landers).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Powers_of_Matthew_Star

Lou Gossett Jr, how great is the pity that you deserve.

I was more fond of BJ's nemesis Sheriff Lobo and his attendant spin-off

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Misadventures_of_Sheriff_Lobo

OH OH OH DO YOU GUYS REMEMBER WHEN the bad local syndicated channel (5 in LA) had a NEW SITCOM EVERY WEEKNIGHT? one was based on Capra's 1938 classic "You Can't Take it With You" and another starring Yacov Smirnoff called "What't a Country"?! What were the other 3? I think one was new episodes of 5th season Charles in Charge or something.

cliffhangers was so wacky.

Part of the charm. Saw just about every episode.

Hahah, Chaki, I'm GLAD to not remember that. Good god.

powerhouse sounds intense, man

roundhouse on nickelodeon was pretty fly. the house band were like 17 year old dudes that looked, sounded exactly like, and wore shirts of THE CHURCH!!

I'm having a total mental block on sheriff lobo. everytime I try to picture him I see roscoe p coltrane laughing his psychotic chee chee chee in my mind's eye...

oh no im thinking of dont just sit there. roundhouse was diff.

Don't Just Sit There was a television show on Nickelodeon that first aired in 1988 and lasted for three seasons. The show was a talk show mixed with a comedy. Out of Order was the house band on the series, they would later get to sing on the show as well as participate in sketches.

The show had guests like Davy Jones, Mayim Bialik, Michael Palin, and New Kids on the Block. One of the first musical guests on the show was the ska band Fishbone.

Chris Guice, bass player and lead singer for Out of Order, now plays with nationally touring Latin rock act deSol.

Mike Baldwin, drummer for Out of Order, now plays with Richmond based Celtic punk band The Ex-Patriots

http://www.tvcrazy.net/tvclassics/americantv/bj/lobo-wallpaper.jpg

ALL COMING BACK TO ME NOW

cliffhangers was so wacky.

Part of the charm. Saw just about every episode.

all 10 of them! where is the dvd I ask.

Perhaps not obscure enough but there's C.P.O. Sharkey. The Dickies appeared on this show as some punk band causing trouble in one episode.

This wiki entry notes the "cigarette box incident" that was talked about on ILE concerning Johnny Carson's alleged racism.

Sheriff Lobo...he's the law! so went his awesome (I think) Hoyt Axton theme song.
I remember CPO Sharkey! it was a hoot

I remember nothing about "day by day" other than it featuring both Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Courtney Thorne-Smith. Apparently a vv young Thora Birch was involved as well...

oh god i remember everything about that show. it was a spin off of something.

This is the thread where I admit that I have every episode of Automan and Project UFO as avis.

i've been trying to remember this show forever, it aired for barely a second - i know it got cancelled before its first season ran out, early-mid 80's, about some round-the-world scavenger hunt that played out each week, hosted by some millionaire mastermind or some shit. ring any bells?

i kept thinking it was called Quest, but imdb's got bupkis.

"They Came From Somewhere Else" I think it was called, anyone remember this. I don't know which channel it was on, weird though. All I can remember is the theme tune.

I'm a Big Girl Now (I think it was on after Benson, and maybe it was a spinoff?).
Pink Lady and Jeff.
Partners in Crime with Loni Anderson and Lynda Carter.

wasnt busting loose starring jimmy jj walker based on teh richard pryor movie?
Those two are called Bustin' Loose

How about The Good Guys, Bob Denver's post-Gilligan series (with Herb Edelman, as I recall).
Also the Gilligan-goes-west Dusty's Trail with Bob as the sidekick to lost-wagon-train leader Forrest Tucker.

Also The New People, a 45-minute drama about a group of college students stranded on a deserted island?
Yeah, I remember that one. Somebody mentioned that a little while back on a thread similar to this one.

The terrible Peter Cook sitcom was The Two of Us - and when it was on I watched every single one o_O

I'd actually KILL for a DVD of Isis.

All you Isis lovers should go over on this thread

More Jason Bateman obscurity, Chicago Sons (with G.D. Sprad-, er, D.B. Swee-, er, D.W. Moffett!)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118284/

Also: He's the Mayor

This is the thread where I admit that I have every episode of Automan and Project UFO as avis.

WANT

"And Then Came Bronson" was produced by MGM in 1968. The theatrical title was pared down to "Then Came Bronson" by the time it hit the small screen in the U.S. It was first shown in the U.S. on March 24, 1969 on NBC-TV as a movie of the week, starring Michael Parks and a red Harley Sportster. Coming close on the heels of the surprisingly successful "Easy Rider" cycle flick, NBC quickly adapted the movie to a one hour weekly series format. Contrary to popular belief, the TCB movie wasn't made in response to Easy Rider's popularity, it was in production pre Easy Rider. The movie version was released to foreign audiences as a theatrical feature film. The feature version was not shown to U.S. audiences for two reasons, and they were both on Bonnie Bedelia's bare chest

goin down that long lonesome highway/tryin to live life my way

"Where you headed?"
"Nowhere in particular."
"Man, I wish I was you."
"Well, stay cool."

Thank you, MST3K, for ensuring I know that.

i've been trying to remember this show forever, it aired for barely a second - i know it got cancelled before its first season ran out, early-mid 80's, about some round-the-world scavenger hunt that played out each week, hosted by some millionaire mastermind or some shit. ring any bells?

Yeah, I remember that, and like you I thought it was called The Quest. I've got a great book called Bad TV which doubtless mentions it.

i totally remember 'what a country!'

it was like welcome back kotter but with wacky immigrants instead of street toughs.

The 80s Gidget show. She was all grown up with a family of her own. Ed Roth did a guest shot in one ep.

I remember liking a show called The Ugliest Girl In Town, with Peter Kastner (whose only other claim to fame is he starred in FF Coppola's You're A Big Boy Now, one of my fave 60s teen movies). It was about a guy that dressed as a girl, but he gets popular as a model because he's so unlike all the other models.

From wiki:
Timothy Blair is a Hollywood talent agent. He falls in love with Julie Renfield, a British actress, visiting the United States to do a movie. After that movie is finished, she returns to England. To get his mind off her, Timothy dresses as a hippie and poses for his brother Gene, a photographer. When the photos appear in a magazine a modeling agent in England sees it and assumes that it's a woman, and he offers "her" a job. Knowing this would be the only chance to be with Julie, Tim accepts and dubs himself Timmie. Tim has two weeks vacation time to spend as much time with Julie as he can, but when as he is about to leave with his brother, Gene loses £11,000 gambling. Unless he pays him back, Tim has to continue being Timmie for a while longer.

Some bizarre stop motion animation called "Qwak" about a duck folded out of multicoloured origami paper that could turn itself into other things by way of some "origami transform". Set in a world full of other origami shape changing animals and appeared to have no plot whatsoever. May also have been French.

Which brings us back to

"They Came From Somewhere Else" I think it was called, anyone remember this. I don't know which channel it was on, weird though. All I can remember is the theme tune.

-- Ste, Thursday, 29 November 2007 09:50 (Yesterday) Bookmark Link

I remember that! Early Channel 4, some Police featured, some odd aliens eating cigarettes. Weird.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_Came_From_Somewhere_Else

Heh:

One of the more notable characters was Wendy, a laughing police officer who sounded a bit like Sybil Fawlty. Towards the end of the series, her demise came as she literally laughed her head off.

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/morespace/itvtvs/progs/theycamefromsomewhereelse.jpg

Made by TVS, responsible for some real garbage in their own region:
http://www.arkspace.abelgratis.co.uk/tvs-progs-1.html

...and also "Knights of God"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_of_God

I swear I'm the only person who remembers an early 90s/late 80s edutainment show about aliens who disguise themselves as flying chairs so that they can observe human beings and then report on them, Mork and Mindy style.

Anyone?

...or The Metric System, on PBS mid-70s. Theme song:
"...it's a system based on 10...THE METRIC SYSTEM!"

http://www.metafilter.com/68703/Multilink-Mike-Post-post

That shit is fucking with my head...

Wow, totally forgot about Charlie & Company, the sort of Cosby knock-off featuring the triple threat of Flip Wilson, Gladys Knight, and a young Urkel...

I have a vague memory of an '80s show where the opening credits froze into high-contrast B&W (or maybe a negative image) like a lightning strike lighting effect.

It was some kind of paranormal/Twilight Zone thing, but I remember nothing else about it. Probably a syndicated series that only lasted a half-season and will haunt me forever.

Are you thinking of Tales from the Darkside?

Even if not, you gotta love the great creep intro to that show: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnE3-0X-174

i really wanna start a ted mcginley appreciation thread.

How about Hard TIme on Planet Earth?

Jesse, an alien is sent to Earth and finds himself in Los Angeles. His only companion is a floating, orb-shaped parole officer named Control. Doomed to stay on Earth until he can show compassion, Control helps him u lead as normal a life as possible, but not knowing Earthly ways he often finds himself in trouble.

This and They Came from Outer Space were my 9-year-old self's favorite shows.

lol @ the wizard

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlXqkpAhW1M

man this sax guy got a lot of work in '89.

there's a whole series of these organized by year. obviously most aren't obscure, but occasionally there's a good "woah, what?!" moment. these may be the same series of vids get bent posted 3 years ago, but those links are dead.

it's unbelievable how long some show openers used to be. I mean, I'm not into this recent trend of using like a 5 second logo reveal with no theme song or anything, but I also don't think I would sit through anything longer than 30 seconds anymore.

bobtwcatlanta's channel is a treasure trove of this stuff

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6JmJxlPZA0

it's unbelievable how long some show openers used to be. I mean, I'm not into this recent trend of using like a 5 second logo reveal with no theme song or anything, but I also don't think I would sit through anything longer than 30 seconds anymore.

― lizard tails, a self-regenerating food source for survival (wk), Friday, July 22, 2011 5:50 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

That's partly a result of networks squeezing more commercials in. On the early-season Simpsons DVD commentaries, the producers talk about how a full two minutes has been lopped off the show since the mid-90s. Shows don't have time for a long intro anymore, much less a decent b-story.

is out of this world not obscure enough

That's partly a result of networks squeezing more commercials in.

also of course, they're scared of people changing channels, which wasn't quite as much of a concern when there were only 3 things on. plus presumably people just skip the show opens now.

I just spent like an hour watching these. I am not proud of myself.

And yet every now and again I would be like "oh man young Ellen Degeneres played a supporting role on this show that was on when I was 7 and I never watched!" and somehow that would make me watch eight more minutes.

There was a show I saw once in the mid-later 80s, a BBC thing... I only recall this one episode about a haunted radio station, where the DJ was being phoned up by a ghost or bothered by one (maybe ala "play misty for me"?) Anyway all I recall elswise is "Ghosts" by Japan was played in it at one point. Does that ring bells for anyone?

anybody remember the short-lived Hardball on Fox?

the baseball 'comedy' from the mid-90s?

Yeah. Having the strike going on irl at the same time (not to mention being a live action sitcom ON FOX) killed it quick.

it's weird because it wasn't a good show at all, but it was the kind of garbage I liked as a kid, as it was edgy enough that I could enjoy it without my parents banning me from watching it.

but now all I remember about it is one player constantly making jokes about wanting to have sex with other men and the episode where all the bats got bent and they had to borrow a bat from a coach named Butt.

completely forgot it was on during the strike. that might explain the other reason I liked it, as I was a Braves fan and despite being in second, was disappointed to not get the pennant race with the Expos.

wtf? Joe Rogan was on it!

lol I don't even remember that!

Which reminds me there was a Get Smart continuation series on Fox around the the same time, with Don Adams, Barbara Feldon, and...Andy Dick, who played their son. I wanna say the week after the last episode aired Newsradio premiered.

Code Name: Foxfire (1985) (8 episodes)
The President of the United States assigns his brother to assemble a covert team of female counter-intelligence operatives, reporting only to him. The leader is former CIA operative Liz "Foxfire" Towne, (Joanna Cassidy) who just got out of prison after serving four years for a crime she didn't commit. Her operatives are reformed con artist and burglar Maggie Towne (Sheryl Lee Ralph) and streetwise driver Danny O'Toole, assisted by Phillips the butler.

I was convinced for years I was the only person who recalled this, esp with any fondness, until I saw Pulp Fiction where Uma Thurman’s character talk about a pilot she did called Fox Force Five following the exploits of an all-female team of secret agents. Google just told me Joel Schumacher was one of the creators

Partners in Crime – Loni Anderson and Lynda Carter
First episode date: September 27, 1984 - Final episode date: December 29, 1984
When their ex-husband winds up murdered, Carole and Sydney set out to find his killer and eventually decide to run the detective agency that they have inherited from him.

Cover Up (undercover CIA agents with the cover of male models and photographer Jennifer O'Neill as handler) is kinda there but think ppl remember that due to Jon-Erik Hexum's death serving as a cautionary tale, or maybe that is very 80s/age specific

But oh yeah, Manimal, Misfits of Science, Automan were on my viewing lists early mid-80s, (tks DJP years after yer post for reminder)
wasn't there also Whiz (Wiz) Kids early proto teen genius/hacker types?

This was one of the best series ever, everyone remembers hardball. it's a shame it only ran for one series.

The chemistry between John Ashton & Richard Tyson was amazing, it has to be one of the most underrated TV shows that people enjoyed that never got a second series or even more.

The comedy between these two was brilliant. it's a shame they can't remake the series as it would not be the same without John Ashton & Richard Tyson, to me they made hardball and it would be impossible to replace them.

Columbia Pictures Television would make a fortune if they released this as a box set. i'm almost certain it would be a hit.

actually i was just the other day looking up the theme song to "monkey magic", which is to say the tv show actually called "monkey magic", not the late '70s japanese adaptation of journey to the west called "monkey" in english which everybody knows as "monkey magic" because of its theme song.

that's not confusing at all, right? anyway in the late '90s there was an animated remake of, basically, the late '70s japanese adaptation of "journey to the west" except this time they actually called it "monkey magic". tommy marolda wrote and performed the theme song and it's extremely good. it ran for 13 episodes with a tie-in playstation game.

i could go on for years about shows like these, particularly from the '70s which nobody remembers at all, for instance:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hizzonner

I don't know that it's considered obscure anymore, but none of my peers growing up had any memory whatsoever of The Great Space Coaster, and I'd started to wonder if I hadn't dreamed its existence until the internet fully bloomed and became a depository of cultural detritus throughout time.

Monkey Magic is a great name. Redolent of film classic Carnival Magic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGbGVtcHETs

Before Pirates of the Carribean, there was....

Disney Presents: The 100 Lives of Black Jack Savage

― Bo Jackson Overdrive, Wednesday, November 28, 2007 10:57 AM

The Slap Maxwell Story popped in my head the other day

(Oops, xpost) Each episode ended with a tally of how many lives the main characters had to save to avoid eternal damnation...As a boy I was very excited to see it get down to 0! The show ended after 7 episodes.

I have never met anyone else who recalls seeing this show:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otherworld_%28TV_series%29

― Shakey Mo Collier, Tuesday, 27 November 2007 19:32 (twelve years ago) link

Hold up was this a show where the guns were weirdly held upside down with the barrel on the bottom and not the top? I want to say maybe the family was driving around in a minivan too.

in the "unjustly forgotten" category i'll nominate the '60s series "The Trials of O'Brian", starring Peter Falk as an irascible Irish lawyer who nevertheless has strong similarities of character to an Italian police lieutenant. From the episodes I've seen I'd say I might like it even better than Columbo (not meant as a knock on Levinson, Link, Bochco, etc), but it was a one-season wonder that aired the very last year the American networks produced new black and white programming for prime time, so it's barely been seen since.

The Slap Maxwell Story popped in my head the other day

― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, February 26, 2020 8:41 AM (fifteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

See also: Buffalo Bill. Dabney Coleman really deserved better than a handful of short-lived and quickly-forgotten tv vehicles.

Multiyear xpost, yeah, Automan, Misfits of Science ... everyone remembers Airwolf, many remember at least the idea of Manimal, but I sure watched those first two. I used to think of Automan every time I heard "Automatic" by the Pointer Sisters.

Maybe mentioned above, but when I was very little (so, let's say early '80s) there was some show about two kids, a boy and a girl, on different space stations or something who would communicate sort of like pen pals via video screens in between iirc non-fiction science stuff. Might have been a PBS show, but I can't remember what it was called.

Josh in Chicago ! i'VE SEEN THAT SHOW! I, and friend, were tripping our brains out and one friend had retreated to his bedroom, giggling hysterically, watching this show which cut between space station pen-pals and documentary clips on random topics like sheep shearing

This was one of the best series ever, everyone remembers hardball. it's a shame it only ran for one series.

The chemistry between John Ashton & Richard Tyson was amazing, it has to be one of the most underrated TV shows that people enjoyed that never got a second series or even more.

The comedy between these two was brilliant. it's a shame they can't remake the series as it would not be the same without John Ashton & Richard Tyson, to me they made hardball and it would be impossible to replace them.

Columbia Pictures Television would make a fortune if they released this as a box set. i'm almost certain it would be a hit.

― Kate (rushomancy), Wednesday, February 26, 2020 9:22 AM bookmarkflaglink

I think we are talking diff Hardballs. Mine came out in 1994 and was baseball themed

that was the joke

Oh. Well i didn't actually remember the other Hardball lol

what about skag, nobody remembers skag

here's casey kasem informing us that "karl malden is skag"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46iJQ2DgKPw

where is the complete blu-ray release of skag with copious bonus features and multiple commentary tracks? where?

i thought that was sorta infamous in a "this is what he left mash for?" kind of way.

― tremendoid

ok i've been absorbing myself all week in this sort of thing and mclean stevenson is being defamed! hello larry was his _third_ series after leaving mash, lear had to coax him out of retirement to do it (i can just imagine him assuring stevenson that no, absolutely, "hello larry" was _not_ going to be another Hot L Baltimore debacle). the other two were even more obscure - "the mclean stevenson show" and another norman lear flop called "in the beginning" where stevenson played a priest. but it's "hello larry" that everybody remembers because it got more push and, accordingly, more push-back. i was actually watching a promo from the FlemishDog collection and apparently Hello Larry was running on RTV Hong Kong in the early '80s! There's probably an alternate universe somewhere involving crazed McLean Stevenson fans hounding RTV to see if they have any copies of "Hello Larry" episodes still around.

I'm unconvinced that some of these alleged shows were actually broadcast. "Photon" I can maybe buy, but "Peppermint Park", that has to be a hoax, doesn't it?

don't know that it's considered obscure anymore, but none of my peers growing up had any memory whatsoever of The Great Space Coaster, and I'd started to wonder if I hadn't dreamed its existence until the internet fully bloomed and became a depository of cultural detritus throughout time.

more proof that old lunch and i am the same person: i just watched an episode or two here and it broke my fuckin' brain; definitely haven't seen hide nor hair of these since i was ten or younger.

https://thegreatspacecoaster.tv/full-episodes-of-the-great-space-coaster/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31MxW4tyQ-o

thing i didn't know: Goriddle Gorilla is performed by Kevin Clash of Elmo infamy

i definitely thought i imagined the magic pencil animation segments from that show... that shit is racy and sexist as hell!

I wish there were a German word for the particular variety of brain-breakage you describe. When I first got the Sesame Street Old School sets, I kept coming across clips that I hadn't seen since I was like three but that were apparently somehow locked away perfectly in the long-lost toddler center of my memory and it had this weird dissociative effect like suddenly being reintroduced in adulthood to my imaginary friend.

it's a kind of concentrated nostalgia, like hashish

Is Profit not obscure enough? It seems like a precursor to '10s event tv.

anybody remember the brief time Monopoly was a (terrible) game show?

anybody remember the terrible THEME song?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVi-LsPctYA

really does feel like something that could have only existed in that awkward transitional period that was the early 90s

Tripp is really terrible on this episode

the host seems like he has somewhere to be in the next 5 minutes

now that we have been blessed for decades with more than 100 cable channels, recently complemented by more than a dozen streaming services, this thread can now graze upon vast pastures of semi-obscure programming, whole continents of barely remembered (because barely memorable) media content, unquenchable artisian springs of senseless, plotless, uncompelling unoriginal offerings. have fun!

ok, Mr Martindale

*winks*

the orgasmic "Oh!" in that theme song is really something

haha I noticed that a well.

we as a family didn't watch it long because my dad is a pedant like me and he kept yelling THIS ISN'T HOW THE GAME WORKS which is pretty rich because he didn't play by the correct rules when we played it at home

I think I watched maybe 2-3 episodes of this show, which is enough to have permanently put the theme song in my head. I imagine it took them less time to write that song than it is long

"what rhymes with monopoly?"

"..."

"fuck it, let's just spell it and repeat it over and over"

Not a tv show but these animations played during saturday afternoon movies in the syracuse ny market

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qzqenhYO1g

love that rotoscoped animation

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eNzUBT1ohhc

Unsub reboot, investigator now hired by ppl wanting to know why they've lost social media followers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beverly_Hills_Buntz

Beverly Hills Bantz

Just scrolled and saw the great space coaster and if it makes forks and old lunch feel better I fucking loved that show and was/still am obsessed with Gary Gnu. He was the best!

Anyone remember the very short lived Nightmare on Elm Street tv show Freddie's Nightmares? One episode of that sparked night terrors in me that lasted months.

There was a Twilight Zone-esque anthology series I saw when I was a kid, and the only thing I could remember is the intro credits featured a roller coaster at night. A little digging turned up Journey to the Unknown, a short-lived British series produced by Hammer Films which aired in the US 1968-69. And all the episodes are on youtube! I know what I'm doing this weekend!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNMmkqjpT0c

Even that font gets me excited!

I vaguely remember liking Crime Story. Does that fall under this decription?

Is BAKERSFIElD P.D. considered to be too obscure? 30 years old at this point, and it laid the groundwork for some many single camera comedies today, except it was actually hilarious

A Canadian show recommendation, and it’s pretty obscure even to us: the primetime stop motion comedy What It’s Like Being Alone

https://www.cbc.ca/programguide/program/what_its_like_being_alone

i have the complete run of beverly hills buntz sitting around in the archives somewhere

thanks for the tip on "what it's like being alone", sounds really interesting

here's one video with the complete run

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKS8OggZ8cg

it does seem to be really obscure, not even on the site i use to find obscure old shows. on youtube though.

the latest thing on my "to watch" pile is the 2008 brazilian miniseries "capitu". the featured review of it on imdb is amazing:

¨Based¨ (in the worst possible sense) on the classic novel Dom Casmurro, ¨Capitu¨ is a pseudo-theatricalization of the book, introducing an invented mental insanity into the protagonist Bentinho, and reversing the latter's love for his beloved wife Maria Capitolina into a kind of hate relationship. The ¨director¨ Carvalho (who BTW was never related to the renowned philosopher Olavo de Carvalho) is a specialist in pseudo-genialities. He also perpetrated ¨Hoje É Dia de Maria,¨ ¨Lavoura Arcaica¨. Capitu had been filmed before by Paulo Sarraceni (with his wife Isabela in the title role) yet with mediocre results as well.

luiz fernando carvalho is unrelated to the philosopher ovalo de carvalho, sick burn bro

anyway it definitely seems like something worth checking out based on that review

Anyone remember this Paul Reiser show? Pretty sure I saw an episode or two

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Two_Dads

oh yes, in fact talked about it at dinner w/ fam the other day

<i>Anyone remember the very short lived Nightmare on Elm Street tv show Freddie's Nightmares?</i>

it's streaming on tubi! went through a horror anthology watching phase recently and watched a chunk of these. cheap, silly, sometimes decent, mostly huh.

formatting fail

Great Space Coaster and Krofft Superstars fuckin ruled.

Bugaloos, Sigmund, Gary Gnu, hell yeah.

Yeah, really weird/psychedelic shit for mainstream children's programming

Anyone remember this Paul Reiser show? Pretty sure I saw an episode or two

Also starring Greg Evigan! They used to show it in an early evening slot on Channel 4 in the UK during the early 90s.

I've never seen My Two Dads but I'm aware of it because the comedian Richard Herring used to reference it a lot, and had a joke about a spin-off where twelve men raised a daughter together called 'My Dodecadads'

There was one episode where Davy Jones guests as a famous musician whom the daughter Nicole is dating. He's ready to retire until he comes up with a new hit song called "Oh, Nicole!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drHQgN-ZfSs

Ok clearly she wasn't dating him my memory is fucked up. He visits her.

the comedian Richard Herring used to reference it a lot

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFOuLUxQTuE

Xpost lmao Peter Noone was in the ep too, forgot about that

noone remembers him

The apartment/loft set on My Two Dads was some peak '80s shit.

A little digging turned up Journey to the Unknown, a short-lived British series produced by Hammer Films which aired in the US 1968-69. And all the episodes are on youtube!

Oh Madeline (1983-1984) starring Madeline Kahn, based on the British sitcom Pig in the Middle.

Can only remember that it had a light humor and charm, that Madeline Kahn wore a miniskirt or minidress when those were coming back in style, and that she used the phrase “it would behoove you…” when that was momentarily trendy.

I'm watching Journey... chronologically, three episodes in so far.

The good:

Many eps based on stories by well-known writers (Cornell Woolrich, Robert Bloch, Donald Westlake, Ray Bradbury, and two by Twilight Zone writer Charles Beaumont.)
One of those Beaumont stories, "Miss Gentilbelle," is one I've known about for years and always meant to read but never had.
The general swinging 60s-ness of the wardrobes, music etc.

The bad:

They're very leisurely. Each of the ones I've watched so far could easily have been 30 minutes. Much like the hour-long episodes of The Twilight Zone, they belabor obvious points.
They're not weird enough production-wise. Given the subject matter, the filming often looks like a soap opera.
The original Woolrich story, "Jane Brown's Body" contains *so* many macabre moments that, for budgetary or general taste reasons, didn't make it to the (very loosely based) TV production.

xp

it does seem to be really obscure, not even on the site i use to find obscure old shows. on youtube though.

the latest thing on my "to watch" pile is the 2008 brazilian miniseries "capitu". the featured review of it on imdb is amazing:

¨Based¨ (in the worst possible sense) on the classic novel Dom Casmurro, ¨Capitu¨ is a pseudo-theatricalization of the book, introducing an invented mental insanity into the protagonist Bentinho, and reversing the latter's love for his beloved wife Maria Capitolina into a kind of hate relationship. The ¨director¨ Carvalho (who BTW was never related to the renowned philosopher Olavo de Carvalho) is a specialist in pseudo-genialities. He also perpetrated ¨Hoje É Dia de Maria,¨ ¨Lavoura Arcaica¨. Capitu had been filmed before by Paulo Sarraceni (with his wife Isabela in the title role) yet with mediocre results as well.
luiz fernando carvalho is unrelated to the philosopher ovalo de carvalho, sick burn bro

anyway it definitely seems like something worth checking out based on that review

Lmao, hate these productions of Hamlet that make him indecisive

My two dad's isn't obscure! I LOVED that show. Greg Evigan!

<i>Anyone remember the very short lived Nightmare on Elm Street tv show Freddie's Nightmares?</i>

it's streaming on tubi! went through a horror anthology watching phase recently and watched a chunk of these. cheap, silly, sometimes decent, mostly huh.

― andrew m., Friday, June 30, 2023 4:43 PM (four days ago) bookmarkflaglink

O_O

The ep that traumatized me featured a teen track star who killed her rival with a trophy.

Watched a bit of Q.E.D. on youtube in honour of this thread. You will be amazed to hear it's not very good.

yeah the notion of My Two Dads as obscure is weird because taht theme song is burned into my brain almost as much as the Growing Pains theme.

but it definitely hasn't had much of a second life in reruns for the modern generation. I know people born in the late 20th/early 21st century who know shows like Who's the Boss, Growing Pains, etc from reruns but have no idea what My Two Dads is (and the look when you tell them the premise is always amusing, from a 'wow how did THAT get made' perspective)

I could have sworn I posted itt about the 80s Italian kids show INTERBANG but I guess it was another thread. I (and apparently nobody else) saw the American dub on tv in the early 90s, I guess during the brief period my parents thought we could afford cable, & have thought about it a lot even tho it was prob terrible & all I really remember was that these kids had to travel around the world looking for 7 magic statuettes of the tower of Pisa

Also it was called INTERBANG

Is Interbang a retelling of Oedipus

Lol could be

it’s a ref to the interrobang but why‽‽

There's a subbed German drama that aired on DW in the US but I'm not sure if it was a real German drama that was cut up for German language learners, or a set of bespoke amateur German as a second language skits. The plot seemed completely inconsequential, but the acting seemed really earnest and not particularly stilted as instructional videos tend to be, but not knowing German I wouldn't know if I could tell the difference.

oh what was that...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Follow_Me!_(TV_programme)

Speaking of Euro kids shows

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_On#/media/File%3AVision_On_logo.jpg

Far from obscure though or barely remembered for that matter.

... oh right, it was shown outside the UK, I'd never have guessed!

Some somewhat anarchistic UK kids shows that I may have mentioned up thread. TTTV and Round The Bend the latter hosted by a crocodile puppet who was flushed down the loo. I'm picturing a thick Scottish accent on him . I think this was late 80s but could be out by a bit.
Appears to have been made by the creators of Spitting Image.

I think TTTV stood for Tea Time TV and may have been at a slightly different era but I'm grouping them together subconsciously.

Vision oN was a show taht was around for years and I think started specifically targeted at a deaf audience or at least to include the deaf which is why they had somebody signing very conspicuously in every show.
It had a number of spin offs, Tony Hart doing his own art show and the little plasticine creatures that hung around his art board getting short animation series.
I remember the main show as a staple during childhood that i think lasted until at least the late 80s unless that wasa spin off. I do remember the grasshopper created from the title logo being doubled by a mirror image .

I'm remembering Fingerbobs from a similar era, which again may not be obscure.

Vision On was indeed conceived as a show for deaf children which makes it ironic that when i hear the name the first thing i think of is this tune

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcCHRW8G9yY

talking of Fingerbobs, I don't remember that although they were still repeating it til 1984 apparently (so I would most likely have seen it), then they did the spin-off Fingermouse, which I do remember, but was surprised to see they only ever made one series of that as well which they just repeated for the next 10 years.

Fingerbobs was great

I have strong memories of a 1980s kids quiz show with Bill and/or Jon Pertwee where they would ask questions like "What price is a loaf of bread in Bill's Bakery in the town where the inventor of the bicycle grew up", and then the rest of the show would be shots of 11-year-olds slowly reading encyclopedias and telephone directories. Perhaps I'm conflating it with another show. I think maybe it was cancelled quite quickly, but I can't find anything on IMDB.

Sorry for my U.S.-centric posting of Vision On--well known in the U.K. but a surprising thing to show up on a local New York City station in the early '70s.

i had no idea it was ever on stateside TV either! really gave me a new appreciation for sylveste mccoy, when i got a chance to see some old eps, he was great on that show

Count me in as another one of the kids who watched a lot of The Great Space Coaster, not sure if I have the courage or patience to revisit it though.

this isn't obscure probably but it took me a while to track down. bon voyage, charlie brown (and don't come back)! (1980) has a bunch of scenes at night around some haunted chateau in normandy in the pouring rain - lots of sneaking down hallways and wandering around dreary landscapes outside and such - set to a dark, jazzy, romantic, string-heavy score. i rewatched it and the vibe is less pronounced than i remember it though it definitely still comes through. those peanuts specials can still make me laugh.

My mom took six year old me to see Bon Voyage when it came out in an almost-empty decrepit pre-war neighborhood second-run one-screen theater (Admission 99 cents!) and it creeped me the fuck out.

I really did love that film a lot. Only saw Race For Your Life in the theater but Bon Voyage was a regular early 80s HBO watch for me.

It's weird the things that your local TV provider will buy. They showed Dusty's Trail on Irish television when I was a kid, but I don't think they ever showed Gilligan's Island.

I feel like I watched a ton of Gilligan's Island when I was a kid. It was always on tv in the NYC metro area. That and Three's Company. So much Three's Company.

Come and knock on our door . . .

My central memory of television programming 1976-1986 is the way shows were generally placed in complementary pairs.

Brady Bunch with Partridge Family. Happy Days with Laverne & Shirley. I Dream of Jeannie with Bewitched. Flipper with Gidget. Green Acres with Beverly Hillbillies. Jeffersons with Good Times. What's Happening with Diff'rent Strokes. Alice with One Day at a Time. Facts of Life, Family Ties. Love Boat, Fantasy Island.

I was looking at the 1979-1980 primetime line-ups, and there are a ton of shows I don't remember at all:

"Tenspeed & Brownshoe" starring Jeff Goldblum and Ben Vereen,
"A New Kind of Family" with Rob Lowe and Janet Jackson,
"Salvage 1" Sci-Fi junkyard series starring Andy Griffith,
"Phyl & Mikhy" a Cold War romance
"Struck by Lightning" a Frankenstein sitcom
"Palmerstown, USA" show about Alex Haley's childhood
"B.A.D. Cats" with Michelle Pfeiffer and Vic Morrow
"Big Shamus, Little Shamus"

That's so funny about the pairings. You're right! Don't think I ever noticed that but I absolutely associate the paired shows with one another.

Don't know any of the 1979 lineup but I was only 1 so.

Diegetically, Diff'rent Strokes was actually paired with Facts of Life.

Don't forget The Golden Girls paired with Empty Nest.

lol my family loved Empty Nest

i think they had that show Nurses tacked on after them maybe.

I always remember the Cosby/Family Ties/Cheers/Night Court run, which for awhile iirc was followed by L.A. Law

i think that's what it was anyway...A Different World came on after Cosby at one point too, and Wings was in there at some point.

lol we watched Nurses too. remember my bro and I would go in grandma's room to watch something else instead

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LY81WYZ-Z_M

The series revolved around a group of nurses working at the same Miami hospital as Empty Nest's Dr. Harry Weston. Initially, the main characters were strong-willed nurse Annie Roland (Arnetia Walker), sarcastic nurse Sandy Miller (Stephanie Hodge), dim-witted nurse Julie Milbury (Mary Jo Keenen) and Latina nurse Gina Cuevas (Ada Maris) who frequently reminisced about her homeland, the fictional San Pequeño.

they had all the types of characters: strong-willed, sarcastic, dim-witted, latina

Ah yes, Saint Little.

lmao

"Salvage 1" Sci-Fi junkyard series starring Andy Griffith,

OMG, we used to love Salvage 1. Starring Joel Higgins, the dad from Silver Spoons!

I remember "Salvage 1," except in my parallel universe it was called "Quark" and starred Richard Benjamin.

I recently saw a social-media post that showed a TV guide page from back in the day. Unfortunately it was a Saturday, so it wasn't representative, but I was warmed by seeing "Gimme a Break" on there.

Among the best theme songs IMO: tidy, concise. "I sure deserve it."

Yes, you do. Nell. RIP.

The Nightmare Man - written by Dr. Who contributor Robert Holmes and adapted from the 1978 novel Child of Vodyanoi by David Wiltshire. A serial is set on a small Scottish island, where the population is gripped by fear following a series of savage murders and the discovery of a strange craft on the local beach.

I remember watching this with my parents back in 1981. It was quite scary. Dad was disappointed by the ending.

For ages, I had forgotten most of the details about this, and it was the BBC mentioning that it was the 70th anniversary of Quatermass which reminded me. I knew there were more modern incarnations of Quatermass, after the original 50s eps which weren't even recorded, or were wiped, and wondered if it was one of those.

Hart of the Yard - this was a short lived US series where a UK cop played by Ron Moody went to work in a US precinct (in San Francisco, as it turns out, I remembered in falsely as New York). For ages I couldn't find out anything about this, largely coz in the US it was called Nobody's Perfect (and they had to change the name coz there had been a UK comedy called that).

Only thing I did remember about it other than the premise was him entering the room, putting his hat on the hatstand and knocking something over and then asking "Did I do that?". Which I found hilarious, but I was 9.

Ark II

We had a Crime Story thread: I Wah-wah-wah-wah-wonder What ILX Thinks of "CRIME STORY"

I had a crush on Bernadette Peters in my youth but even that couldn't save All's Fair, a minor Norman Lear production featuring Peters and Richard Crenna as a mismatched couple yelling about their political and generational differences. It lasted one season 1976-77.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FivmnKyfpIE

xp Thanks for the link. I vaguely remember a huge narrative and stylistic shift when the series moved to Vegas in S2.

The same basic material for Crime Story also provided the basis for the true crime book Scorsese adapted for Casino.

Fewer Atomic bombs in Casino

Thought recently of the 10-episode Keri Russell teen soap, Malibu Shores, circa 1996. Class conflict between the valley kids and Malibu kids. Christian Campbell was also in it, and frankly was the main reason my gay-ass 11 year old self watched.

Bernadette Peters was very crushable.

Almost forgot all about that show.

There was a show I saw once in the mid-later 80s, a BBC thing... I only recall this one episode about a haunted radio station, where the DJ was being phoned up by a ghost or bothered by one (maybe ala "play misty for me"?) Anyway all I recall elswise is "Ghosts" by Japan was played in it at one point. Does that ring bells for anyone?

― Bloompsday (Trayce), Saturday, July 23, 2011

No one ever did comment on this/help me out. Still don't know what the show was. it was kind of like a much-dinkier "Inside No 9".

Ah! But that somehow reminds me of an obscure show I do recall (had to Google it a bit)

"Mission: Magic", featuring a cartoon Rick Springfield!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxY-XEv2BuM

My brother sent me a clip recently from the Paul Lynde Show. I'm not sure I ever knew he had a show. It probably deserves to languish in obscurity, but he really did have a pretty perfect sense of comedic timing.

I have at least one bit from the trailer for that burned in brain.

Malibu Shores is the ultimate in "I've seen them in something else but I need to check with IMDB" casting

I had a crush on Bernadette Peters in my youth but even that couldn't save All's Fair, a minor Norman Lear production featuring Peters and Richard Crenna as a mismatched couple yelling about their political and generational differences. It lasted one season 1976-77.

Speaking of obscure Lear shows, but one of my pet annoyances is when people talk about "Hello Larry" like McLean Stevenson quit MASH so he could do that show. It was his _third_ post-MASH show, following "The McLean Stevenson Show" and "In The Beginning", a Lear show starring McLean Stevenson as a priest which was cancelled after 5 years. After "Hello Larry" Stevenson inexplicably got one more shot with "Condo" in '83.

I've never seen "Hello Larry", but reading about it, it looks like an example of my favorite '70s phenomenon - take a flop show and completely change the premise, characters, and plot in the hopes it will be successful. (As far as I can tell this literally never worked.) Look at this fantastic revamp:

In addition, various supporting characters were added in the apartment building where Larry and the girls lived; these included a neighbor, Leona (Ruth Brown), who usually did not approve of Larry's parenting; Tommy (John Femia), a purportedly worldly wise teenage boy who became a love interest for Ruthie; Larry's widowed father (Fred Stuthman), who moved in with the younger Alders; and former Harlem Globetrotters player Meadowlark Lemon as himself, running a local sporting-goods store in the series (believed to be an attempt to boost ratings with African-American audiences who had tuned in for Diff'rent Strokes).[6] None of these changes, nor a two-part episode in which Larry's ex-wife Marian (Shelley Fabares) tried to reconcile with him, were enough to save the show.

They also had Stevenson guest-star on "Diff'rent Strokes" to try and get people to watch the show. God, they tried with that one.

Other examples of this from the '70s are Mrs. Columbo/Kate Columbo/Kate Loves A Mystery, Temperatures Rising, and perhaps most infamously, Supertrain, which was revamped _twice_ in nine episodes. Supertrain was a terrible show (I do have bootleg DVD-Rs of the complete run, some of them from the original broadcasts - it was rerun on A&E in the late '80s and some are from those rebroadcasts), and but its creative team gets more flack than they deserve. First off, MASS TRANSIT IS GREAT AND WE NEED MORE OF IT, ok obligatory leftist bit done. Second off Fred Silverman... maybe it was a terrible idea done badly, but Silverman was also behind the "Rural Purge", a really pivotal moment in history... the racial implications of the Rural Purge are often ignored and overlooked, and I think it's worthy of consideration. Third off Dan Curtis flopped with the show, but come on, Dark Shadows. Wouldn't you give the guy behind Dark Shadows all of the money in your bank account to make a TV show? I would!

And of course the concept has had further life. The Bollywood film "The Burning Train" has a sort of similar Irwin Allen disaster movie/supertrain premise, and then of course there's Snowpiercer...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7hTET3tbNQ

take a flop show and completely change the premise, characters, and plot in the hopes it will be successful. (As far as I can tell this literally never worked.)

I think Cougar Town did something like this, keeping only the title and Courteney Cox. Also, didn't Ellen do something like this after the first season?

Third off Dan Curtis flopped with the show, but come on, Dark Shadows. Wouldn't you give the guy behind Dark Shadows all of the money in your bank account to make a TV show?

Never got into Dark Shadows, but Dan Curtis made some terrific occult-horror movies - TV and theatrical: The Norliss Tapes, the Kolchak movies, Burnt Offerings, Curse of the Black Widow

a lot of the pairings mentioned sound familiar to me but Diff'rent Strokes was always paired with Silver Spoons for me

I watched Hello Larry regularly but could not even say which iteration I watched, that's how little it stuck with me. I basically recall McLean Stevenson and a microphone.

Adam-12 and Emergency! another frequent pairing. And it's odd bc in some ways they occupied the same fictional LA, but in other ways didn't... sometimes actors appeared in both playing different characters, and sometimes the same characters.

One Adam Twelve, one Adam Twelve

Dragnet occupied that same fictional space.

All three of them Jack Webb productions - he was fond of reusing the same actors over and over again.

Jack Webb's quote about "if it's a government agency that has a seal, then I can make a series about it" totally OTM

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O%27Hara,_U.S._Treasury
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chase_(1973_TV_series)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_D.A._(1971_TV_series)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hec_Ramsey

this is what Nickelodeon thought was both edgy and hip for adults

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jLtFpkjwsU

xp Yeah, the two Adam-12 cops also appeared on the other two shows as the same cops, but then for example William Boyett played two different regular characters on Adam-12 and Emergency!. Virginia Gregg played 14 different characters on Dragnet alone! (And also multiple characters on the other two shows).

Never got into Dark Shadows, but Dan Curtis made some terrific occult-horror movies - TV and theatrical: The Norliss Tapes, the Kolchak movies, Burnt Offerings, Curse of the Black Widow

― Elvis Telecom

i want to give it another try at some point, it almost seems like a us version of sixties doctor who

re: same actors, etc - i miss tv shows being shot in new york, shows like law and order had a whole different set of bit players because of where it was filmed

never seen it all the way through but the 1948 film _he walked by night_ is very proto-dragnet and i appreciate that about it

The Night Stalker is justly not forgotten.

Dark Shadows was also shot in NYC, as were most US soaps in the '60s. What's most amazing about that show is the conditions under which it was produced. They basically shot it like a play in real time, using the commercial breaks to switch sets and sometimes change costumes. There was post-editing only for very egregious mistakes.

^cool!

I once saw a (barely remembered, semi-obscure) comedian deliver a rapid-fire monologue about how many sitcoms were based on a cliche title.

AllsFairDifferentStrokesFactsOfLifeFamilyTiesSilverSpoonsGiveMeABreak...

Dark Shadows was also shot in NYC, as were most US soaps in the '60s. What's most amazing about that show is the conditions under which it was produced. They basically shot it like a play in real time, using the commercial breaks to switch sets and sometimes change costumes. There was post-editing only for very egregious mistakes.

― Josefa

right, that's more-or-less how sixties doctor who was... early tv productions were actually often called "teleplays". they, uh, didn't do a lot of editing in post. switched between cameras live, etc., etc. by the time of "the claws of axos" they would at least stop and restart shooting, but my recollection is that if you look at the doctor who pilot, there's a whole chunk of it that was filmed twice because there was a sound error. they were only doing 40 some-odd episodes a year, mind you, so they would at least _rehearse_ the scripts beforehand, but it was still a pretty quick turnaround.

Noodles, that pairing works too! One of the half-remembered joys of that era was that you could mix and match like Garanimals. Lots of combinations were plausible. The point (to me) is that programmers cared, and they used actual human thought to construct a lineup that would keep viewers engaged and keep them from flipping to another channel.

So many afternoons just lying on an ugly carpet and eating terrible food. We didn't know how good we had it.

One time, deep into one of those endless sitcom runs, my sister asked me to go get her a Klondike bar. I rode my bike to 7-11 and got (gently) hit by a car. When I returned an hour later, she asked me why it took so long. Good times (to coin a phrase). Nowadays I lack the required attention span for most tv but there was definitely a sweet spot when my receptiveness for entertainment matched the entertainment I had access to. I doubt it will ever happen again.

Relatedly, Dan Peterson, you may wish to read Derek Thompson's book Hit Makers on the optimal balance between familiarity and novelty. A lot of time is spent on the work of the industrial designer Bernard Loewy, who had a principle called MAYA (most advanced yet acceptable).

Kate, the aforementioned book goes into some mildly interesting history about how so much early television was, basically, filmed radio.

The thing that saved radio was: cars.

Kate, the aforementioned book goes into some mildly interesting history about how so much early television was, basically, filmed radio.

The thing that saved radio was: cars.

― Exit, pursued by a beer (Ye Mad Puffin)

i've put it on my list even though it has possibly one of _the_ most off-putting blurbs i can think of:

Description:
“This book picks up where The Tipping Point left off." -- Adam Grant, Wharton professor and New York Times bestselling author of ORIGINALS and GIVE AND TAKE

i'm definitely interested in the social effects of technology but there's this whole Jared Diamond argument that reduces all of history to technological innovations. the point of view that says that the long history of slavery in america is due to the invention of the cotton gin making slavery economically feasible. fucking clean wehrmacht bullshit, slavery in america isn't just because of eli whitney, it's because _america is foundationally a white supremacist ethnostate founded on the notion that Black people should be considered property_.

and for that matter... to bring it back full circle... a lot of the reason sixties doctor who survives as much as it does was because, and this isn't widely acknowledged, the show was distributed as a form of british imperialist propaganda, and it _does_ seem like _hit makers_ talks about the way that social forces shape technology rather than the other way around, at least to some extent. like, the existence of television recordings owes a lot to desilu, as does a _lot_ of early television... we're most familiar with the system wherein networks commission pilots, but back in the 50s and 60s pilots were made by production companies, and desilu was one of the biggest pilot producers. on top of that, recorded television owes a lot of its existence to the desire (i think by desilu? maybe the network) to broadcast "i love lucy" on the west coast on a time delay.

(i'd really like to see a book with reviews of pilots that didn't go to series from the '50s through the '70s... i have a book just listing them, but i'm more interested in knowing which ones are standouts that never went to series.)

anyway, the way social forces affected doctor who. this is a special interest of mine - i can tell you about the difference between suppressed-field and stored-field methods of recording, though i don't have all the bicycle chains memorized. the root of my interest is the story about episode hunters calling up iran in the '80s and asking if they had any missing doctor who episodes. the sheer amounts of fucking privilege necessary to do that! imagine living in a world where the most important thing about iran was that they bought some episodes of 1960s doctor who.

one of the early companies that was responsible for sales of episodes to other countries was T.I.E. Limited. there are... suggestions that this company was also involved in intelligence operations. on top of that the episodes were distributed to the stations at really cheap prices. perhaps this was to serve as propaganda for the commonwealth, or perhaps it was simply to provide entertainment to the english population who went to those countries to uphold and preserve the british empire. there is, in fact, a belief that the reason "the crusade" is the only season 2 serial to not exist in its entirety was because it was thought it would be inadvisable to screen it in arab countries! (this belief is however, to the best of my knowledge, mistaken.)

everybody talks about where the missing episodes were sent, why they're missing, but nobody looks at it from the other perspective - what survives, and why? the bulk of the season 1 episodes which survive, for instance, are believed by some to have come from algeria. to me, there are so many interesting stories there!

and of course, you can also see this in the way the "historical episodes" are produced, the way they reflect the prejudices and norms of the time. these may be liberal norms - lucarotti's historicals _are_ fascinating. "the aztecs" advocates for not fucking around with indigenous peoples, but it does so from a fundamentally paternalistic standpoint, assuming that interfering with indigenous practices is desirable (please not that i am not arguing in favor of human sacrifice - i'm more addressing the larger framing here). and then there's the later episode he wrote for the failed tosh/wiles iteration of the show, "the massacre". this is interesting because the topic of the story, it wasn't one he wanted to write, but one he was handed by tosh/wiles, i believe. i'm not english and i don't know the politics involved, but it seems to me there's a certain amount of residual anti-catholicism present in choosing to tell a story about the massacre of the huguenots. maybe it's lucarotti's gifts as a storyteller that this doesn't come to the fore more. what i _can_ say is that the 1960s doctor who historicals are, by and large, very bad history indeed.

anyway. something i've wanted to write about in-depth for a while, because it's not something i've much seen addressed elsewhere, but i haven't really had the time or energy...

(i'd really like to see a book with reviews of pilots that didn't go to series from the '50s through the '70s... i have a book just listing them, but i'm more interested in knowing which ones are standouts that never went to series.)

Goldberg's Unsold Television Pilots?

(I mean, is that the book you have?)

I'd love for a channel to resurrect Trio's Brilliant But Cancelled series.

Goldberg's Unsold Television Pilots?

― Elvis Telecom

that's the one! there's some great stuff in there but it's pretty overwhelming...

(I mean, is that the book you have?)

I'd love for a channel to resurrect Trio's _Brilliant But Cancelled_ series.

I think Cougar Town did something like this, keeping only the title and Courteney Cox. Also, didn't Ellen do something like this after the first season?

I think CBS was trying to do a similar thing with the 2nd (and ultimately final) season of B Positive by shifting focus to Annaleigh Ashford and her new storyline running the retirement home after Thomas Middleditch got #METOO'ed.

Cougar Town re-vamped its tone, going from "lol, these women are cougars" to a general "older Friends" type sitcom. They kept the main characters, I think.