Category: Television

Ace posts again a link to a New Shows of 1980-something’s title credits, and again, I feel the need to watch the whole video and annotate which ones I remember or, heaven forbid, refer to in my daily life almost forty years later (I’m not stuck in amber–you’re loose in the aether).

Again, I’ve bolded the ones I remember and linked to any referred to on this blog.

• Square Pegs, the Freaks and Geeks for our parents’ generation. Ace calls it “a show that everyone remembers, but I’m not sure anyone actually watched it.” Which is true for me.
• Gloria, a All in the Family spin-off. Not one of the successful ones.
• Silver Spoons. Referred to in passing for the Jason Bateman connection; I am surprised that I did not refer to it on the blog as my inspiration for having full sized video games in my home. I know I’ve mentioned that on Facebook anyway.
• Family Ties. I called Michael J. Fox Alex P. Keaton here; I have a tie-in children’s book somewhere on the shelves here. Perhaps I should read it among the movie paperbacks.
• Star in the Family. Starring Brian Dennehy and Michael Dudikoff. In a sitcom.
• It Takes Two. I want to say I remember it, but probably I remember the song (which is not the theme song for the show).
• Cheers C’mon, man. Although I don’t see a reference to it on this blog, I did refer to it in real life recently as an example of how 80s sitcoms were crass and sexual at times because I remember Rhea Perlman’s character telling someone to announce that she has the thigh sweats for a man.
• Newhart. I saw this a bunch for some reason back in the day. And although I don’t seem to have used the “I’m Larry. This is my brother Daryl. And this is my other brother Daryl.” bit on the blog, I have used it in real life within the last decade (or as I like to say now, “Recently.”).
• The New Odd Couple. Ron Glass’s other show before Firefly. Although I think he had a couple back then, ainna?
• Ripley’s Believe It Or Not!. C’mon, man. You can still hear Jack Palance saying, “Believe it. Or not,” can’t you?
• St. Elsewhere. I can even remember the real name of the hospital without prompting. It was like E.R. for your parents, but with the voice of KITT. But it was a nine o’clock show, so I never saw it as it was past my bedtime.
• Bring Em Back Alive. Which is apparently an 80s show based on the life of trapper Frank Buck, who played himself in Africa Screams.
• Tales of the Gold Monkey. I thought I had mentioned this somewhere, but a quick search says no. I wish I had seen this when I was younger.
• Voyagers! I might remember this, but I never watched it. Basically, it’s like a Sliders for your grandparents. Because Sliders isn’t for kids today. Come to think of it, maybe Sliders is for your grandparents now. Time flies even without a portal.
• The Powers of Matthew Star. You know, I would have been right in the target audience for this one. But I missed it.
• Knight Rider. You know I saw this. I corrected trivia about it in the book report for Super Incredible Trivia.
• Tucker’s Witch. Never heard of it.
• Remington Steele. Mentioned here when I listed a set of television private investigators who were actually private investigators.
• The Devlin Connection. Featuring computers and 80s tech fonts which look like Comic Sans to us in the 21st century. I missed it, though.
• Matt Houston whose star Lee Horsley, as you might remember, made my aunt’s toes curl.
• Gavilan. This was Robert Urich’s show before Spenser: For Hire and after Vega$. I never saw it, but I remember the bit from the promos, also in the titles, where he punches a guy in the face and shakes his hand because it hurt. I’m not saying I’m a Robert Urich fan, per se, but I did create a test user named Dan Tanna on my job just this week.
• The Quest. What is that all about? But it illustrates that certain actors had their runs in different programs through the 1980s: Robert Urich, Perry King, Stephen Collins–these guys always seemed to be leading a television series, even though many of them were pretty short-lived.
• Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. I didn’t watch it, though, as I was not into Westerns. Also, Richard Dean Anderson was one of those guys, although he hit it big with MacGyver.

I was thinking I did really well on this particular quiz, but it’s only 13 of 23. But I think that’s all of the ones that ran for more than one season and one or two others.

I guess that was a peak year for television for me: My parents were separated, we were on welfare, and my mother could not drive, so she could not take us to the library, so it lent itself to a lot of television.

Also, in 1982, look at the two Raiders of the Lost Ark tag-alongs: Tales of the Gold Monkey and Bring Em Back Alive. And a science fiction bit with Star Wars sound effects in the titles (The Powers of Matthew Star) and a Time Bandits tag-along (Voyagers!). Very derivative stuff, and the television-sized budgets didn’t hold anyone, apparently.

Still, better than I’ll do in another forty years. Or even this year looking back to 1990-something.

Over at Ace of Spades HQ, my friend (I say because he’s pimped my books on the Sunday Morning Book Thread and has netted me more sales than an In The Mail mention on Instapundit) Oregon Muse has a feature every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday that includes memes and a little game called “Who Dis?” wherein you are to guess a male and a female celebrity and their connection.

Unfortunately, today he makes a probably common mistake: confusing Heather Thomas with Heather Locklear.

Photo 1:	Photo 5:
Heather Thomas	Heather Locklear

I mean, in the 1980s, teenaged boys would not have made this mistake, but it is not the 1980s nor are we teenagers any more.

I mean, who didn’t have the Heather Thomas towel poster?

Well, I didn’t have it. I think my brother did.

I didn’t mention the error in the comments at AoSHQ (nor Heather Thomas’s connection to Lee Majors, which is the television program The Fall Guy) because I’m a lurker there who doesn’t comment. Also, I wanted to include pictures of who might be the second and third hottest Heathers ever. What, with the picture of Morena Bacarrin yesterday, it’s pretty clear that Musings from Brian J. is becoming one of those kinds of blogs. Perhaps I’ll even bother to send one or both of these posts to Wombat-Socho at The Other McCain for official Rule 5 post consideration. But probably not. I’m too lazy to comment and too lazy to linkwhore.

Earlier this week, I watched a video that listed the new shows of 1983 and turned it into a quiz wherein I listed the ones I remembered.

I have done the same with the 24 New Shows of 1987 (26 if you count the two Fox shows mentioned but not depicted).

As then, I have bolded the shows I remember and included links to any I mentioned by name on this blog.

• Dolly!, a variety show. Come on, kids did not watch these.
• Women in Prison, a sitcom?
• A Different World, which I didn’t watch. But I didn’t watch The Cosby Show, either.
• Full House
• Second Chance
• Everything’s Relative complete with shot of the World Trade Center in the beginning of the intro.
• My Two Dads; I remember a single episode, where they give a party and try to engage the teens in conversation, and the daughter imagines them as really old.
• I Married Dora; I am pretty sure I watched this every week and was very disappointed when it was cancelled. I remember the ending of the last show, where they break down the fourth wall and say they were cancelled and all bow. Also, this program more than Down and Out in Beverly Hills caused my crush on Elizabeth Peña.
• Buck James
• A Year in the Life
• thirtysomething; although this came on at nine, so I didn’t watch it. Not that I would have. Thirty-something was old.
• Frank’s Place; I’d like to think I kind of remember this, but not for sure.
• The “Slap” Maxwell Story
• Hooperman; although all I remember is that John Ritter was the title character. Good enough for trivia nights.
• Beauty and the Beast
• Once a Hero
• The Oldest Rookie
• The Law and Harry McGraw; although, again, only the title and that Jerry Orbach was in it.
• Jake and the Fatman; Joe Penny’s show after Riptide
• J.J. Starbuck
• Leg Work
• Private Eye; I want to say I remember this, but there were so many shows (and video games with the same or similar names.
• Wiseguy; didn’t see it though, as I think it was a nine o’clock start.
• Tour of Duty; also here and here. I actually have the whole series on DVD as I previously mentioned.

So I rmemember a bunch of them, but only watched two of them back in the day (watching the videocassettes that my father recorded with him and my brother counts).

Weird; I thought I had a lot of time to watch cable in the old days; however, by 1987, we were living in the trailer and we had cable, so I was watching a bunch of movies on Showtime over and over as I have previously mentioned.

Yesterday, Ace posted a link to a YouTube montage of the intros of new television shows of 1983.

22 in all. I thought I’d treat it as a quiz, though, and put the ones I remember in bold and include links to those I’ve referred to on this blog which is at least three. I’m going report on this in real time, posted after I watch the whole video, because it’s like 25 minutes long and I only have time to watch it once.

The shows are:

• It’s Not Easy
• We Got It Made–although I was sure I referred to it somewhere, I cannot find it, but for a while, I misremembered Bill Maher as the straight man male lead.
• Oh Madeline–although as I mentioned when I referred to the show last month, I remembered it was on, but I never watched it.
• AfterMASH
• Jennifer Slept Here–really, I haven’t brought that up? It didn’t run very long, but I can still remember the theme song. Also, with this and the short run Eric Idle vehicle Nearly Departed makes me wonder why we don’t have reboots of ghosts-live-here sitcoms these days–but both of these were very short runs indeed, which perhaps answers my question.
• Just Our Luck
• Webster referred to in the book report for Alex Karras’s Tuesday Night Football.
• Mr. Smith
• Manimal, although I think it came on on at nine p.m., so I only saw the intro before I had to go to bed.
• Hardcastle and McCormick; okay, I’m cheating, I referred to it on another blog.
• The Scarecrow and Mrs. King
• Whiz Kids
• Boone
• The Rousters
• The Yellow Rose
• Cutter to Houston
• Trauma Center
• Bay City Blues
• For Love and Honor
• Emerald Point N.A.S.
• Lottery
• Hotel

To be honest, I thought I was going to clean up on this show because I knew so many early; however, it looks like they stacked sitcoms early in the list, and I was most familiar with those programs.

I also thought I’d referred to a couple more shows than I thought I did, but I’m almost half-convinced it’s because my quick searching failed. Did I now go on about how pretty Ann Jillian was at some point?

At any rate, it was an interesting bit of nostalgia (the whole point of the montages, I know). I saw a bunch of that guys whom I saw in other programs. And I saw numerous actors and actresses who lucked out that these shows were short lived, as that meant they were available for other projects that really worked out for them. For example, Susan Dey and Richard Dean Anderson were in Emerald Point N.A.S.; if that show had been even a trifling hit, who would have been MacGyver? And if Bay City Blues had worked for a bit, would Sharon Stone have become a movie star? Would Dennis Franz have become a bankable cop in Hill Street Blues, Beverly Hills Buntz, or NYPD Blue?

I don’t like to spend thirty minutes watching YouTube as a rule, gentle reader. And my television (or streaming) habits are not such that I’m well poised to even bother with quizzes like this in 2050 (not that there will be enough shared nostalgia to warrant them anyway–the prevalence of cable in the 1990s pretty much splintered us starting even then).

However, I do have the urge to try something similar with 24 New Shows of Fall 1987–by then, my viewing habits had changed and I was no longer roaming the housing projects at night (the street lights come on later in Milwaukee) and was instead in a trailer in the soft southern lands, so I might do even better. Although perhaps not with the references.

George Clooney gives ‘Buck Rogers’ reboot serious star power

I bet climate change. And nobody will take my bet that the antagonists will be changed from Chinese. Probably to Republicans. Or businessmen who brought on the apocalypse for their own power/profit.

Reeling in the years, here’s previous mention of Buck Rogers on MfBJN:

• I Am Buck Rogers
• Book Report: Buck Rogers: A Life in the Future
• Book Report: Armageddon 2419

Not really, I hope, but the New York Post story entitled Who will replace Alex Trebek as ‘Jeopardy!’ host? Meet the top candidates has five candidates:

• George Stephanopoulos, the former Clinton White House staffer who is now a television political commentator.
• Betty White, which is based on a joke Trebek made once about a suitable replacement.
• Ken Jennings, the winningest Jeopardy! contestant.
• Laura Coates, a CNN legal analyst talking head.
• Alex Faust, a hockey play-by-play announcer.

Come on, two political talking heads are on the short list? Really?

Clearly, it’s Ken Jennings, right? And the rest of this column was driven by the need to file some column inches, ainna?

Also, is this too soon?

My beautiful wife and I have been watching the James Spader television show The Blacklist since almost the beginning. We have been recording it from the beginning, but I think we started watching it after a whole season had elapsed as we don’t tend to watch 3.5 hours of television a day.

We’ve stuck through it even though its internal intrigues have often sounded like they were not planning any sort of arc across the seasons, but rather came up with something after each renewal. So we’ve had lots of crazy things going on, the story line turning on itself, mysteries resolving into new intrigues that, in total, won’t stand up to scrutiny.

We’ve stuck through it through poor police procedures, most notably how lackadaisical the police are at setting a perimeter when busting in on bad guys, often skipping any sort of perimeter if the bad guys need to escape or setting the perimeter appropriately at 46 minutes after the hour when they need to wrap the episode up. I’ve forgiven other television-driven decisions and tactics as well, not to mention the intrigues and characters who are important for a while and then are not.

But in the current season, I’m having a hard time with the absurd hard-left story lines and moralizing.

Spoilers below the fold.

Continue reading “Why I’ve Almost Given Up On The Blacklist“ →

Seen Powerline’s The Week in Pictures:

Come on. I mean, aside from the commas missing from the appositive phrase, Diana was not the “queen lizard.” Any fool knows she was not even in charge of the invasion force, being instead in charge of one of the ships and the chief science officer.

Although one of her superior officers (Pamela, a Supreme Commander) intimates that Diana had a relationship with the supreme leader of the the Visitors, her position was certainly not queen.

I mean, if you don’t remember this stuff off the top of your head, you can read about it on Wikipedia.

Man, the first miniseries came out when I was eleven, and it creeped me out a bit–aliens was something that tripped my willies even into my early 20s.

Although I have both V and V: The Final Battle on DVD, I haven’t watched them in a long time. And I have not seen the new one (well, 2009-new, which is actually newer than the new Battlestar Galactica) because Morena Baccarin cut off her hair for it. Also, because it’s the new one, and the old one is always better.

Sledge Hammer was born in St. Louis.

(I learned this because Adaptive Curmudgeon had a post today capped with a clip from the 2008 film Burn After Reading that featured Sledge Hammer! and the Farmers Insurance pitchman, so I looked him up on IMDB and learned that he’s been in a lot of other television shows and films since the television comedy that I know him best for.)

Certainly the IMDB entry says he’s known for other things.

But come on. He’s Sledge Hammer!

Trust me, I know what I’m doing.

Kids who grew up on syndicated television in the 1970s, before cable television, might have trouble with this, although they might not even know it: Confusing their Frenches.

Mr. French was a character on the television show Family Affair played by Sebastian Cabot.

Victor French was an actor who appeared most notably (for syndicated television viewers) in Little House on the Prairie and Highway to Heaven.

I’m throwing Merlin Olsen into the mix here because he also had facial hair and because he appeared in Little House on the Prairie as a replacement character when Victor French left the show. Also, he appeared in a Highway to Heaven episode and said to Victor French “All I could see was the flowers and the beard. I thought you were Merlin Olsen.”

Mr. French	Victor French	Merlin Olsen

I am sure this field guide has absolutely no meaning in the second decade of the twenty-first century, where I’m the only one thinking of these particular television programs, none of which I particularly liked but watched we only had five channels and because Sid Meier’s Civilization was still decades away.

Gen Z’s ‘OK, Boomer’ meme may become a TV show.

It’ll be as big as the television series based on a Twitter feed was ten years ago.

Which is to say, not very big at all. Even William Shatner could not save it.

Because old people watch television, and they don’t want to watch television mocking them nearly as much as kids want to make television shows that mock old people.

Besides, as you know, I’ve already got a favorite Boomer show.

So yesterday, I illustrated a repeated motif in the television series Airwolf, that the climactic air battles were always a bit touch-and-go, dramatically, until the Airwolf pilots did the loop. You see, Airwolf had jets and could actually do a loop unlike, you know, real helicopters. And at the end of the climactic air battles at the end of the show, Airwolf always won by doing the loop. So I did an extended rant about how they should maybe do the loop immediately and win decisively in the first minute of battle. But that would make for bad television. And perhaps it stressed the airframe and they tried to avoid it if possible.

So then I got to thinking about helicopters in television shows, and then maybe a quiz wherein you try to name the television program from the name of the helicopter in it.

You know, like Blue Thunder, which was spun off from the movie of the same name (and featured Dana Carvey in a dramatic role). Airwolf essentially ripped off the super copter schtick, but did it more successfully than the Blue Thunder television series did.

But the thoughts of a quiz evaporated quickly when I realized that the helicopters were the star of the shows, so the shows were named after the helicopters. What show was the helicopter “Airwolf” on? Not much of a quiz after all.

The only one I could think of off the top of my head was the Screaming Mimi, which was not the title of the show on which it appeared.

Do you happen to know the show I’m talking about?

Continue reading “An Ill-Conceived Quiz” →