TV Shows That Became A Different Show From How They Began

Discussion in 'Visual Arts' started by Solitaire1, Feb 22, 2021.

  1. boyjohn

    boyjohn Senior Member

    I didn't see the third season but this reminded me that I need to go back and watch the first two again, as they were some really fine TV.
     
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  2. m5comp

    m5comp Classic Rock Lover

    Location:
    Hamilton, AL
    On the British sitcom Are You Being Served?, the original star was supposed to be Trevor Bannister (who played Grace Brothers junior salesman Mr. Lucas) and John Inman received IIRC 5th billing in the pilot episode. Of course, after a couple of seasons/series, Inman's character, Mr. Humphries, because extraordinarily popular and AYBS? basically turned into The John Inman Show (notwithstanding Mollie Sugden's colored wigs and double-entendre references to her cat).
     
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  3. fr in sc

    fr in sc Forum Resident

    Location:
    Hanahan, SC
    For all intents and purposes I thought The Andy Griffith Show became a vastly different show by its last three seasons, even though three of the main characters (Andy, Opie and Aunt Bee) were still there and the premise and locale hadn't changed. I know after the first few episodes of the first season they realized instead of making Griffith the lead comedian it was better for Don Knotts to do it as he was much better and gave them more to work with, but once Knotts left and the show switched to color it was a lot less humorous (especially Andy, who from then on struck me as tired and drawn-looking) and the whole ambience of the sets looked cheap (compare the drugstore in the first season with what it looked like in later years, something out of an Iron Curtain country). It also seemed weird that after the failure of Jack Burns as the new deputy in season six nobody was found to replace him since the deputy role had been so important up until then.

    Of course, The New Andy Griffith Show in '71 would be the epitome of a horribly subpar sequel and even if they changed his name and the show's setting, it was still a bizarro version of TAGS; Griffith did the smart thing and stayed off series TV for years after that!
     
  4. Lenny99

    Lenny99 The truth sets you free.

    Location:
    Clarksburg WV
    That’s a good one, “out of the iron curtain”. Lol.
     
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  5. Michael

    Michael I LOVE WIDE S-T-E-R-E-O!

    The Andy Griffith Show
     
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  6. Michael

    Michael I LOVE WIDE S-T-E-R-E-O!

    Tales From The Crypt...the last 2 seasons IIRC were not as good.
     
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  7. pocofan

    pocofan Senior Member

    Location:
    Alabama
    MAsH. Started out as a wacky comedy and turned into a dramedy.
     
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  8. pocofan

    pocofan Senior Member

    Location:
    Alabama
    News Radio. Once Phil Hartman was gone the show was never the same.
     
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  9. Jack White

    Jack White Senior Member

    Location:
    Canada
    Don't know if anyone has answered this yet ...

    Springer was a lawyer, political campaign worker/ consultant, elected politician, and local tv news commentator and then anchor prior to hosting his tv show.
     
  10. W.B.

    W.B. The Collector's Collector

    Location:
    New York, NY, USA
    Talk about the old dictum of "how the mighty have fallen" . . .
     
  11. W.B.

    W.B. The Collector's Collector

    Location:
    New York, NY, USA
    Well, Webb's most famous shows were on NBC, and Conrad had CBS ties already (Escape, the radio Gunsmoke; Cannon was years off into the future at that point), so . . .
     
  12. W.B.

    W.B. The Collector's Collector

    Location:
    New York, NY, USA
    The way episode titles were structured ("The One Where . . . ") was lifted directly, it seems, from the ill-fated 1977-78 The Harvey Korman Show . . . which featured as its main writer one Garry Shandling.
     
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  13. W.B.

    W.B. The Collector's Collector

    Location:
    New York, NY, USA
    In-between DC and Philly, Povich also worked in Chicago.
     
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  14. Grand_Ennui

    Grand_Ennui Forum Resident

    Location:
    WI
    Regarding Jerry Springer, in theory I agree with you, but let's face it, the man may have fallen, but he was cushioned by a truckload of money, and lots of it.
     
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  15. Manapua

    Manapua Forum Resident

    Location:
    Honolulu
    And who's most lasting contribution to American culture will be Jerry! Jerry!
     
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  16. Quite a few comedies ended up basically turning into soaps. Only Fools And Horses being a prime example, first three seasons are gold but after that... can be up and down. Big Bang Theory did the same thing when all the main characters got girlfriends. That said BBT has not aged well in general.

    Dr Who fell flat on its face about two episodes in to the 00s reboot when the Doctor mentioned that the Time Lords had all been wiped out by Daleks, despite the fact that in 1989's 'Remembrance Of The Daleks' ONE SINGLE TIME LORD (the Seventh Doctor) managed to virtually wipe out the Daleks as a serious force using the Hand of Omega. It made no sense for the Doctor to suddenly be the last survivor of his species in this regard, especially when it was just mentioned in an off hand comment - in the classic series (i.e. proper Dr Who) such an event would have taken up at least an entire season arc to explain it. The reboot had no credibility from that point on.
     
    Last edited: Jun 7, 2021
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  17. Solitaire1

    Solitaire1 Carpenters Fan Thread Starter

    This reminds me of the different way that Frank Sinatra has been portrayed on Saturday Night Live. From what I've heard, Joe Piscopo's Sinatra was very respectful towards Sinatra and there were certain things that Piscopo would not do as Sinatra. It got to the point that they did a sketch of the things that Sinatra would not do. Phil Hartman's Sinatra came across as a bit mean, with harsh words towards most people in the sketch The Sinatra Group (a parody of The McLaughlin Group).
     
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  18. fr in sc

    fr in sc Forum Resident

    Location:
    Hanahan, SC
    Well, maybe not completely respectful towards Frank----I remember that beautiful sketch of him and "Stevie Wonder" (Eddie Murphy, natch) cutting a version of "Ebony and Ivory" in the studio and Frank adlibs the lines, pointing at Stevie and belting out "You are blind as a bat and I have sight!" and the audience guffaws in shock. Unfortunately, YouTube has butchered the clip so all the humor from it is missing.
     
  19. indigovic

    indigovic (Taylor’s Version)

    Location:
    North Bend, WA
    I have heard many opinions about Doctor Who, including many that decry some or all of the new series, but this particular opinion seems pretty unique to you.

    First, to claim that the entire series fell apart based on a single moment of perceived discontinuity is pretty ludicrous. Let's face it: continuity in Doctor Who has always been haphazard, even in the scale you're talking about. Even in the series' original run, the Master, the Daleks, and the Cybermen were each fairly regularly being nearly or totally wiped out only to make a surprising comeback months or years later; in the '80s, they literally stopped even trying to explain how the Master escaped from whichever surely fatal predicament he was last seen in.

    Second, regarding the impact you're attributing to a specific moment: In "The End of the World" (the second episode of the season), the Doctor reveals that the Time Lords were wiped out in a war, but doesn't yet attribute it to the Daleks. It's not until the sixth episode, "Dalek," where we learn that the Daleks were on the other side of that war, so I'm assuming that's the moment you're talking about here. Saying the show "fell flat on its face" with that episode certainly doesn't match most people's opinions; indeed, that episode marks an upward inflection point in the series' ascent in popularity. Critically speaking, it garnered an audience Appreciation Index of 84, which puts in in the top 13% or so of all Doctor Who episodes for which an AI is recorded; it was nominated for a Hugo award; and The Daily Mirror's reviewer called that episode "...the best thing on telly. Ever."
     
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  20. I was probably getting a bit confused as to exactly when the Doctor revealed it was the Daleks who wiped out the Time Lords, but my point still stands. The Time Lords were a massively powerful species who were at least the Daleks equal if not stronger, and if one Time Lord alone could almost totally defeat the Daleks using the Hand of Omega, why would it be realistic for the Daleks to wipe them out in the manner outlined? Even by the show's continuity standards, that was a step too far.

    You might have been able to get away with it had an entire season or two been devoted to the Time Lords/Daleks showdown. But to just explain it away so briefly....
     
    Last edited: Jun 7, 2021
  21. indigovic

    indigovic (Taylor’s Version)

    Location:
    North Bend, WA
    Addressing the continuity, the Hand of Omega didn’t annihilate the Daleks—it blew up Skaro’s sun, taking the Dalek homeworld with it; that was clear in the very episode where it happened. But that “fact” itself had been subverted long before the new series came along: the very same incarnation of the Doctor who blew up Skaro visited it to pick up the Master’s “remains” from the Daleks, kicking off the events of the 1996 TV Movie.

    As for your bigger point that a story that big should be told onscreen, well, the producers clearly felt that the relaunch of the series needed to bring back some of the mystery surrounding the Doctor’s past that has always been part of the show (and is reflected in the show’s very title), and saw this as a good way to do that while simultaneously creating a continuity-sink for questions precisely like “so was Skaro destroyed or not?”
     
  22. Spastica

    Spastica Run aground on the floor for you....

    Location:
    Modesto, CA
    Not exactly the same thing and it was more on a week by week thing and not a change overall. Been watching it lately and noticed....

    On the later seasons of Gomer Pyle, they started having episodes where Gomer isn't Carter's nemesis and they're more like best friends going on little adventures.

    It definitely changes the vibe of the show. Before you can get used to it, Carter is chewing him out and hating him in the next episode.

    Whenever I watch that final season and see Duke as the Corporal, it makes me wish they had just went all in and had Gomer become the Corporal. It could've freshened up the story instead of constantly recycling plots from earlier Gomer seasons and Andy Griffith.

    I hate how this show ended without any closure.
     
  23. Blimpboy

    Blimpboy Forum Resident

    Location:
    Walton, KY
    I'm surprised All In The Family hasn't been mentioned yet. The show began with a middle aged couple supporting their recently married daughter while her husband went to school. The show tackled social and political issues relating to the Generation Gap. The show changed so drastically in it's 9 year run that it was re named Archie Bunker's Place and ran for another 4 years under that name. By the second year of that show, only Archie remained from the original cast.

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]
     
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  24. Oatsdad

    Oatsdad Oat, Biscuits, Abbie & Mitzi: Best Dogs Ever

    Location:
    Alexandria VA
    I think "Place" is a spinoff series, not a continuation, so I wouldn't count it as a show that changed.

    It's like "After MASH" or "Mayberry RFD": series that spun off from the original...
     
  25. OldSoul

    OldSoul Don't you hear the wind blowin'?

    Location:
    NYC
    It already practically becomes ABP in season 9, though, doesn't it?
     
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