TV Shows That Became A Different Show From How They Began

And again, my point is that one single Time Lord dealt a hammer blow to the Daleks which didn't destroy them totally but did knock them back for a considerable while. To suggest that the entire Time Lord species could be wiped out by Daleks is just ridiculous, unless the Daleks acquired a serious technological upgrade, but even so in that case it would surely have made better TV to actually film the showdown rather than to reduce it to a conversational reference.

Personally I think the show should have brought back the Guardians and E-Space.

 

Mannix spy becomes a detective.

 

Mannix wasn't a spy. He just went from corporate detective to solo. Other than having a boss, the types of cases he handled really weren't that different in the first year.

 

The Brady Bunch. The cast starts dressing funkier and the kids form a band that gets a record contract lmao.

Archer became Archer: Vice for season 5. They relocated the characters to Miami where they become criminals. It has proven to be the go-to animated comedy for promoting cocaine, but it did not have the resilience to survive.

 

Danielle Brisebois (Stephanie) appeared in 23 episodes of All in the Family, and then 96 (out of 97) episodes of Archie Bunker's Place.

 

Wasn't the biggest change that Jean Stapleton wasn't in "ABP"?

I admit it blurs the lines between "spinoff" and "renamed continuation", but without Stapleton, I'm more of a mind that it should really be considered a different series...

 

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say "Gunsmoke" (1955-1975), as well as most western-type shows that existed into the 1970's. They originally had a blueprint of "Catch the new-in-town/guest star/bad guy and toss him in jail in 50 minutes" but evolved into "What the hell is your problem?", tackling the social issues of the 1970's in the 1870's, which also was the template of "The Waltons" and "Little House On The Prairie".

I swear, I used to watch "Bonanza" reruns in late 70's and every other episode seemed to be about the Cartwright's Asian cook getting "roughed up" in town, and then the Cartwright boys finding the "new in town" trouble-maker and knocking his block off, but not before lecturing him about racism.

 

And it has morphed into the bad guy being the mastermind of an international spy ring.

 

Madmen - soap opera about a man trapped in a family life he didn't understand turned into snapshots of 60s moments plastered onto the plot points of a changing corporate world.

 

She was in its first season, though, so even that isn't really different.

 

I was never big into westerns, but my Dad liked GUNSMOKE, so it was always on well into its later years. I recall Dad noticing a change in GUNSMOKE, but I can't say when it happened. He used to watch the opening of the story and say, "Looks like Matt Dillon's out of town again". Was there a time when James Arness was given a number of episodes off?

 

Yeah, I remember that too. Jay Leno was usually the guest Marshall that week.

 

the winner in my book is Lost In Space...a drastic change.

 

remember the days when there were 32 Episodes per season? with some shows being an hour long! lots of time to change the pace...

 

I don't know if it applies, but when Home Improvement became more about the wife getting her degree and whining constantly at Tim, we tuned out. Granted the kids were older and unfunny, but I was really there for the humor and not the drama. I've read interviews with PR that others here linked to, and she made no secret that she was not a comedy person and wanted to bring more gravis to her character.

 

I looked on IMDB and it claims Stapleton only appeared in 5 episodes, and then they kill her off for the start of Season 2...

 

Whatever.

 

yes i recall too something at least in the first season she wasn't allowed more than 1 line before tim or one of the kids came into the scene or had a line or something weird like that

 

Gilligan's Island

 

well it failed.... ; )

 

where did you get that from? do you have a link?

 

The ambience - it became a ghost town in comparison; the first episode in color (with Andy particularly nastier to Opie than he'd ever been before), has no one on the streets, I recall; no extras sitting around or walking, nothing. And it seemed to stay that way.
And never mind also all these new characters brought in that the viewing audience was treated like they/we are supposed to accept as having always been there! It became a really bad show to me. Went from one of the greatest TV shows to this different thing that was mediocre at best.
Oh and a particularly bad episode was one where Helen was going to be a writer and Andy showed a chauvinistic side so exaggerated (I'm not "PC," but this was ridiculous). (There were a lot that were so bad, I don't even want to think about them; the show ended for me with season six in my mind)

 

I can't remember there ever being a time when James Arness was off for any number of episodes, however, as the show progressed, he (and most of the main cast) were almost guest stars on their own series... By that I mean they may start the episode showing the main cast, then the guest star/stars of the episode is introduced and then the story turns to them, until the end of the episode when Matt and Festus find the outlaws, Doc saves the injured or sick guest star and/or Kitty gives them a job swamping at 'The Long Branch Saloon'...

Okay, it wasn't quite as simple as all that, but the main cast was often secondary to the guests in the later seasons.

I recall Peter Graves (the real life brother of James Arness) saying the first time he went to the 'Gunsmoke' set, he seen how they had the days they'd be using James blocked off and then all the rest of that time he was off-Peter said something along the lines of that being the first time he decided he wanted in on a gig like that.

 

MekkaGodzilla was making a joke referencing Johnny Carson having guest hosts whenever he took a week off…

 

That's the way I sort of remember it. The main regulars of the series had become supporting players - townspeople as wallpaper to provide a bit of continuity in an otherwise anthology series. The only regular who seemed to get a lot of screen time in those later years was Festus (Ken Curtis). I recall seeing a number of those.