TV Shows That Became A Different Show From How They Began

Quincy started as essentially as police show about using pathology to solve crimes, but turned into show about social causes, like the farm workers plight in California.

 

Dexter.
Started out as a genre show with elements of black humor.
Became a relationship drama.

 

I always wondered why Quincy didn't get punched more often. And that's just by his colleagues!

Still enjoy it when I catch an episode though.

 

Father Dowling Mysteries - started off as a priest solving street crimes to taking the devil head on

 

IMO...it became more of a clown show and that's change...done with this...

 

I was excited as all get out when the debut appeared -- I still remember the promo photo announcing the show showing up TV section of the newspaper -- and you're right about the serious tone. There was a Cold-War vibe to Dr. Smith in the first episode -- he was a secret agent / saboteur out to have them all killed.

Falling off the cliff in quality was hallmark of all those Irwin Allen shows, unfortunately. What I read is that every time he blew the budget in the first season with top-flite SF authors/script writers and when that money dried up it was anything goes.

So do I, but I've come to appreciate the 'over the top' monologues given to the Dr Smith character in the latter years.

 

I got the cheap complete TZ BD set and the BDs were locked into the hubs...it took me hours of careful maneuvering to get each one out of the grasp from hell case...I also had 2 scratched BDs...I held them up to the light and I can see the scratch through the front of the BD disc...

 

He spent a lot on visual effects, practical effects, actors, etc. at the beginning of the season and thereafter the budgets dropped signicantly.

 

Technically George (Mr B) and Dorothy (Missy) went to Baghdad, Iraq…I guess they needed a real good lawyer and Missy’s home improvement skills so they left their son Harold (Sport) and dog Smiley with George’s never before seen or mentioned younger brother Steve, his wife Barbara and daughter Susie, palming off the maid Hazel too. Actually the show was canceled but Shirley Booth was able to get it revived on a new network with younger, cheaper actors and have Hazel less antagonistic towards Steve than she was towards George (although she still was plenty annoying, counting pills in jar to make sure he took his vitamins and barging into his real estate office when he didn’t). But Ann Jillian was cute as Steve’s secretary Millie.

 

If I remember correctly, the kid that played Jason, the youngest son, also made an appearance.

 

It's possible, the only person from the original family that appeared that I remembered was the Mother, but it was only a fleeting appearance.

 

Gotham (for the better)
The Good Wife (for the better)
The Rookie (for the worse)
That 70's Show (for the much worse)
House (for the mucho mas worse)

 

Well aware of that story,so I purposely mentioned "behind closed doors." in 2016 Jerry knew sleaze better than anyone for the national ticket. Jerry could eat of bowl of Steve Bannon,take the necessary dump and go on with life.

 

Been awhile since watching this specific episode but there's an episode in the later seasons of Gomer Pyle.... titled Gomer Goes Home...where he heads back to Mayberry on vacation. Of course Andy, Aunt Bee, Opie, and Goober are on their own vacation. Gomer has his own little adventure in the town.

Anyways...it's just like you described. Other than a handful of people, it's a ghost town to the point it's obviously a set and not a real town.

It's like they weren't even trying anymore.

 

Because it would knock his hairpiece off.

 

indigovic wrote the following as part of a post:

Towards the end of The Fourth Doctor's run they provided an explanation for The Master's continuing survival. After attempting a thirteenth regeneration he was left a walking corpse that was falling apart. He survived by hijacking the body of Nyssa's father/grandfather (I don't remember which one it was) which gave him a younger body (and Anthony Ainsley took over the roll for the rest of the Classic Series). Although he could survive indefinitely by this method, according to one of the novelizations he considered it a ghoulish existence and wanted a true time lord body.

Based on what little I've seen of him in the New Series (I haven't yet watched most of it), it seems like he got a new time lord body. However, The Master could also continue surviving via the method I mentioned above so it is likely that he could survive for centuries via that method.

 

I was referring to his specific escapes rather than his ongoing ability to regenerate. In stories from the '60s and '70s, we're always shown exactly how the Master is able to get out of each predicament that threatens his survival or freedom—usually coupled with a "well, I guess that means we haven't seen the last of him" comment—but they just didn't bother with that in the '80s.

For example, at the end of "Castrovalva," the Master's TARDIS is apparently trapped when Castrovalva collapses into itself; the next time we see him, all we get is the Doctor saying "So, you escaped from Castrovalva." At the end of "Planet of Fire," the Master's body is apparently consumed in flame; in "The Mark of the Rani," the Doctor says "He was burnt to a crisp the last time I saw him," but they never explain how or why he wasn't. At the end of that story, he and the Rani are trapped in her TARDIS with a T. Rex; this is never mentioned again (probably for the best on that one, really). And at the end of "Survival," the Master has been infected by a virus that's turning him into a Cheetah Person, and he ends up trapped on their dying world. Each of these escapes were eventually explained in other media, but never on TV.

 

Does Top Gear count? motoring 'magazine' show turned into a comedy whilst Clarkson, May and Hammond had it, but poorly emulated ever since they left.

 

Yes. Emphatically yes!

 

Bring back Angela Rippon!

 

The difference between the two openings used for Henry Fonda's late 60's TV show "The Smith Family" is unbelievable, like an SCTV parody of a sitcom:

 

I had only ever seen the color episodes from the 70's as a kid until a few years ago. I remember being shocked when watching an early episode by how lovingly Kitty was looking at Matt! I think by the time the 70's episodes had come along she had realized he was never going to marry her so had gotten a bit jaded with the relationship!

 

Poor Ms. Kitty-It seemed any time she was the focus of an episode, she was on a trip in a stagecoach which was inevitably held up, flipped over, or had some other emergency where she was either held hostage, was injured, or had to help an injured fellow passenger...

 

It became more stylized and moody when Michael Mann dug his heels into it. I'd say 1/3 into Season 1. I like it through Season 2. Season 3 is where Mr. Law and Order changed it up. It's different from the get go and went downhill quick.

 

Though I think it slips with a few episodes where it seems clear Serling was less involved, it's still a damn good run. I was over the top excited when the Blu Ray set arrived