The Substitute Blogger 2: Electric Boogaloo

I Love Television by Brian Smith

I love television.  More than any person should, I suppose.  Why is it that when someone says “I sat all night under a blanket and read a book by the fire.”  Everyone else thinks it’s great?   Yet, if the same person says “I sat last night and watched television all night,” it is either assumed they are lazy or wasted their night?  Having said that, this post is about the some television shows of my youth.  Normally, it’s not nice to write about negativity, but in this instance it’s needed.  Blame cable television.  They keep showing old reruns on weird stations now. 

This posting should be titled "Why Growing Pains Stinks."  Most people I know that are my age THINK they like the show.  I watched it recently for quite a few episodes.  If you haven’t watched it recently go ahead.  But until then let me recap every episode.  Twenty minutes of fat jokes and parents making fun of how dumb Mike is.  Another one of those shows that pulled “The cousin Oliver” and added a new character to help save a dying show.  This show does not hold up.

Another would be Miami Vice.  Every show/movie that needs a “flashback to the 80’s” (stop it Adam Sandler. Just stop it) scene has someone dressed like Don Johnson.  That was such a small part of the decade.  Let it go.

Charles in Charge: I was so excited to see this on Netflix.  I remember loving it, almost unwatchable now.  Nicole Eggert almost saves it.  But Buddy Lembeck was not funny.  Can’t believe we used to think the show was.

As a kid, I could never escape The Jeffersons.  I thought it would be like M*A*S*H and get better once I got older and understood it.  Nope. Just some moron yelling all the time, it’s even worse than it used to be.  I almost added Different Strokes here.  Any show with “catch phrases” (Whatchu Talkin’ Bout Willis) is doomed to fail in my eyes.  BUT, it spun off Facts of Life, which holds up remarkably well.  And it has some of my favorite episodes of any show.  Ever.  Kimberly and Arnold getting kidnapped?  The episode at Mr Horton’s bike shop with Dudley?  Any episode with a reference to “The Gooch”? 

Three’s Company was a show I was worried about.  Two smoking hot girls and a goofy guy?  How can it not work?  John Ritter looking back is criminally underrated.  His physical comedy was genius on that show.  He had absolutely no props except for a swinging door in the kitchen.  And he somehow managed to make bumping into it funny every time.  He left us too soon.  Also this show had my second favorite “Larry” of all time (Larry Mondello, the apple eating friend of Leave it to Beaver still floors me, and thirdly Larry Fine of the Three Stooges is very underrated).

Now I will move on to my favorite surprise.  A show that I thought would be the worst of the lot is still really really good: Family Ties.  Alex Keaton is still funny.  Mallory, even though I remember how pretty she was, has some of the best zingers on the show.  The friend Skippy was one of the better friends featured in these shows.  Sadly his acting career didn’t move much after this (except for his Guilty Pleasure Hall of Fame movie Trick Or Treat).

Thanks for reading this.  There are so many more hours of shows to sort through.  Please be sure to send along your thoughts on a show or two.  The owner of this blog loves getting comments.