No, the first one was the hit (3rd in the ratings, I believe, the record for a 1-season show.)
This wasn’t a spinoff of MTM; you’re thinking of “Rhoda.” And I never watched “Valerie,” I just remember the brouhaha when Harper demanded more money so they replaced her with Sandy Duncan–without changing the name of the show.
I’m still in awe. 
Yeah, I was mixing up Valerie Harper with the Rhoda character that she played. It’s coming back to me now.
Who gives a fuck? It’s a lousy sit-com.
Well, apparently, Nanook, YOU give enough of a fuck to come in here and post to the thread. Please do this kind of thing in the Pit, sweetie.
No, they changed it to “Valerie’s Family”, and later to “The Hogan Family”.
I ditto what Exapno said. Why should all the other actors and the crew be out of a job because of this? And, y’know, in real life, people do die. Even parents; even unexpectedly. Why shouldn’t a TV show reflect that?
Not-quite-the-same-thing-but-I-can’t-help-being-reminded: When Katey Sagal was on Married With Children, Peg got pregnant because she was pregnant. Then she miscarried*, and they worked around her for a few episodes**, and when she returned, the imminent third child was supposed to be Al’s nightmare. Actors are people, to whom these things happen, and that’s why you have writers: to work around them.
*Actually the second miscarriage for her :(, but the first one hadn’t been reflected in the character.
**Including one of the series’ best two-part episodes ever: the one where Kelly had her own show, Vital Social Issues ‘n’ Stuff with Kelly.
Married… with Children also worked around the death of Divine, who was supposed to have a recurring part on the show.
I’ve watched this show from it’s inception and can’t imagine it without John Ritter. It is most definitely “his” show. It will take some creative writing to get his “wife and children” through the crisis of death-of-a-loved-one to funny-and-entertaining-sitcom.
Although it also sucks, I think I would have rather seen them try to replace John Ritter with another actor than watch the depressing grief of the characters go through dealing with his death.
Because it’s a tv show, not a charity. It has to make a profit. I highly doubt that this will be a profitable move. Maybe they’ll get a ratings spike because there will be a lot of interest in those last three shows and the one after it but it’ll likely fizzle out after that.
Haj
Still, haj, those three episodes will likely do better than a repeat of something or a new show. It makes sense for the network to try and keep the show going since it’s already an established name and a hit. Yeah, it’s not very likely to work, but even if it lasts a little while, it helps them out, which I guess justifies the move.
Never underestimate the stupidity of a network. Look what happened when THE MAN died from Chico and The Man! Look what happened to SANFORD AND SON. Networks are made up of morons. I only wished I’d watched the stupid show so I could stop watching it now. But…no, I don’t really wish that do I? Neh. At least there was a good Queer Eye on tonight 
They’re made up of businesspeople (not that the two groups are mutually exlusive). The next few episodes will probably draw more viewers than when Ritter was alive, and even if it fades after that, they’ve still drawn an audience to their advertisers and they’ll just be in the position they would’ve been in anyway: having to find a replacement for the show. Unless you’re against the move on moral grounds, there’s nothing I can see that’s stupid about it.
On purely creative grounds I object. If they had any creative integrity they’d leave it. But they don’t. It is thus that I call them morons, not to mention their UTTER lack of knowledge of what connects with REAL people.
Admittedly I can’t bitch much considering the subject matter to begin with. Not the death of a marginally funny guy (who certainly connected with people in real life) which is indeed a sorry thing, but the milieu of the network sitcom, which is a truly pathetic medium to begin with <shrug>
So you’re real people, but the people who watch the show aren’t? 
I’m not arguing most sitcom’s aren’t boring. It scares me that (since The Sopranos isn’t doing anything right now) there’s not a single live-action show I’m interested in right now that’s not sports, Jeopardy!, The Daily Show, or Late Night with Conan O’Brien.
…Far be it from me to say that network exec types aren’t utterly creatively (and morally ;)) bankrupt. Or that they create lots of bad, vapid shows that all seem to be cloned from the same donor (I suspect it’s the ass of either Aaron Spelling, David E. Kelley, or David Schwimmer). I’m just saying I don’t think this is a stupid move from their perspective.
Yes, but when Freddie Prinze Jr. also died, the show was over - they didn’t recast him. With Chico and the Man, you had two stars, each feeding off the other. With Eight Simple Rules, you basically had one star, with everyone else feeding off him.
What happened with Sanford and Son? Redd Foxx died many years after it went off the air - he had begun a new series when he died. Now I forget what it was… the Royal something? With Della Reese, too.
Freddie Prinze the first, you mean. And they brought in a teenager for Jack Albertson to play off of.
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Yeah, him.
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They did? Oh. Oh yeah, now I remember seeing that on the E!True Hollywood Story about FP Sr. Didn’t last long, though.
Redd Foxx was just about to start a show called The Royal Family. The network ended up showing it without him about 6 months later, but it died after a couple of episodes.
After replacing Freddie Prinz, Chico and the Man didn’t last another year.
So shows have tried to carry on when their star dies, but have not had much success.
Check out this article on CNN’s website
http://www.cnn.com/2003/SHOWBIZ/TV/09/17/ritter.show.ap/index.html