# Benton's Mother (ER) - Other series with plotlines that drag the series down **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 12, 2014, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501 "2014-03-12T02:16:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/21 "2014-03-14T19:24:17Z")
I didn’t care for the plotline on Psych in which Juliet found out that Shawn Spencer was faking being a psychic. As a viewer, I knew he was faking it, so I assumed that the characters did as well. Also, the whole Yin-Yang thing was boring. ---
**Author:** ![Mrs.Cake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/2acd7d/32.png) [@Mrs.Cake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mrs.Cake)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/22 "2014-03-14T20:36:32Z")
Any story involving Faith killed _BTVS_ dead for me. Lord, she was annoying and her storyline was crap. ---
**Author:** ![Dogzilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@Dogzilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogzilla)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/23 "2014-03-14T20:43:09Z")
The best thing about Eric LaSalle on ER was: every time he appeared on screen, I get to break out into song. _“Just let your soooooul glo.”_ (From Coming to America). He will always be the Soul Glo guy to me. Always. ---
**Author:** ![Eureka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/74df32/32.png) [@Eureka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eureka)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/24 "2014-03-14T20:46:01Z")
Right now, on NCIS-LA, Kenzi is off in Afghanistan or someplace similar, with only Granger and sporadic contact with her usual team. It’s becoming excruciating. they’ve done this as a way of dealing with the actor’s pregnancy, but I am soooo ready for Kenzi to be back in town. I’ve actually enjoyed many of the substitute partners for Deeks, I just don’t like the misery that Kenzi’s being put through. And the amount of reruns from Christmas through the present, makes it even more tortuous. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2014, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/25 "2014-03-14T22:26:11Z")
Evil Zack on _Bones_. The series hasn’t been the same since. (They are adding _another_ flunky of the week in the next episode. Egad.) ---
**Author:** ![HyacinthBucket](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hyacinthbucket/32/3063_2.png) [@HyacinthBucket](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HyacinthBucket)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/26 "2014-03-16T05:24:27Z")
The appearance of just about any member of Daphne’s family on **Frasier** was enough to make me reach for the remote. Not only unfunny, but teeth-grinding annoying. ---
**Author:** ![Jim\_s\_Son](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19adc/32.png) [@Jim\_s\_Son](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jim_s_Son)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/27 "2014-03-16T11:56:59Z")
> [@woodstockbirdybird](#): > > I was certainly rooting for Jack Bauer’s daughter to die every time she got into trouble on _24_ to spare me from having to deal with any of her boring plotlines anymore. The mountain lion was a better actor. But Cuthbert was nice eye candy in a series that had some of the ugliest women ever. Star Trek Voyager was the worst ST franchise highlighted by Janeway’s holodeck as a governess to two brats. Should have had her as the mystery solving wife of an absent minded, badly dressed, cigar smoking detective in the 1970s. After all, Picard played a Sam Spade type character in 1941 ---
**Author:** ![GreasyJack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/df705f/32.png) [@GreasyJack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GreasyJack)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/28 "2014-03-16T12:07:13Z")
> [@Push\_You\_Down](#): > > The acting troupe on season 3 of Deadwood. Brian Cox was great and the rest of the characters were fine but they took time and story away from everything we had actually come to be invested in. From what I understand, the acting troupe story arc was _supposed_ to be going somewhere but was a victim of HBO’s unexpected cancellation of the series. When they finally heard for sure they were cancelled, they already had about half of the 3rd season in the can so they had to spend the last few episodes hurriedly tying up all the other story arcs, but it was too late to go back and just expunge the acting troupe altogether. ---
**Author:** ![Accidental\_Martyr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ce7236/32.png) [@Accidental\_Martyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Accidental_Martyr)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/29 "2014-03-16T12:47:20Z")
> [@bibliophage](#): > > Every single episode involving the character of Q in ST:TNG was awful. It got so bad I just didn’t watch those episodes if I knew he was going to be on. Same here. I couldn’t stand any of the Q episodes. They just seemed pointless and I didn’t find them entertaining at all. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/30 "2014-03-16T15:18:21Z")
The _entire_ plotline in Suits on USA Network about how Mike Ross never attended Harvard Law School and was never admitted to the bar is like a bomb that would end the show if revealed. Most of the major characters (at least those who actually _are_ lawyers) would be disbarred, disgraced and probably jailed; the firm itself would be sued out of existence by its clients. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/31 "2014-03-16T16:02:07Z")
I thought of another one. I generally love **Veronica Mars** , but I was never interested at all in the storylines involving the family of Irish criminals, Kendall Casablancas, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/32 "2014-03-16T16:03:06Z")
In the first couple of seasons of _Barney Miller_, the theoretical idea of the show was that it would be split between Miller’s work life and his home life. Barbara Barrie was cast as his wife and Michael Tessier and Anne Wyndham were cast as his children. The problem soon emerged that there was no balance between the work scenes and the home scenes. All the interesting scenes were the ones at the police station. A lot of times the home scenes were just Miller telling his wife about something that happened at work. The home scenes were reduced and by the third season they had disappeared. ---
**Author:** ![BobArrgh](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobarrgh/32/2881_2.png) [@BobArrgh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobArrgh)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/33 "2014-03-16T22:34:07Z")
Benton’s mother on ER was very, very real for me, but not when the series was running. My own mother developed Alzheimer’s and one year when I was making my yearly visit to see her (she lived in Los Angeles, and I live in Kansas), she greeted me with, “Your name is ‘Bob’? That’s such a nice name.” And then she stretched out her hand to shake mine. At that moment, the scene from the ER episode where Benton’s mother introduces herself to him and comments that his name is nice flashed through my mind. So, maybe the storyline dragged down ER a bit, but it was so very, painfully true. A whole lot more believable than all the disasters that happened to the doctors and nurses at that hospital. ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2014, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/34 "2014-03-16T23:07:48Z")
The Opera House nonsense that went no where on Battlestar Galactica. Every plotline that didn’t include Dexter or Deb on Dexter ---
**Author:** ![Snooooopy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2014, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/35 "2014-03-17T19:02:37Z")
I have to say, I’m really kind of surprised to see Q getting a place in this thread. I always liked seeing him come around. I thought that he injected a much-needed dose of impishness into a group of incorrigibly upstanding characters. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2014, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501/36 "2014-03-17T19:12:30Z")
> [@Jim\_s\_Son](#): > > Should have had her as the mystery solving wife of an absent minded, badly dressed, cigar smoking detective in the 1970s. After all, Picard played a Sam Spade type character in 1941 That wouldn’t work. Maybe if she changed her name? But, Kate (Janeway) sure does love a mystery! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bentons-mother-er-other-series-with-plotlines-that-drag-the-series-down/683501.md?page=1)