I’m with you, particularly on Skinner. I remember one early episode in which 2 thugs are trying to intimidate him, and he says, “You just made a mistake. You made a Green Beret mad” and pauses in throwing them out of his office only to beat them up.
If I can site a book series [gasp!], I will mention Matt Scudder in the series by Lawrence Block. He goes from an alcoholic, down and out PI dating a hooker, to he and the retired hooker live in a great apartment in Manhattan and go to shows at Lincoln Center. Like they have season tickets to opera or something! The books stayed good to the end, but the character wasn’t nearly as compelling to me.
Actually, while I’ve only seen a few episodes of that show and those in syndication, the character of Sean changed a lot on that show. In early episodes he was a regular doofus with a middle class family and one show mentioned something about one of the other guys watching his sister undress while staying over. Towards the end he was a sensitive poet type who lived in a trailer with his single dad and was an only child (though somehow a Lawrence brother gets thrown into the mix as a sibling who’d evidently been adopted by another family or something) and other kids made fun of him because he was poor.
Another “not so dumb” to “cartoon idiot” was Chrissy from Three’s Company. She was never a neurosurgeon but in early episodes she held her own: she’s even the one who was sly enough to tell the Ropers Jack was gay. By the end of Somers’ episodes she’s a total airhead.
And of course there’s Urkel, who was originally just the super annoying ubernerd kid next door but by the end is an absolutely brilliant technogeek and inventor who makes machines that would earn him billions and has a super suave alterego.
[HIJACK]When Biography was a staple on A&E one of their subjects (when they were getting desperate) was Reginal Vel Johnson, Carl from Family Matters. Since his life evidently didn’t have a whole lot of drama but they need to do that whole “childhood/early career/success/major crisis/recovery” arc that they always did, they chose for the “major crisis” [along with tearful interviews of Johnson and his friends] his being upstaged on Family Matters by Urkel as the quality of writing became increasingly sillier. It was hysterical, because the narrator couldn’t have been giving it more pathos if he’d been Anne Frank and the “major crisis” was that he was earning more money per episode than most people see in a year (especially most actors) for a job that wasn’t creatively rewarding- one of those "Uh, Bud, how intellectually rewarding is being a waiter or working in accounts receivable somewhere, and since you’re the star of the show your contract almost certainly has a “will always have the highest salary” clause [if not, switch agents]- you’re earning millions to be intellectually unrewarded as opposed to $5.89 per hour to be intellectually unrewarded and when the show’s over you can go play the psychiatrist in a Summerstock production of EQUUS or be Falstaff in the Saskatoon Moosekatel Players production of Henry 4.2 or whatever- I’m just not feeling the sad stock music.[/HIJACK]
Actually, I think his character was effectively developed. He did have a mother for a while but she left them. There is an episode where they realize shes back across the highway spying on them and Corrie visits to patch things up. His dad had been a traveling salesmen/ inventor and Sean was always left alone and poor. Eventually, his dad split for good and he lived with the Matthews. His brother appeared when he went to college. His dad had him before Sean and they met up near the end of the series. I don’t think his change was as erratic or abrupt as many of the other characters listed.
If I have missed it I apologize but has anyone mentioned the fact that Chief Wiggum apparently changed races during the course of the series. Didn’t he go from light skinned (albeit yellow) to dark skin and hair and then back again? I think that would qualify as “goin’ through some changes”.
I can remember an episode where he was black…
…best friend to the hero in action movies, use your imagination.
You might be thinking of Lou. He used to be yellow and was supposed to sound like Sly Stallone, but now he’s black.
Simpsons writer Mike Reiss was on some type of lecture tour when he came to my college. He seemed disappointed that Ralph had devolved into what he called “a retarded Buddha”
Blackadder and Baldrick. In the first series Blackadder was the idiot and his servant Baldrick was the wily one. For the second and later series the characters were basically reversed.
Smithers was black for an episode or two.
Oh right, your going to mention Eric Matthews, but not TAPANGA?!
I mean she goes from something that Mingus/Minkus wouldnt touch, to well, they did get married right?
Come on!
((Man Boy Meets World was on for a LONG time.))
The biggest transformation on Married with Children was Marcy’s. She started out as sweet, lovable Marcy Rhodes, successful and denovated to her husband and her upper middle class life. She ended up as March D’Arcy, married to a boy toy and becoming a total bitch.
OK, I searched for this one, and didn’t find it, so I don’t think I missed it.
Radar O’Reilly on M.A.S.H.. He started out (the only actor to make the transition from the movie) as a canny guy who manipulated things, Henry Blake included. He was clever and tough. Even in the series. Does anypne remember how he was mailing a jeep home, piece by piece? Over a relatively short time they took the edge off. He was no longer larcenous or horny. He became a Holy Innocent – with a teddy bear, no less. Phenomenal character change.
Forgot about Topanga. She started out as a hippie psychic that was more or less the butt of Sean and Corrie’s jokes. Then she just started getting hot. Then her and Corrie got married and she was as normal as can be.
But Giles had already gone through some serious changes in his life. Remember Ripper? Black leather instead of tweed.
And Ripper still showed up, on occasion.
Yeah, that was the Christmas episode where Hawkeye was writing a letter to his dad - I *think *it was the first season. One of my favorite episodes.
In at least one early episode, Father Mulcahy was a womanizer (and played by a different actor).
Charles also evolved a bit, going from a total stick up his ass snob to a far more likable and sympathetic character (and then bitter in the final episode). He grew and aged so much it was if his time in the Korean War lasted 10 years instead of just a little over a year.
While we’re on the subject of Buffy and its growth curves, I’m surprised nobody mentioned Willow, who started as a sweet introvert that coincidentally behaved exactly like the flute girl from American Pie and ended up as…
An insanely evil witch who flayed people alive for no really good reason, then tried to end the world with bad logic. Then she became a good witch and lesbian goddess or… something.
“For no really good reason?” 
I’d consider the murder of her lover to be plenty good reason for flaying that bastid. Not to mention the whole mind-slave murder stuff. Flaying was too good for him.