Bob A brilliant Bob Newhart comedy, especially if you knew anything about comic books. Great, quirky characters, too. The ratings were good, considering that CBS bounced it all around the map.
The network must have ordered changes. The next season, Bob went to a greeting card company and they added Jere Burns and Betty White. It stunk.
Murder One - I was one of the few people who liked it, and almost no one remembers it…still.
The original premise was 24 like. A lawyer show, but instead of several cases started and solved in 60 minutes, it was one major case and the trial would be stretched out for the whole season (there was an episode and a half on jury selection).
Very few people watched. And it was kind of hard to get into unless you watched from episode 1 all the way to the end. But critics liked it (which was death for any ABC series at the time “The show has critical acclaim? Change its schedule every week! Pre-empt it for no reason! Make stupid changes!”).
So, the second season they dumped the format and made it 3 cases (and several little 50 minute beginning to end cases), dumped the interesting half of the cast, dumped the lead (Daniel Benzali, who had been amazing) and exchanged him for a newer, “sexier” star (Anthony LaPaglia - who has done decent work, just not on that show), and dumbed down the plots to make it not worth watching.
The addition of the Defiant on Deep Space Nine carried more than a whiff of desperation, I thought; suddenly the producers were talking about going out into space to have adventures “because that’s what Star Trek has always been about.” Uh huh … and it took you, what, three, four seasons to arrive at this realization? Couldn’t be that many fans found the show talky and dull, eh? (I realize DS9 has lots of dedicated fans and that it’s acquired a reputation as sort of the thinking person’s Trek series, but that’s mostly hindsight, as I remember it being tooled and re-tooled pretty much constantly.)
And are there really people who think Buffy* was at its peak when it ended? 
The addition of Worf to the cast of DS9 also smacked of desperation. The Defiant was definitely added because the producers realized that the show needed more action to avoid tanking.
amarinth, I’m right with you on Murder One. I greatly enjoyed that first season, and my interest decreased during the second (although I don’t think it was unwatchable or anything; just not as innovative or addictive as the original premise). Teddy (Daniel Benzali’s character) was a unique character, and in addition to the murder arc, the dynamics of the office politics were also fascinating. Plus, anything with Stanley Tucci and Donna Murphy can’t be bad!
My nominee for Series Fucked Up by Network Interference in a Pathetic Attempt to Appeal to the Masses: American Gothic. And I’m not even talking about the obvious destructive behavior of CBS in moving AG around from night to night, putting it on hiatus during sweeps, and showing episodes out of order. (The series had an umbrella plot arc throughout the season; though episodes were stand-alones, they also included sideplots that developed the larger story.)
No, the nail in the coffin of this show was when CBS’s Les Moonves demanded that the producers get rid of one of the main leads, Dr. Matt Crower (played by Jake Weber). To CBS, Weber wasn’t enough of a sexy hunk, and Matt not enough of a he-man action hero, to function as the series’ only adult male good guy and attract the ladies. :rolleyes: So with no other choice in order to save their show, series creator Shaun Cassidy and the other producers (including Sam Raimi) got rid of Matt’s character by making him psychotic and tossing him in a looney bin, and brought in a replacement played by a pretty boy.
But Matt’s tragic backstory and quiet strength were sorely needed: the former lent a darker, tormented edge to the show and led to the mutually compassionate father/son-esque dynamic between Matt and the young boy Caleb (Lucas Black); the latter was an intriguing contrast to the colorful, confident, seemingly all-powerful demon known as Sheriff Lucas Buck (Gary Cole). Similarly, Jake Weber’s subtle and sympathetic portrayal of Matt also balanced very well with Cole’s charming, supremely menacing, and sometimes unabashedly over-the-top version of Lucas.
Meanwhile, the butch new doctor Billy Peele was one-dimensional, predictable and a pushover who brought nothing but shallowness to the table. The series ended six or seven episodes later, wrapping up the storylines hastily and somewhat haphazardly.
Would AG have survived with Jake Weber/Matt in place? Probably not – it was far too dark a show for network TV in 1995. (Would’ve been perfect for HBO – its series Carnivale is extremely similar in both theme and tone.) But at least the single season’s story arc would have been more along the lines of Cassidy’s twisted vision.
Yeah, I’m still bitter, what’s it to ya?
I think the John Laroquette show fits but not because of the girlfriend. It started out as a dark comedy with John as a recovering alcoholic who we weren’t sure would make it. They turned it into a version of Night Court when they realised that no show that dark was going to make it. They should try it again now. It might have more success nowadays.
The Defiant was added because of pressure from the fans because they couldn’t handle a space based sci-fi show without a ship so I wouldn’t really call that desperation… it was more like finally relenting. Plus, with the discovery of the Dominion, which had been planned from the beginning of Season Two, they needed a ship anyway.
The addition of Worf, as the poster below you said, was pretty transparent though and it wound up making the show that much better so I won’t complain.
Can you tell me how it was constantly retooled? Those two things were the only major changes to the show aside from Terry Farrel’s departure in Season Six and the arrival of Nicole de Boer to replace her in Season Seven.
Monk is dumping the assistant.
I’d even say that the show had two major downgrades - the middle of season 2 when they get rid of SD6, as you said, and then season 3, when Syd’s personal life is, well, nonexistant and the show turns into Generic Spy Thriller With Outfits.
Seriously. That caught me off guard, too.
I thought they added the Defiant to DS9 because that was roughly the point in the the series where they added the White Star to Babylon 5.
DS9 got the Defiant in S3, which was 1995, I think.
When was the White Star comissioned? I’ve never watched B5.
That’s becuase of internal confilicts, not viewer demand. If the viewers around here are any indication, they’re demanding to have her stay!
Not to mention, they abandoned the week by week cliffhangers in favor of random moments of soap opera tension to cap off episodes as well. I loved having the resolution to plot happen at the beginning of the next episode, which then either kickstarts the next development, or just ends and they find something new to work on. A completely transparent ploy to make you watch next week, and provide some action at the start of the show before the plot got going. But it worked great, until ABC demanded they get rid of it because new viewers weren’t capable of sitting through five minutes of nifty fighting, cool outfits, and exciting action before having the plot explained to them. Hmph.
Murphy was pregnant during the fourth season; the show ran for ten seasons. It wasn’t a desperate attempt to salvage ratings, either. It was a huge risk, but it paid off. And no, I don’t think the producers anticipated that Dan Quayle would make an issue of it. He was the only person who publicly objected, and then during the summer hiatus, when he needed an example to bolster the Bush I reelection campaign “family values” plank.
Mork and Mindy, though, I’ll grant you. That show was floundering, and the producers hoped that bringing in a comic legend (Jonathan Winters) would save it. Sorry, guys: if you drop a gold nugget into a used litterbox, it’s still a used litterbox.
Never watched Mad About You, so I can’t comment on that. I will add Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Roseanne, although in those cases, the actresses were pregnant for real.
X Files.At first each episode was a separate development,with just a little bit of continuation.Then they started making it into a continuous storyline,with Scully’s baby and the super-genetic men.It all got a bit farfetched.The thing I liked with the early X Files was the storyline whilst being bizarre was just realistic enough that it might happen…
