# Duplicate episodes in different series **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** tv-shows-scripted\ **Created:** [August 1, 2022, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900 "2022-08-01T01:44:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2022, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/81 "2022-08-16T15:38:01Z")
Ray Bradbury Theater “A Touch of Petulance” and Freddy’s Nightmares “Judy Miller, Come on Down” both had characters go back in time to try to keep their past selves from murdering their spouses. (The latter featured the last performance of Susan Oliver, so I guess this could go in the "spotting Star Trek actors thread too.) ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/82 "2022-08-17T03:12:39Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > There’s a B&W episode of _ **Combat!** _ with Lt Hanley, in which the Americans and Germans call a truce so they can rescue a French woman’s child who’s fallen into a well. > > Two or three years later, there was a virtually identical episode of _ **The Rat Patrol** _ in living color, though the woman was North African instead of French. (It was also only half as long.) > > That episode is probably best remembered for the squib and blood pack under Hitchcock’s shirt being clearly visible just before he’s shot in the shoulder. Both took the same plot as _The Well_, where a race riot is averted to rescue a girl who fell down a well (which was the root cause of the racial animosity). ---
**Author:** ![peccavi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peccavi/32/388_2.png) [@peccavi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peccavi)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/83 "2022-08-17T15:34:15Z")
I seem to recall that _The Mod Squad_ and _Charlie’s Angels_ (both Aaron Spelling productions) had episodes built around traumatic amnesia of one of the characters (Peggy Lipton, Cheryl Ladd?)and them being hunted by the bad guy while trying to regain their memory. If I recall correctly, the episodes were beat for beat alike and even had some of the same dialog. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/84 "2022-08-17T16:02:32Z")
Reminds me of an episode of _ **Mannix** _ in which Joe was disabled and had to deal with it while still a target for the bad guy. Except he was temporarily blinded instead of losing his memory. At the end, he beat the bad guy in classic _ **Wait until Dark** _ style before regaining his vision. (Hysterical blindness, maybe?) I wonder how many times _that’s_ been done? ---
**Author:** ![Author\_Balk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Author\_Balk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Author_Balk)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/85 "2022-08-17T17:32:16Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > At the end, he beat the bad guy in classic _ **Wait until Dark** _ style before regaining his vision. (Hysterical blindness, maybe?) I wonder how many times _that’s_ been done? This sounds a lot like an episode of Monk. It’s Monk Can’t See a Thing. He was temporarily blinded. He encounters the bad guy, while still not being able to see. Just in time his vision starts coming back and he was able to beat the bad guy. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/86 "2022-08-17T17:41:15Z")
There was a fad in the 90’s to have a ‘Door #1, Door #2’ episode. Malcolm In The Middle did ‘Lois goes to bowling alley with kids, Hal goes to bowling alley with kids’. Frasier did a similar episode as did Veronica’s Closet. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/87 "2022-08-17T17:48:10Z")
I believe they were all inspired by the Gwyneth Paltrow movie _ **Sliding Doors** _ (1998). ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/88 "2022-08-17T17:56:33Z")
Just what I was going to say - the Frasier episode was even called “Sliding Frasiers” ---
**Author:** ![Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/intergalactic_gladiator/32/112_2.png) [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intergalactic_Gladiator)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/89 "2022-08-17T19:08:09Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > They were both written by show creator Donald Bellisario, but it is still lazy. Bellisario reused a lot of footage from movies for his show JAG. I think the pilot ep lifted Top Gun footage and the most obvious reuse (to me) was when he lifted a whole scene from Clear and Present Danger. ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2022, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/90 "2022-08-17T19:14:59Z")
There was also an episode of the Bad News Bears TV series in which one of the kids needs to replace a Johnny Bench autographed baseball that they lost. So they lure Johnny Bench to them to get it autographed by…one of them pretending to be deathly ill. ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2022, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/91 "2022-08-18T03:54:14Z")
I seem to recall _Starsky & Hutch_ and _Charlie’s Angels_ both doing episodes where a convict escapes from prison, kidnaps the cop who put them away (Hutch/Kelly) and injects them with heroin, so they get to feel the agony of withdrawal. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2022, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/92 "2022-08-18T04:12:09Z")
_ **The Time Tunnel** _ did this all the time. Two examples that stand out in my mind are the one with the sabotaged space mission (set in 1972, IIRC!), which used the _Luna_ scenes from _ **Destination: Moon** _, and the “Trojan Horse” episode with footage from _ **300 Spartans** _. Another is the one about the Alamo, with scenes from (You guessed it!) _ **The Alamo** _. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2022, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/93 "2022-08-18T04:40:21Z")
> [@sciurophobic](#): > > _he Brady Bunch_ borrowed several plots from _My Three Sons_ > > - The youngest son is desperate to win a trophy because everyone else in the family has one. eight is enough parodied that with Nicholas stealing and hiding the neighbor’s cat so he could get arrested because all the other 7 had done so and he wanted to experience it ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2022, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/94 "2022-08-18T14:53:35Z")
In the mid 1970s, _McCloud_, _Starsky & Hutch_, and _The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew Mysteries_ all did episodes in which the detectives hunted a killer who thought he was a vampire. ---
**Author:** ![CaptMurdock](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/captmurdock/32/11736_2.png) [@CaptMurdock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CaptMurdock)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2022, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/95 "2022-08-18T16:44:35Z")
True (I _love_ that episode of **S&H** ) but IIRC, the _Hardy Boys_ one had the twist that he actually was a vampire (or at least, he didn’t cast a reflection…) ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2022, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/96 "2022-08-18T20:45:43Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > In the mid 1970s, _McCloud_, _Starsky & Hutch_, and _The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew Mysteries_ all did episodes in which the detectives hunted a killer who thought he was a vampire. As opposed to [Kolchak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kolchak:_The_Night_Stalker), where the killer actually _was_ a vampire? ---
**Author:** ![Dbug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Dbug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dbug)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2022, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/97 "2022-08-28T11:46:48Z")
Rugrats had a similar plot with chuckie wondering what life would be like if he was never born i esnt to say it was called chuckies wonderful life ---
**Author:** ![Dbug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Dbug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dbug)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2022, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/98 "2022-08-28T11:48:48Z")
While not a similar plot i recently learned several shows brady bunch and different strokes being 2 of thwm added younger characters to tey and boost ratings and save the shows ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2022, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/99 "2022-08-28T15:55:09Z")
[Banacek](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banacek) was a TV show starring George Peppard as a detective who solves ‘impossible’ mysteries. The episode _No Stone Unturned_ involved the vanishing of a big, heavy statue that couldn’t be moved without a crane. It turned out that the statue was actually an inflated balloon. The thief just deflated it [Blacke’s Magic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacke%27s_Magic) was a TV show starring Hal Linden as a detective who solves ‘impossible’ mysteries. The Episode _Ten Tons of Trouble_ involved the vanishing of a big, heavy statue that couldn’t be moved without a crane. It turned out that the statue was actually an inflated balloon. The thief just deflated it ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2022, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900/100 "2022-08-29T02:41:39Z")
Don’t think this one’s been mentioned yet: On _ **The Andy Griffith Show** _, Gomer Pyle becomes Andy’s devoted servant after Andy saves his life The only way Andy has to get Gomer off his back is to stage an accident Gomer can “save” _him_ from to even things out. (Of course, Gomer would fail miserably if left on his own, so Andy has to give him a surreptitious hand.) Exactly the same scenario played out with Gomer and Sgt Carter in _ **Gomer Pyle, USMC** _. Hardly surprising, considering the latter was a spinoff of the former. There were probably other such recycled scripts, but I don’t recall them offhand. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/duplicate-episodes-in-different-series/968900.md?page=6)