# Good TV show with the worst premise **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 15, 2014, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378 "2014-10-15T05:10:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Greg\_Charles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/839c29/32.png) [@Greg\_Charles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greg_Charles)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/21 "2014-10-15T14:28:14Z")
_Wonderfalls_ – a highly educated, but highly unmotivated woman works at a Niagra Falls gift shop. After a bump on the head, she starts hearing toy animals telling her what to do. It was brilliant. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/22 "2014-10-15T14:44:11Z")
> [@Bridget\_Burke](#): > > A mash-up of Washington Irving stories, in which Ichabod Crane pulls a Rip Van Winkle & wakes up near modern Sleepy Hollow. Let’s add flashbacks to the American Revolution. And the Book of Revelation! And make the British Army be evil, rapists and D=devil worshipers, Benjamin Franklin a sort of Dr. Frankenstein and an arcane wizard. ---
**Author:** ![ISiddiqui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/97f17d/32.png) [@ISiddiqui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ISiddiqui)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/23 "2014-10-15T14:45:40Z")
> [@Bridget\_Burke](#): > > A mash-up of Washington Irving stories, in which Ichabod Crane pulls a Rip Van Winkle & wakes up near modern Sleepy Hollow. Let’s add flashbacks to the American Revolution. And the Book of Revelation! The funny part is that doesn’t even begin to explain how strange the premise of “Sleepy Hollow” is… nor how absolutely great it is. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/24 "2014-10-15T14:46:50Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > And make the British Army be evil, rapists and D=devil worshipers, Benjamin Franklin a sort of Dr. Frankenstein and an arcane wizard. Were there any mundanes at _all_ on either side during the Revolutionary War? ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/25 "2014-10-15T14:58:28Z")
It’s the story of a man who can bring dead things to life with a touch, but if he doesn’t touch the thing again within 60 seconds, something else dies. He uses this ability to bake amazing pies, and to solve crimes with his detective friend and his lifelong crush, a girl he brought to life and can now never touch again. And it’s a comedy. ( **Pushing Daisies** , if you didn’t know. And it was a great show.) ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/26 "2014-10-15T14:58:36Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Were there any mundanes at _all_ on either side during the Revolutionary War? Probably, just like any other war. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/27 "2014-10-15T15:25:14Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Probably, just like any other war. Yeah, but did they have speaking parts? ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/28 "2014-10-15T15:31:54Z")
> [@njtt](#): > > A show about nothing. Disagree. It wasn’t a show about nothing. They spoon-fed that to critics who never examined whether it was true. It was a show about a professional comedian in Manhattan and his amoral friends. Plenty of back story, too. That’s as much of a premise as anything else out there. Wow. I have issues. _ **Family Guy** _ is a great show with a terrible premise - “_The Simpsons_ only Homer’s even dumber and the characters are less likeable.” ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/29 "2014-10-15T15:32:36Z")
I recall rolling my eyes over “Quantum Leap”…and the rest is history. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/30 "2014-10-15T15:41:59Z")
> [@Max\_Torque](#): > > It’s the story of a man who can bring dead things to life with a touch, but if he doesn’t touch the thing again within 60 seconds, something else dies. He uses this ability to bake amazing pies, and to solve crimes with his detective friend and his lifelong crush, a girl he brought to life and can now never touch again. And it’s a comedy. > > ( **Pushing Daisies** , if you didn’t know. And it was a great show.) I guess I’m a bit confused… if he touches her, does she die again? What happens after 60 seconds? And how do you use such an ability to make pies? ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/31 "2014-10-15T15:50:13Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > Let’s take a bunch of city folks, all strangers to each other, most of whom have never been out of the city, let alone gone camping, and strand them on a desert island with nothing but a machete and a pot to boil water in. We’ll come back in three days and make them do a bunch of obstacle courses and swimming competitions and see who survives. Not really accurate. I lost interest as soon as I realized everyone survives. ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/32 "2014-10-15T15:52:21Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > You mis-spelled _“in a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp”_. I thought the thread was about good to great tv. There’s a ton of shows with wacky premises that resulted in mediocre or worse tv (e.g., “My Mother the Car”). But it’s more extraordinary when the show is better than its w.t.f. premise. “Hogan’s Heroes,” while it is an ok way to fill a half hour of airtime, is simply not among the great TV shows. ---
**Author:** ![epbrown01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ba0ec/32.png) [@epbrown01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/epbrown01)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/33 "2014-10-15T15:54:57Z")
> [@Greg\_Charles](#): > > _Wonderfalls_ – a highly educated, but highly unmotivated woman works at a Niagra Falls gift shop. After a bump on the head, she starts hearing toy animals telling her what to do. It was brilliant. Nitpick - there was no bump to the head; Jaye heard the wax lion then fainted. Great show. As the monkey explained, she heard them because she listened. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/34 "2014-10-15T16:00:12Z")
Let’s take Sherlock Holmes and make him a doctor solving the disease of the week. And let’s make him an unlikable asshole. Let’s take Sherlock Holmes and make him a modern private investigator in modern London. And let’s make him an unlikable asshole. Let’s take Sherlock Holmes and pretend the BBC isn’t doing the same show at the same time and set it instead in modern New York. And we will make Holmes a recovering heroin addict. And Watson is a woman. Enough with Sherlock Holmes. Has it been done to death? And yet each show is quite good to varying degrees. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/35 "2014-10-15T16:03:28Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > I guess I’m a bit confused… if he touches her, does she die again? What happens after 60 seconds? > > And how do you use such an ability to make pies? Yes, if he touches a dead person they come back to life, and then he has a choice: touch them again within 60 seconds, they will re-die and no-one else will die; or don’t touch the person again within 60 seconds, and some other (person or animal or plant) will die. Then if he touches the person ever again, they will still re-die and the other thing that died will not come back to life. This had nothing to do with his ability to bake pies, that was just what he loved to do. It helped solve mysteries because he could touch the victim, they would come back to life, they could ask whodunnit and touch the victim again within 60 seconds and they would be dead again. Of course this almost never actually worked in a straightforward manner. ---
**Author:** ![oft\_wears\_hats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/7993a0/32.png) [@oft\_wears\_hats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oft_wears_hats)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/36 "2014-10-15T16:14:20Z")
> [@Martian Bigfoot](#): > > A high school chemistry teacher turns to a life of crime when diagnosed with cancer. Whacky hijinks ensue. > > OK, maybe it’s not the worst premise ever, but it doesn’t exactly scream out “the best thing that’s ever been on TV” either. I honestly thought _Breaking Bad_ had quite an original premise. If nothing else, the originality sold me on trying the show, and it was one of the best television series I’d ever had the pleasure to watch. My vote is for _American Dad_. It sounded (and started out as) a lazy attempt to cash in on Seth MacFarlane’s _Family Guy_ cred. A hyper-conservative caricature who works for the CIA and has a talking fish and an alien as housemates. It was a by-the-numbers Family Guy ripoff, complete with standins for Brian and Stewie. The first half of the first season was exactly what you’d expect, and it wasn’t very good. But once it found its footing, it turned into a hilarious, clever show that I personally think had a greater integrated funniness than _Family Guy_. ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_Panic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/don_t_panic/32/398_2.png) [@Don\_t\_Panic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_Panic)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/37 "2014-10-15T16:19:03Z")
> [@oft\_wears\_hats](#): > > I honestly thought _Breaking Bad_ had quite an original premise. If nothing else, the originality sold me on trying the show, and it was one of the best television series I’d ever had the pleasure to watch. Oh, it’s totally the best thing that has ever been on TV. I guess it’s not a case of “bad premise” as much as “most above and beyond its premise”. ---
**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:** [October 15, 2014, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/38 "2014-10-15T16:19:58Z")
> [@amarinth](#): > > I thought the thread was about good to great tv. There’s a ton of shows with wacky premises that resulted in mediocre or worse tv (e.g., “My Mother the Car”). But it’s more extraordinary when the show is better than its w.t.f. premise. > > “Hogan’s Heroes,” while it is an ok way to fill a half hour of airtime, is simply not among the great TV shows. In that case, perhaps, but more often great TV shows have premises so flimsy you might as well not bother describing it. A wacky redhead wants to be in showbiz like her husband. A desperately poor bus driver’s schemes to get rich backfire, while his wife always forgives him. Mind you, this was a **sitaution comedy**. An upper-middle class black doctor and his attorney/wife raise five children and never encounter financial, racial, drug, or really any other type of problems. Not to mention the premise of the original Law and Order – there’s a crime, the police spend the first half of the show tracking down a suspect, and the prosecutors spend the second half of it trying the case. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2014, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/39 "2014-10-15T16:25:15Z")
On a ratio scale the “reality” show Splash surprised me. Let take random famous people and have them dive off diving boards. For a whole season. Not saying it was fantastic, but hella better than it sounds at least. ---
**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:** [October 15, 2014, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378/40 "2014-10-15T16:28:01Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > Yes, if he touches a dead person they come back to life, and then he has a choice: touch them again within 60 seconds, they will re-die and no-one else will die; or don’t touch the person again within 60 seconds, and some other (person or animal or plant) will die. Then if he touches the person ever again, they will still re-die and the other thing that died will not come back to life. > > This had nothing to do with his ability to bake pies, that was just what he loved to do. It helped solve mysteries because he could touch the victim, they would come back to life, they could ask whodunnit and touch the victim again within 60 seconds and they would be dead again. Of course this almost never actually worked in a straightforward manner. Wasn’t part of the premise that Ned saved money for his pie business (The Pie Hole) by obtaining spoiled/rotten fruit and then making it fresh again by touching it? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/good-tv-show-with-the-worst-premise/701378.md?page=3)