# TV shows famously aired out of production order?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-shows-famously-aired-out-of-production-order/715494>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [March 20, 2015, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-shows-famously-aired-out-of-production-order/715494 "2015-03-20T15:10:40Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 3

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**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 30, 2015, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-shows-famously-aired-out-of-production-order/715494/41 "2015-03-30T21:04:25Z")

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_The Monkees_ is an excellent example.

It isn’t at all rare for the pilot episode to run later, if at all. Many times the pilot isn’t all that great.\* (If there’s a cast change, it can’t be used at all unless you pull a _Star Trek_ “The Cage” trick.) So the network will pick a later episode and air that one first, hoping the show will gain a stable audience before the pilot runs. Needless to say, this can cause continuity problems unless the producers plan on it.

One thing I’m stumped on. I thought there was something odd about the _cross-series_ order of things between _Happy Days_ and _Joanie Loves Chachi_. That they were not married in episodes of the former that took place after the start of the latter when they were married. But I can’t find it. Anyone know about this?

- The original pilot for _The Big Bang Theory_ can be easily found. It is terrible and the actress that plays the Penny-like character is pretty bad. But not as bad as another actress that played a friend of Sheldon and Leonard. Only three actors from the first pilot made it into the 2nd pilot: Parsons, Galecki, and Vernee Watson-Johnson, who plays Althea the nurse in this and other episodes.

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**Author:** ![Jalola298](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Jalola298](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jalola298)\
**Post date:** [March 31, 2015, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tv-shows-famously-aired-out-of-production-order/715494/42 "2015-03-31T01:51:17Z")

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Even in the last year, I swear to God in **Broadchurch Series 2** , David Tennant’s hair switched from red to black a couple of times. Apparently he had to go back a shoot a couple of pick-ups for Gracepoint in September. Broadchurch 2 was still in production till mid-October. Arrrgggh.

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