Yeah, I was going to suggest Glee as an example of a show that made a big pop culture splash with its first two seasons but seems to have been largely forgotten by the public already…and it still has its final half-season to go.
The AV Club recently referred to Glee co-creator Ryan Murphy as “TV’s current king of diminishing returns” and put Glee and two of his other shows (Nip/Tuck and American Horror Story) as the first three items on their list of “One-season what-ifs: 14 TV series that should’ve stopped after one season”.
I hear/read more references to this show today in proportion to it’s lifespan than perhaps any show (except maybe Freaks and Geeks or Firefly). It’s even in the news now.
I learned about him back in the 80’s when I devoured books when I came to America. One of my favorites books from the library was Cult TV by John Javna, when Entertainment Tonight showed clips by him I was already aware of who he was and how important he was for the history of American TV.
Years later when I was in college in a media class the teacher lamented how very little of the history of the media the typical student knew, and asked the class about who he was, so I told them. As he commente later he was amazed that an immigrant knew more of their history than the natives.
I still remember when the book referred to the original 60’s Star Trek: Star Trek got good ratings in their first season, but it was never among the top 30 [if the guys at classicTVhits.com are correct] and then the book had a side boxed note:
“Back then the show was beat on the ratings by shows such as Iron Horse and Mr. Terrific… you do remember those huh?”
Certainly not forgotten but I’d like to nominate The Sopranos. I really did believe that show would forever change television drama. That goodies versus baddies would decline as a concept, or, as a concept in higher end productions. Everyone was to be an sob from now on. No political or social belief was sacred. Liberal characters were to be portrayed on an equally poor footing as conservative or reactionary characters. Apart from a few notable exceptions this has turned out not to be the case. Sure, good characters can do bad things on modern shows, but they are almost always driven to it by the unreasonable behaviour of others. Reactionary or conservative beliefs are still a character flaw.
No entirely, I just started watching The Shield. So far their formula seems to be Vic and his crew’s story line, and then there’s Dutch and Claudette’s story line, followed by Julian and Danielle’s story line.
My submissions:
Barbara Mandrell and The Mandrell Sisters
Hee Haw
Country was cool for a brief stint in the late 70’s and early 80’s.
I read the other day that Knots Landing was on for 14 seasons. I was stunned; I literally know nothing about it besides “it was a prime-time soap opera”.
I do remember them. Mr. Terrific was a parody of super hero shows. It wasn’t very good, and it was pretty pointless – Batman, which it was trying to parody, was itself already a parody of superheroes.
Besides, the competing superhero parody show, Captain Nice, was better. Not only was it created by Buck Henry (who had created Get Smart! with Mel Brooks), but it starred William Daniels – later to be John Adams (and Sam and John Quincy Adams), Dr. Mark Craig, and the voice of KITT.
You can’t mention country TV without a shout out to the Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, and Petticoat Junction. CBS was the country broadcasting system for a time. That was almost a decade earlier though, late sixties through 1971.
I think HD has a lot to do with it. Except for a few shows (e.g., Seinfeld, Friends) most older shows have been relegated to those obscure cable channels like MeTV or FamilyNet if you’re scrolling through all 1000 channels. The major channels don’t want to bother with shows that look terrible on modern televisions.
Hee Haw is BRIEF???!
The show had a life on network TV, then a much longer one – NOT in reruns – in syndication. The show was on the air continuously from 1969 to 1992. Other shows would KILL for a 23 year run.
I remember both of those. Iron Horse was a western on ABC with Dale Robertson, about the building of the transcontinental (I think) railroad. MAD Magazine did a satire on it called “The Iron Horselaugh” (or possibly “-laff”).
I don’t think it aged any worse than the other original Nicktoons. The move to Disney killed Doug. Nevertheless, every Halloween you’ll see at least one Quailman.
I guess The Real World could count. Made a big splash, but started sucking post Miami, maybe Boston. Hawaii really accelerated the trainwreck. I don’t even know if MTV still makes the show. Its relevancy is on par with TRL and now 106&Park as far as brainless entertainment of my youth.
I’m surprised this hasn’t been mentioned, given the shock-of-the-news only a few months ago:
*Mork & Mindy *had people imitating Mork and stalking Mindy (Pam Dawber) and each week it found a way to critique human behaviors from the perspective of an outsider, and the audiences laughed at those observations.
That, of course, was a spin-off from an everyone-is-watching-it show called Happy Days, itself a spin-off from Love, American Style because it was such a popular recurring skit.
But Happy Days spun off three shows – Laverne & Shirley (already mentioned above), Mork & Mindy, and Joanie loves Chachi – two of which became cultural icons of their time and the last of which didn’t seem to last a season. Now there are few who seem to remember any of them.
Around the time Mork & Mindy was airing (same time, different night?) or shortly after it folded, there was The Greatest American Hero with William Katt donning the superhero suit he couldn’t control. By that age, though, I was watching mainly to catch glimpses of the gorgeous Connie Sellecca, who later moved to the very short-lived Hotel (essentially Love Boat in a San Francisco drydock;)).
Actually, no. Love, American Style was a collection of three or so short playlets plus blackout gags between. ABC also mused the series to test possible series, as well. They tried Barefoot In the Park and Wait ‘Til Your Father Gets Home and others. One of the pilots they tried was a second try for a 1950s-based show (they had previously tried a pilot entitled New Family in Town that had Harold Gould – Rhoda’s Dad and “Kid Twist” from The Sting – as the father). The second pilot had Tom Bosley as the dad, and was called Love and the Television Set*, revolving around Richie’s dating a girl whjo was only interested in his because his family had a TV set. Drippy with nostaligia, and with no Fonzie yet. The pilot got a big boost when Ron Howard, who’d played Richie Cunningham, starred in George Lucas’ 1950s nostalgia movie, American Grafitti. ABC cashed in on their already-made pilot. There was never another episode of this on Love American Style.
*All Love American Style episodes were entitled “Love and the (blank)”
Here’s an off-topic weird thing. Does anybody else remember the animated series about a family of lions that used the same dialogue soundtrack as Wait Till Your Father Gets Home?
