# What are the five worst television shows of all time? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 22, 2009, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833 "2009-07-22T06:15:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2009, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/101 "2009-07-24T15:30:38Z")
> [@emcee2k](#): > > And, a dark horse: **Corner Gas**. Sorry, it just isn’t funny. I know Canadians seem to like it, but they also willingly live in Canada so their taste is obviously questionable. Madness. I am not Canadian so far as I know, and I like Corner Gas, not least because of the scrumptious [Gabrielle Miller](http://www.thepromotionpeople.ca/images/GabrielleMiller144.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2009, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/102 "2009-07-24T15:42:56Z")
**Corner Gas** is always amusing, if rarely laugh-out-loud funny. That puts it above 98% of American television. ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2009, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/103 "2009-07-24T16:08:34Z")
> [@C.Montgomery\_Burns](#): > > Just watch The Soup for a weekly roundup of suckitude of monumental proportions. Kendra? (Fill in the blank) of Love? Kardashians? Take your pick, because if it’s on The Soup, it sucks. (But man, it’s funny!) Don’t forget _The Dish_. Think about it. Somebody has to watch that Kendra/Kardashian/Hills/Housewives crap in order to mine the clips. Pity those people. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2009, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/104 "2009-07-24T16:29:50Z")
[Woops!](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woops!) This aired on FOX back in 1992 and lasted a few months. The premise was that a small group of people had lived through a nuclear holocaust (one by simply being in a Volvo), and now they had to band together in order to survive. But the characters were obnoxious, the jokes weren’t funny, and the premise itself was just creepy. I caught a couple of episodes when it first aired–I wondered if the second one I watched could be as bad as the first, and it was–and consider it the worst show I have ever seen. ---
**Author:** ![C.Montgomery\_Burns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecd19e/32.png) [@C.Montgomery\_Burns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C.Montgomery_Burns)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/105 "2009-07-25T02:26:51Z")
> [@AuntiePam](#): > > Don’t forget _The Dish_. > > Think about it. Somebody has to watch that Kendra/Kardashian/Hills/Housewives crap in order to mine the clips. Pity those people. The amount of concentrated douchebag on The Soup exceeds the legal limit on a weekly basis. If life were fair, those writers would make more money than anyone in Hollywood. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/106 "2009-07-25T03:08:04Z")
> [@FoieGrasIsEvil](#): > > Survivor > Jerry Springer > The Bachelor > MTV Real World > All soap operas Nobody wants to defend these listings? Shame on you! ---
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/107 "2009-07-25T03:22:59Z")
I’ll defend the first few seasons of _Survivor_. It started out really good, with enough changes between seasons to make each one memorable. Then it became the same thing over and over, the same stock castaways, the same challenges… I loved it when it started, but now I haven’t watched it in about two years. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/108 "2009-07-25T03:58:28Z")
Really, you people aren’t even trying. Can you believe that something called [Heil Honey, I’m Home!](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heil_Honey_I'm_Home!) - a sitcom about Adolph Hitler’s homelife - even got past the “you were drunk, right?” stage of development? But I think the record has to go to [Australia’s Naughtiest Home Videos](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia%27s_Naughtiest_Home_Videos), which was pulled off the air 34 minutes into it’s 90 minute timeslot by the TV network owner Kerry Packer, who rang his station to say - or more likely, scream - “Get that shit off the air!”. ---
**Author:** ![SSG\_Schwartz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@SSG\_Schwartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SSG_Schwartz)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/109 "2009-07-25T04:21:58Z")
> [@FoieGrasIsEvil](#): > > Survivor > Jerry Springer > The Bachelor > MTV Real World > All soap operas I will try to defend _Jerry Springer_. It really is not the worst that TV programs could be. In fact to some, it may be as good as it gets. The show has had nudity, profanity, and violence. Added to that, one episode featured a man marrying a horse. Set in Chicago guarantees that there would always be a couple hundred people available to insult the freaks on the stage. I can’t see the show working in Connecticut. You may not like it, and I may not like it, but it is the television equivalent of a cold cheeseburger and fries. Also, it gives the average viewer, sitting a home at a time when most people are out earning a living, a chance to see people worse off than they are. It gives people a chance to say to themselves, I may be eating ding-dongs in a run down trailer park at noon on a Tuesday, but at least I haven’t impregnated my wife’s 300 pound great-grandmother. SSG Schwartz ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/110 "2009-07-25T04:51:07Z")
> [@SSG\_Schwartz](#): > > I will try to defend _Jerry Springer_. It really is not the worst that TV programs could be. In fact to some, it may be as good as it gets. The show has had nudity, profanity, and violence. Added to that, one episode featured a man marrying a horse. Set in Chicago guarantees that there would always be a couple hundred people available to insult the freaks on the stage. I can’t see the show working in Connecticut. > > You may not like it, and I may not like it, but it is the television equivalent of a cold cheeseburger and fries. Also, it gives the average viewer, sitting a home at a time when most people are out earning a living, a chance to see people worse off than they are. It gives people a chance to say to themselves, I may be eating ding-dongs in a run down trailer park at noon on a Tuesday, but at least I haven’t impregnated my wife’s 300 pound great-grandmother. > > SSG Schwartz But that’s not what they say! They identify with the impregnator or the impregnatee! And as for nudity, if it had that uncesored for American TV, then it wouldn’t have qualified for an “worst of all” list. Carry on, SGT. ---
**Author:** ![Nation](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5daacb/32.png) [@Nation](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nation)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/111 "2009-07-25T04:54:05Z")
that damn sitcom/drama/crap Cavemen or whatever it was called loosely based on the commercials. The commercials are funny as hell though. ---
**Author:** ![Abby\_Emma\_Sasha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e68b1a/32.png) [@Abby\_Emma\_Sasha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Abby_Emma_Sasha)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/112 "2009-07-25T09:30:11Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I will never mock Cop Rock. I still remember the song from the cop’s funeral: _My only regret is I haven’t told you yet how much I love you…_. > > Also I feel obliged to defend The Dukes of Hazzard. It’s pure, goofy fun. > > I’ll nominate Love Boat; its landlubber clone Hotel; the execrable Dallas; the even more execrable Dynasty; and, in a tie for the fifth spot, Melrose Place and Beverly Hills 90210. Charmed escapes this list only because the non-Rose McGowan leads were so freaking hot. **Skald** , I’m afraid I let you off too easy in my rush to defend _Cop Rock_. I cannot let the desecration of \*Dynasty,\*_Dallas,_ and _Melrose Place_ go unattended. Those were some of the best night time soaps ever. Now, I admit, if you’re not a daytime soap fan you’re probably not going to like the prime time sudsers. However, the presposterous story lines and the over the top characters made these shows a very guilty pleasure. I do not apologize one bit for loving them. I did like your subtitle for _Hotel_, I always called it _Love Boat in Dry Dock_. ---
**Author:** ![Labtrash](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/labtrash/32/528_2.png) [@Labtrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labtrash)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 11:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/113 "2009-07-25T11:10:47Z")
\*\* I Love New York\*\* (and all later incarnations with that vapid whore) What do I win? ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/114 "2009-07-25T14:12:48Z")
I’ll come up with more but Rowan and Martins Laugh in and the old Andy Williams show immediatly spring to mind as being memorably dire. Also Big Brother and any "People"show as in members of low life families airing their real and/or imaginary relationship problems in public. ---
**Author:** ![C.Montgomery\_Burns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecd19e/32.png) [@C.Montgomery\_Burns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C.Montgomery_Burns)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/115 "2009-07-25T18:27:33Z")
> [@labtrash](#): > > \*\* > I Love New York\*\* (and all later incarnations with that vapid whore) > > What do I win? A lifetime supply of penicillin and rubber gloves. ---
**Author:** ![Recliner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/a88e57/32.png) [@Recliner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Recliner)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/116 "2009-07-25T19:46:21Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I challenge anyone to search youTube for _The Half-Hour News Hour_, though I will not be held responsible for the subsequent injuries resulting from your brain trying desperately to break free of your skull and flee in terror. “Oohh, we’ll show that liberal Daily Show! Conservative humor is just as funny!” Heh. This show needs to be smacked around more – it got off easy. ---
**Author:** ![Pyper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pyper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pyper)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/117 "2009-07-25T20:10:11Z")
> [@Kimmy\_Gibbler](#): > > Bitches, _please_. That episode where [DJ passes out at the gym](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5qZPe8HuxI) is **classic.** Wow, talk about an inappropriate laugh track. “I’m worried DJ might be sick!” _laughter_ “She hasn’t eaten anything in three days!” _uproarious laughter_ ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Jeffrey\_Lebowski](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_jeffrey_lebowski/32/215_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Jeffrey\_Lebowski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Jeffrey_Lebowski)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/118 "2009-07-25T21:04:08Z")
> [@Borborygmi](#): > > _Home Movies_, I thought, was a dismal short-lived animated series on UPN. A check of Wikipedia reveals to me that it actually survived the quick hook from network TV and lived on for four seasons on cable… damned if I know how or why. I couldn’t disagree with you more. A terrificly funny show, and Coach McGuirk, voiced by Brendon Small, is one of the all time greatest tv characters, imho. \*Coach McGuirk: [looking at a bald child with an oxygen ventilator] I love this kid. He’s like a chipmunk with a disease. Coach McGuirk: [drunkenly] So I said to her “You want it clean? HUH? You want it CLEAN? YOU CLEAN IT! CLEAN IT YOURSELF! CLEAN IT YOURSELF!”… and I haven’t spoken to my mother since. \* ---
**Author:** ![eleanorigby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee7513/32.png) [@eleanorigby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eleanorigby)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/119 "2009-07-25T23:37:28Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > After you die, and come back as a car, I am going to sell your parts for scrap. And then maybe that song will be out of my head forever. > > Regards, > Shodan Cash for clunkers? 🙂 I nominate: 1. The Beverly HillBillies–classist, sexist and stupid, all in one! (or Green Acres–fairly interchangeable, no?) 2. Didn’t 3’s Company have a spin-off? If not, then 3’s Company. 3. Chachi-the Happy Days spin off. (no idea how to spell his name; don’t care) 4. Tie for 4th: George Lopez Show, Carlos Mencia (anything with him in it) or that Dimitri Martin show. 5. Any Judge show. I have heard tell that Teletubbies was watched by HS and college kids whilst high or on acid/ecstasy–apparently there is a lot to be gleaned from the show when one is altered in some way. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2009, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833/120 "2009-07-25T23:45:18Z")
> [@eleanorigby](#): > > 1. Didn’t 3’s Company have a spin-off? If not, then 3’s Company. [The Ropers](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ropers) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-five-worst-television-shows-of-all-time/503833.md?page=7)