Back in January I gave my list of Great Shows, Bad Characters. And now
it's time to reverse that and name five great characters trapped in bad TV shows.
1. Hawk (A Man Called Hawk): Not only is Hawk (from Spenser: For Hire) one of the great characters of 80s television, he's one of the great characters of television history. And Avery Brooks...what a perfect actor for the role. No one else could have played Robert B. Parker's character like Brooks (see the later Spenser flicks for proof of that). But then they gave him his own show, moving him to D.C., and he started playing the piano and getting all mushy. Eh. Great character, bad show.
2. Blanche, Rose, and Sophia (The Golden Palace): Three great characters from The Golden Girls decide to open up a hotel in Miami when Dorothy gets married and moves away. Blanche, Rose, and Sophia open a hotel? That never made any sense to me.
3. Dr. Smith (Lost In Space): What a weird show, and what a weird character. Conniving, cowardly, over the top, and a little evil, Smith was the ultimate creep. Jonathan Harris did a great job with such an outlandish character in an outlandish premise. I never knew why the family always tried to save him. I would have let him get killed by monsters or giant carrots or whatever the Robinsons were fighting that week.
4. Joey Tribbiani (Joey): No explanation necessary.
5. Jack Stiles (Jack Of All Trades): I had high hopes for this show, because Bruce Campbell was the star. But...wow, what a dud this was.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
2-16-2006 @ 1:55PM
Joshua Stein said...
I don't know, I always liked Jack of All Trades. It was like a live action cartoon. No real plot to speak of, nothing particularly memorable going on, and in the end, it was silly and fun. Or maybe it was just that I had to sit through the schlock that was "Cleopatra 2525" in order to get to it. It took me seven episodes of Firefly to realize where I knew Gina Torres from.
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2-16-2006 @ 2:00PM
TheMatt said...
I have to do it, even if it will cost me stars. Ahem..."SpenSAH!"
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2-16-2006 @ 2:26PM
Thomas said...
Joey isn't what I'd call bad, it's not great - it's average. There are far worse shows out there.
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2-16-2006 @ 2:58PM
Alan said...
I think most terrible shows get sold on the strength of their characters.
I think the whole cast of The Munsters, The Flinstones, and The Facts of Life are great characters with incredibly bad writing.
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2-16-2006 @ 4:30PM
Eric J said...
I just realized - Gaius Baltar is Dr. Smith.
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2-16-2006 @ 5:02PM
Mase said...
How about the character Six from "Blossom"?
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2-16-2006 @ 5:06PM
Mase said...
In all seriousness, I'd actually have to say John Larroquette's ADA Reinhold "Dan" Fielding from "Night Court". Really not a great show, but Larroquette made it watchable. I only tuned in for his character.
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2-16-2006 @ 5:53PM
kel said...
I'm going to get flamed for this, but the cast of Firely on Firefly. The characters were all great, but they were stuck in a sci-fi/western mash-up that more often than not just did not work. I loved the show because of the writing and characters, but the setting was a bit much and I totally understood why so many people couldn't get past it.
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2-16-2006 @ 5:55PM
Michael said...
Dont forget Danny Aiello in Dellaventura and David Morse in Hack! I think I was the only one who watched these shows.
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2-16-2006 @ 6:46PM
Atticus said...
I think I'm one of the few people out there who likes Joey [the show and the character].
Every time I watch it I keep waiting for Chandler to come walking through the door.
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2-16-2006 @ 7:00PM
LC said...
Michael Ironsides character "Ham" on V was a great character on a terrible show. I loved the mini series, but the tv series was absolutely awful. I think because they decided to use writers with no sci fi knowledge helped sink it.
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2-16-2006 @ 9:25PM
Jamie said...
Gil Gerard's Buck Rogers and erin Gray's Wilma Deering were great characters who were given bad, campy scripts. That show could have dealt with "stranger in a strange land" sci fi concepts, but seriously missed the opportunity.
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2-17-2006 @ 2:30PM
John said...
"I have to do it, even if it will cost me stars. Ahem..."SpenSAH!""
I always waited for Robert Urich to guest star on Star Trek: DS9 just to hear Avery get to say SpenSAH again. =(
Second best would be Robert Guillaume, so Odo could call him Benson....
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2-19-2006 @ 6:54AM
Hannah said...
I'm very upset about Joey being canceled. Do you realize how there are no funny sitcoms anymore? At least we had Will and Grace and Joey. I had tears from laughing on a few occasions while watching Joey. The only part of the show I didn't like was his sister. She was never funny, annoying, and almost made the show unpleasent to watch. Maybe NBC should take the character of Joey and pair him up with another Friends character and try again.
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2-19-2006 @ 8:25AM
Hannah said...
Is there anybody I can contact at NBC to let them know how stupid they are for taking "Joey" off the line up? Four Kings will fail. Joey was FUNNY. We just need to make a few adjustments, such as finding a more likeable character than his sister. Seriously, we could make this show (or Joey's character on a different show) work! We desperately need something funny to watch.
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2-19-2006 @ 8:49AM
Lila Kleinman said...
Joey's show was average with a few funny moments thrown in. But every time I watched it, I'd always comment that I really disliked the sister character. She was grating and very unfunny. Maybe a different actress???? Not at all surprised that it was cancelled.
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2-19-2006 @ 8:50AM
April said...
I agree about Joey. His character was ALWAYS funny but the sister was NOT california enough for the show. i'm guessing that's one reason it was pulled. Michael was a necessary part and was getting a bit funnier, as was the cute blonde neighbor. HOW DO WE KEEP A FRIEND ALIVE?!?!?! Come on NBC throw us a bone! you could always move it to a lesser network, we'd ALL find it :)
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2-19-2006 @ 8:55AM
Ed said...
Bring Joey back, I like the show and the character and his sister....For the one who mentioned Hack and David Morse, it was a great show but only made for one season, when his court case ended. After that there was no real story. Great character, bad show, Carol O'Connor in Archie Bunker's Place tops the list, although Carol wasn't particularly funny in it, we know how funny he was.
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2-19-2006 @ 8:56AM
Jeanmarie Collins said...
I can never remember a spin off of any t.v. series that has been successful; movies with remakes are rare also. Perhaps the producers should pay closer attention to the past, and focus on being more creative in the future. Even great actors can not save a bad script or an old, used concept.
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2-19-2006 @ 9:22AM
Robert said...
There have been many successful TV spinoffs. The Jeffersons was a spinoff of All in the Family. Laverne and Shirley and Mork and Mindy were spinoffs of Happy Days. The Facts of Life was a spinoff of Diff'rent Strokes. Knots Landing was a spinoff of Dallas. The difference in that era of television and the current era is that there were writers capable of recognizing that some characters were strong enough to be spunoff into other shows and then developing strong plots and interesting dialogue for them.
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