Posted Dec 14th 2009 7:04PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
A lot of times, when a show that we love gets canceled way too early in its run, we like to trot out the mantra: "It was before its time." But looking at a television landscape with
The Office,
30 Rock and
Parks & Recreation (and that's just one night on one network), I really do think
Sports Night may have been too innovative for its own good.
Creator Aaron Sorkin even wanted the sitcom to air without a laugh track, but ABC balked and there is one evident in the first season. It was dropped by the second season, but unfortunately the show was dropped as well after only 45 episodes.
Character relations were front and center, and the humor was much more subtle and dry. In 1998, comedies were still dominating the television landscape, led by traditionally formatted shows like
Frasier, Friends, The Drew Carey Show and ABC's TGIF lineup. Maybe the very non-traditional
Sports Night should have been an hour long, and acted more like FOX's
Ally McBeal.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Sports Night
Posted Nov 30th 2009 5:01PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Sci-Fi/Supernatural Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
After the breakout success of
Lost in 2004, the following year saw three big-budget attempts at science fiction series with dense continuity. Unfortunately, it also saw those three series ultimately fail to hang on to their viewers, through internal problems or network mismanagement, and fans were left with three frustrating cliffhangers.
While they were allowed to complete more episodes than many series that followed them, I suspect this trinity of cancellations is a big reason current TV viewers are nervous about jumping on board complex shows with intricate continuity and details.
I watched
Surface,
Threshold and
Invasion that season, but always found myself much more involved with the stories and drama unfolding on the latter of the three. Despite Katrina-related sensitivity due to its hurricane-themed opening,
Invasion did an amazing job of building tension during a possible alien infiltration.
V could learn a thing or two from this show.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Invasion
Posted Nov 26th 2009 2:02PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
I'm not particularly thankful that I'm going to be having my very own battle of the bulge this upcoming week, but I am looking forward to good eats and seeing the family. The older I get, the faster these years wiz by, so it's important that we slow down and take the time to be appreciative of what we have, even if we might always want a little more.
This year, we made the jump from a 1997 model 27" Philips Magnavox television to a massive 52" HDTV. We also picked up a PS3, partially for the Blu-Ray player. So I'm thankful to finally be caught up with the rest of the world in television technology. Who knew it could all be so pretty?
More specifically, I think we're in a great era of television, even as viewer numbers continue to erode. There are just so many good shows on television, and thanks to DVRs and online streaming of those shows, we even have better opportunities to watch them. But what specifically am I thankful for
this year?
Continue reading What Jason is thankful for
Posted Nov 17th 2009 10:12AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, OpEd, Animation, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
Before
The Simpsons begat
Futurama, current executive producer of
The Simspons Al Jean, along with Mike Reiss, created a short-lived animated series about a film critic who hated almost every film he ever saw.
Starring
Jon Lovitz in some brilliant voice work,
The Critic ran through two networks in two seasons. Like
Futurama and
Family Guy, it found some success with reruns on cable -- in this case, Comedy Central -- and a subsequent DVD release. But unlike those series,
The Critic remains but a distant memory.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: The Critic
Posted Nov 3rd 2009 10:05AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
I remember watching
Boomtown for the first time. I remember where I was, and at what point in our lives it was on the air. Now, I watch a lot of television and have seen and forgotten more shows than most people would ever even want to be aware of. But
Boomtown had that much of an impact on me.
Oh, I'm a sucker for a unique premise or take on familiar territory. I first tuned in to
24 because it took place in "real time," and I just had to see how that would work. I tuned into
Boomtown because it promised me a look at crime from every possible perspective. How, I wondered, is that possible? And yet it brilliantly, beautifully and all too briefly was.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Boomtown
Posted Oct 27th 2009 2:01PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
This week, we're going to take a bit of a departure from the shows we normally cover. It's very rare that a show that puts out 76 episodes could be considered by anyone to be gone too soon, and yet I make the argument that
8 Simple Rules (for Dating My Teenage Daughter) is that show.
I'm also not going to try and convince you that
8 Simple Rules was one of the greatest sitcoms of all time, because it simply wasn't. It was a fairly standard, solid series headlined by a brilliant comic actor... and then it became something else.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: 8 Simple Rules
Posted Oct 20th 2009 5:01PM by Jonathan Toomey
Filed under: TV on the Bigscreen, Arrested Development, Cable/Satellite, Cancellations, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
It seems these days when anyone talks about
Arrested Development, the conversation inevitably turns to the still up-in-the-air film sequel -- something that's proven to be more elusive than finding your own Cornballer. Last we heard,
the film was actually in development (a term that only loosely means what it's supposed to in Hollywood), but in the meantime, though, there is some good news -
IFC has picked up the off-network rights to Arrested Development.
Continue reading Arrested Development news that isn't about the movie: IFC to air series
Posted Oct 19th 2009 2:04PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Sci-Fi/Supernatural Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
The name "Max Headroom" comes from the last thing TV reporter Edison Carter saw before he was knocked out and hacker extraordinaire Bryce Lynch dumped his memories into a computer: a sign reading "Max. Headroom: 2.3 meters" as a warning for low clearance. The program came alive and an '80s icon was born. Most people today remember Max Headroom for his pervasive commercial association with New Coke.
Yet it was in the
Max Headroom series that he was truly groundbreaking. The show was developed from a UK telefilm:
Max Headroom: 20 Minutes Into the Future. And that film was only created to give back-story to a talking head they wanted to use in a music video show.
Unfortunately, the popularity of this show and the character lasted about as long as New Coke. And for those of you who have no idea what New Coke is ... exactly!
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Max Headroom
Posted Oct 12th 2009 5:03PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
ABC has a certified hit with their big sprawling look at an American
Modern Family. But this isn't their first foray into a big family sitcom. In 2006, they aired a partially improvised comedy about a big, sprawling American family.
Sons & Daughters was barely on a month, but it sunk its talons into me and still hasn't let go. With mostly improvised dialogue, there was something very honest about the language they spoke, complete with the stammers and stutters that make up real conversation. The show was honest, heartfelt and funny. And with a massive cast, it felt like we were constantly on the verge of total chaos somewhere.
It looks like
Sons & Daughters was ahead of its time, hitting the air when Americans were touting the sitcom as a dying format. Goss needed to hold out until this season, somehow. Now we're taking a hard look at the sitcom again, and finding that we do like it. It just has to be good.
Sons & Daughters was good.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Sons & Daughters
Posted Oct 5th 2009 11:28AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Other Sci-Fi/Supernatural Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
The modern poster-child for a show that's "gone too soon" is
Jericho. The impassioned fans buried CBS under a ton of nuts, which got the show renewed for a shortened second season. Your mileage of the quality of that season may vary, but the fact remains that the fans did something none of these internet campaigns today will be able to.
What people don't realize is that when
Jericho came back for the second run, the ratings weren't any better than when the first season ended. So when they cancel your favorite show and you start mailing in bizarre objects and setting up your web petitions because "it worked for
Jericho," remember that the networks remember
Jericho as well. They remember that it failed to find a sizable audience twice.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Jericho
Posted Sep 28th 2009 1:06PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
Every once in a while, a show creeps up on the American public and really captures its imagination. Unfortunately, a lot of times that show is in a terrible timeslot on a tiny little network struggling to survive. Such was the case with
Jack & Bobby.
I'd like to think people didn't just automatically assume that this was a biopic about the Kennedys, though it certainly was playing with that notion intentionally by choosing that name. At its core, the show was simply another teen drama; the kind The WB had built a network around by the fall of 2004.
But it was also something more than that. It was an in-depth examination of the genesis of an American hero. How can someone go from being an ordinary person with ordinary problems into the most powerful man on the planet? While Jack and Bobby were typical all-American brothers, it was one of their destiny to rise to the seat of President of the United States by the mid-21st Century. That's the destination.
Jack & Bobby was the journey.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Jack & Bobby
Posted Sep 21st 2009 3:00PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Sci-Fi/Supernatural Shows, OpEd, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
In 1994, I was excited about
My So-Called Life and
Friends, but not much else on the TV schedule caught my eye. A friend of mine loved ABC's
Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, so I would go over there to hang out and watch it.
Being sci-fi buffs, we decided we should check out
Earth 2, a new show that aired an hour before
L&C on NBC. I have this tendency to at least try out all the new science-fiction shows, knowing that even if I like them, the odds of them surviving beyond one season are slim. I quickly gave up on
M.A.N.T.I.S. over on Fox, but found myself more intrigued by
Earth 2.
What a fascinating and sophisticated look at a science fiction world. It was so much more realistic and grounded than the
Star Trek series could ever be. The characters were horribly flawed and they felt much more human. As expected, the show failed, but not before I got 22 great episodes that still resonate in my memory.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Earth 2
Posted Sep 14th 2009 11:02AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Other Sci-Fi/Supernatural Shows, OpEd, Desperate Housewives, Stargate, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Chuck, Reality-Free, Dollhouse, Gone Too Soon, Joss Whedon, V
When I first started exploring this project, there were a few shows that I knew were going to be important to hit. This is the first of those.
Firefly was
Joss Whedon's sci-fi western series. The show mustered disappointing ratings in its short eleven-episode run on FOX.
Since then it's gone on to near mythic cult status. There was such an outcry of support from its loyalists, the Browncoats, over its cancellation that the producers made a feature film sequel. That movie,
Serenity, answered a lot of questions about the future fate of the cast. Unfortunately, like the television series, it couldn't find quite enough people to show up and tune in to warrant a sequel. Nevertheless, the few morsels of
Firefly we did get are enough to prove that this is one of the most innovative and enjoyable series ever to hit the airwaves.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Firefly
Posted Sep 7th 2009 11:03AM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Comedy Shows, Late Night, OpEd, Talk Show, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
When
Andy Richter left
Late Night With Conan O'Brien to establish his own career in acting, nobody knew that he'd come full circle and rejoin O'Brien years later. At the same time, nobody knew that creator
Victor Fresco would do much the same thing.
Andy Richter Controls the Universe was one of those quirky shows that most people, who enjoy a dash of nonsense in their comedy, really dug. It was a very playful show about a guy working in a massive company. It featured a small ensemble with great chemistry on-screen, and had a unique look at big corporations.
A few years later, Fresco tapped that well again, and we got
Better Off Ted, another comedy with absurdist tendencies set in a massive corporation with a small cast. Like
Andy, it eked out a second season based more on critical acclaim than ratings. As someone who enjoys both shows, I find myself worrying that
Ted will share
Andy's ultimate fate, cancellation after the second season.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: Andy Richter Controls the Universe
Posted Aug 31st 2009 2:40PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, Gone Too Soon
With the news coming down this week that
MTV is adapting the UK's teen sensation Skins for American audiences, it became obvious which show I was going to do next for this column. The thing about
Skins that works so well is that it rings of authenticity, which is rare in teen programming. It also features teenagers who are truly acting their age; no old dudes with male pattern baldness pretending to be high school sophomores.
We've seen all this before. A long time ago, before The WB and UPN built programming models for teen audiences, there was a little show on ABC that nobody really knew what to do with.
My So-Called Life tackled teen issues, not in "a very special episode" way, but in a raw, unfiltered way. It was wonderful.
Continue reading Gone Too Soon: My So-Called Life
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