TVSquad

(S15E07) Poor Ericka. In tonight's episode of The Amazing Race, she didn't look quite like Miss America. Stress will do that to you. It seems each week a team or two make what might be a fatal error in the game. Oh, not something that could kill them -- just one which could lead to being Philiminated. This leg wasn't only tough on Brian and Ericka. One of the Globetrotters had to don a dress. Thankfully, it seemed to be specially tailored to fit him.

1974 -- the start of the second revolution of live-action, Saturday morning programming. There's no clear reason why, after nearly a decade-and-a-half, the networks decided to infuse their schedules with more live-action fare. Perhaps, after 10 years of non-stop animation, they decided to mix the formula up. Perhaps they were looking to further model the Saturday morning schedule like their primetime partners. Or, perhaps they realized that ordering live-action programs was cheaper than ordering new cartoons.

IIIIII'mmmm going with 'cheap' as the main reason.

Of the fourteen shows that premiered in the 1974-75 season nearly a third of them were live-action programs. Only one of them came from the Sid and Marty Kroftt factory. The others came from two studios that hadn't had much experience with 30-minute, live-action fare...Filmation and Hanna-Barbera. The rest of the schedules were filled with animated retoolings of primetime programs, talking motorcycles, and dogs who performed karate. As we've done of the last few installments the 1974-75 season will be split into two parts. This time we'll look at CBS's schedule. So, if your Schwinn is in the garage, let's journey back to a far simpler time.

On a cursory glance at the 1970-71 Saturday morning schedule, one would think it was another year of classic children's fare. Yet, on closer examination, one would notice something else about the schedule. It was a bit dull. Oh, there were certainly some classics that premiered during this time -- many of them remembered to this day -- but the rest of the shows were somewhat forgettable.

It was almost like the networks and production studios had run out of steam when it came to Saturday mornings and weren't sure what to do. Understandable, since strict network standards as well as lobby groups like Action for Children's Television (ACT) put a stranglehold on what could and could not be shown. The result was a mix of animated spin-offs and live-action series that were a bit on the bland side. It would be a trend that continued through the first few years of the 1970s.

So, if you have your bowl of Cap'n Crunch on-hand, let's journey back to 1970.

Last year, I mentioned a site called RejectedJokes in which comedy writer Ben Schwartz performed all the jokes he wrote that were rejected by the likes of Letterman and SNL's Weekend Update (he's a freelancer for both).

Ben's latest gig is creating videos for the Web site Super Deluxe. Below is a video he made featuring Rob Riggle (The Daily Show) as the coach for the Washington Colonels, a basketball team that has lost 125 matches in a row. Could it be that Riggle's team is that bad, or is it because their rival, the Bronx World Travelers, always bring things like stools and mini trampolines onto the court?