Oh, there you are! I'm afraid you're a bit early. I'm not quite ready to start this thing just yet. If you could hand me those vacuum tubes-- no, not the ones over by the Tesla coil, the ones on the bench, please. See, I've decided to bring my blog back to life (or what passes for it) and I decided the best way was to go the full Frankenstein-- watch out you don't trip on that cable there.
Well, yes, of course I got distracted. My Netflix queue isn't gonna watch itself, you know, and I did just spend last week re-reading the full run of iZombie (in finer comic shops everywhere!) Still, I had topics to discuss, stories to share, and big ideas that needed their space, hence the Colin Clive act on this space here. And what better way to revive this corner of ideaspace than with a discussion on, well, revivals?
So, I read an article recently about WKRP in Cincinnati, which got me thinking about its lesser-known follow-up, aptly titled The New WKRP in Cincinnati. Yes, they took the central premise and a few of the same characters and threw a bunch of new characters together to see if it worked. It lasted about two seasons in syndication, which shows you what the first-run syndication market was like. Actually, a lot of revival shows went straight into syndication. You had your more recently deceased network programs that were given new life, like Charles in Charge, or It's a Living (which sparked my preteen crush on Ann Jillian), or the interminable Punky Brewster, which had me convinced that Chicago must've been one of the most depressing places to live.
Then there were the ones that you had to dig a little deeper to find. Older programs that were given a kind of un-life. The New Gidget shambled along the beaches for two seasons, and I watched it, with very little knowledge of the original. What's Happening Now!! (don't forget those exclamation marks, kiddies) eluded death for 66 episodes, and I somehow conflated it with the original series. The New Monkees (yes, this was a thing that existed!) defied the natural order for 13 keyboard-driven, ponytail-pompadoured, '80s-tastic episodes, and, God help me, I watched it. The Munsters Today crawled from their tombs and somehow managed to stay on for three seasons compared to the original's two, and I... hang on, what?
Yes, The Munsters Today somehow lasted longer than The Munsters. And you thought this Frankenstein bit was just for show. No, I don't remember much about this show other than a pre-Boy Meets World Jason Marsden as Eddie doing a "hip" version of "Michael Row the Boat Ashore." And John Schuck was no Fred Gwynne. And I don't really care to spend any more words on it. Look, okay, I misspent my youth watching far more television than is healthy. And now, the TV landscape has changed and bastions of weird programming don't exist in the same capacity these days.
Besides, it wasn't all bad. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the more successful revivals. Yes, despite having none of the original cast (and an extremely rocky first season), Star Trek: The Next Generation led to new televised Star Trek in one form or another for 18 years (and probably kicked off the late '80s/early '90s TV revival craze in the first place), and the BBC Wales revival of Doctor Who is bigger now than it ever was during its original 26-year run. Of course, they have their detractors, too, fans of the original, clashing with fans of the new. Kirk vs. Picard. Tom Baker vs. David Tennant. Somehow I doubt there was ever an internet discussion of Andy Travis vs. Donovan Aderhold.
I don't have any lessons, morals, conclusions about this. Now that I think about it, reviving my blog by talking about failed revivals is probably a risky thing in itself. I guess the main thing to take away from this is, they tried something newish, and it didn't always work, but they gave it what they got, and the rest is history.
And Ann Jillian was a babe.
And now, if you'll excuse me, I've a giant wall switch to throw and laugh maniacally at. Don't be a stranger, hmm?
No comments:
Post a Comment