The It Was a Thing on TV Podcast Network

Numerous successful scripted television shows made their way to Saturday mornings in the mid-70s, like I Dream of Jeannie, Gilligan's Island, and Star Trek.  The Partridge Family got the same treatment in 1974, but with a catch--it's set over 200 years in the future.  Also, some key components in the Partridge Family universe were missing.  If you see the show image, it looks awfully similar to a...

The New York Mets had a nutty last week and a half going from Atlanta to Milwaukee to Atlanta to Milwaukee as they clinched in a playoff spot in dramatic fashion on the last day of the regular season and advanced to the NLDS in a thrilling three-game Wild Card round. Greg shares with Mike in this delayed reaction his thoughts regarding the week that was and at the end, they look at the upcoming Di...

Thursday, October 3rd marked the 41st Anniversary of the premiere of the short-lived 1983-84 NBC game show "Go" from Bob Stewart Productions. To mark the occasion this edition of "The Best of It Was a Thing on TV" goes back to Episode 72 when we discussed it back in the Summer of 2020.

We're back with another batch of goofy and bizarre hometown commercials. Here is the line-up for this installment of Hometown Commercials: Unique Creations: https://youtu.be/9T_GZeZyYqU Shift It: https://youtu.be/1gYE5TyijxE West Palm Loan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XHUGEVMa8I Zachary’s Night Club: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvyS8dY2kQA Beacon Plumbing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=...

The FBI was a stalwart on ABC's line-up from 1965 through 1974.  The network kicked the tires on a new, updated version of their venerable classic in 1981 with this show, which featured contemporary storylines and a more diverse cast of characters.  Audiences weren't buying what ABC was selling, as this new version lasted merely a season.

Almost five years ago, we started this podcast.  Now, we are celebrating our 500th episode by going back to an early favorite of ours and revisiting it, mostly for the caliber of guest stars that we didn't recognize back then.  Enjoy as we go back to one of the biggest flops in television history, as we prepare to do the next 500, leading to show 1000.

30 years ago FOX shook up the TV landscape when they grabbed the NFL's NFC television package from CBS. In the process, several CBS stations in NFC markets not wanting to lose out on football jumped ship to FOX and set up a domino effect around the country changing many TV viewers' habits. Some of these changes are still being felt in various markets years later.   Below is a list of links used in...

We've talked about this in some past episodes and in this special edition of "It Was a Thing on TV Presents" before the week we celebrate out 500th episode we talk about TV Guide's 50 Worst Shows of All-Time List from 2002. We talk about why some shows deserved or didn't deserve to be on the list and we add some shows that were either neglected or should be added since TV Guide published the origi...

In 1988, the film Alien Nation was a theatrical release.  That spawned this televised adaptation of that film.  While only running for a single season, the franchise showed it had popularity and staying power, as televised movies and other forms of media appeared after this show's demise.

NBC was still trying to get their bearings aligned in early 1985.  One midseason replacement which had decent enough ratings against formidable competition was Sara, Chico's submission for the listener vote last year.  Quite a few cast members from Sara went onto much greater things, including a popular Oscar winner, a comedian/pundit, a multi-talented award-winning actress, and everybody's favori...

In our latest "Before the Show" Greg and Mike in Segment 1 go over one of their latest things in the pre-show segments by looking at the College Football announcer pairings for the week. They also discussed Shannon Sharpe's um ........ social media skills earlier this week. Then in Segment 2, Chico joins on as they discuss the rating system Mike has created for Quinn Martin's opening title sequenc...

Kevin Smith gave us "Clerks", a cult classic indie film from 1994. "Clerks" gave us Jay & Silent Bob. Jay & Silent Bob gave us a lot of laughs.... so ABC gave an order for an animated follow-up. Then America gave it a shot... and ABC gave up after a pair of eps, only for the show to become... a cult classic. Join us as we travel the full circle to the Quick Stop.

Not to be confused with Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In, this version was a series of specials throughout the 1977-78 television season with little connection to the original.  The positive of this version is a superstar talent got his first national exposure on this show, among other talents who had lengthy careers in television and elsewhere.  A negative is the producer got sued and lost millions be...

Bob Newhart struck gold with The Bob Newhart Show in the 70s and Newhart in the 80s through 1990.  Could Newhart do it again with another self-titled endeavor?  Bob was a clever and funny show, but it didn't have a certain something that both his previous shows had.  Despite quality names as guests including a future Friend, the show was saddled with bad time slots and only lasted a handful of epi...

It's time for the final entry of Back to School 2024.  This time, we're focusing on educational shows.  Everybody remembers shows like 3-2-1 Contact, The Electric Company, and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.  But do you remember some of the 15-minute shows like Wordsmith and Math Wise?  If not, we have you covered in this episode about educational shows which generally ran from about 9 in the morning...

Before Brian Griffin created a series about two oddball roommates on an episode of Family Guy, that premise was used in a short-lived NBC series which paired up a 14-year-old with an ex-Marine in his 40s in a college dorm.  Ratings were amazing for the premiere episode, but the show still lasted only 8 shows.  Find out why in this installment.

It's time to go back to school for the next three installments!  We start with someone who is teaching until he gets his big break in acting, hooking up with seemingly every single lady along the way.  Nick Freno: Licensed Teacher brought some realities teenagers went through (and still go through) at the time, in addition to being a light-hearted comedy.

After the last video game show (episode 201), we said it would be our last look at video games based on TV shows.  We lied!  We found nine more games worthy of covering for what we believe will truly be the final video game show we cover.  This time, we found some truly bad games from a variety of genres, from dramedy to animation to action shows.

It's the mid-90s and two startup networks are looking for programming.  A flavor of the month at the time was giving stand-up comics their own shows, see Seinfeld, Life with Louie, and Roseanne, and later The Drew Carey Show and Everybody Loves Raymond.  The new network was UPN and the comic was Richard Jeni, who took a concept from his stand-up show and loosely molded it into a Seinfeld-like TV s...

Tomorrow (August 16th) marks the 25th anniversary of the premiere episode of Who Wants to be a Millionaire? on ABC. The gang shares their memories and expectations leading up to the first episode while looking at some of the questions from the premiere. Some of the questions in the premiere seemed easy in 1999 while some questions that looked hard in 1999 would be considered easy in 2024.

The 1990s was a renaissance for George Foreman, between regaining the WBA heavyweight championship, and the creation and rise in popularity of what became the George Foreman Grill.  Before those events, Foreman helmed a self-titled short-lived sitcom.  Happy 78th birthday, Susan St. James!

In the television landscape of 1998, there was a need for late night programming on FOX and other channels not part of The Big Three networks, something to fill the void when The Arsenio Hall Show ended.  Enter the NBA hoopster with a million dollar smile and the energy to match.  Unfortunately, said hoopster didn't have the chops to host.  It didn't help the show's sidekick got the boot during th...

As the 2024 Paris Olympics come to a close later this week, we go back again to our 2021 Olympics series of shows for this special "Best of" with one of our favorite episodes. Back in 2003-04, FOX presented a series of specials with man going against members of the animal kingdom. Come for Kobayashi eating hot dogs against a bear, stay for the focused zebra that must realize that it's in a race!

In 1988, the U.S. Men's basketball team finished with a disappointing bronze medal, after having won the gold in almost every other previous Olympiad.  For that reason or because some teams had professional players, the Olympics opened the games to professionals.  The United States loaded up their squad with 11 of the NBA's best, plus Christian Laettner.  The first game was against Angola which, t...

As the Olympic Games are ready to start in Paris, the podcast will devote the next two episodes to happenings in previous years.  We start where each Olympics start--the opening ceremonies.  Each Olympic host city has their idea of what would be the perfect opening ceremony.  In retrospect, those ideas, while good in theory, were not for one reason or another.  The ceremonies also gather attention...