The It Was a Thing on TV Podcast Network

This week, we're celebrating Norman Lear's 100th birthday by looking at two of his less successful shows.  We start with Lear's adaptation of a play about a seedy hotel with even seedier residents, Hot l Baltimore.  Most of the players were relative newcomers, and three went on to much greater success in the decades that followed.

We're giving you two shows for the price of one this episode.  These shows premiered on the same day, the shows aired consecutively on NBC, and both looked technologically amazing for late 1976.  Alas, technology couldn't save the pair, as their final shows aired on the last day of the year.

What if Merlin the Magician lived in the 20th Century instead of during Arthurian times?  In 1981, CBS gave us an answer to that question when Merlin lived in San Francisco and owned an auto repair shop.  It appears CBS had faith in the series, but it went up against difficult competition from the start.

We previously talked about the 1990 MLB All-Star Game, with its long rain delay.  Now, we're talking about what happened during that delay.  CBS fired up an episode of its freshman hit Rescue 911.  It was a bit of an odd selection, maybe more so because this episode had a gruesome event, during a jovial event (The All-Star Game.)

Our journey to this year's All-Star festivities continues with the 1990 edition, one with great pitching, first appearances by several baseball legends, and a lengthy rain delay.  We'll continue talking about the rain delay on Thursday.

We're rounding the halfway mark in the baseball season and we have three special episodes lined up for the occasion.  First, we watch dozens of legends participate in an old timers game whose participants span almost 50 years of Major League Baseball, the oldest of whom pulls off the highly improbable.

In our second of two entries related to the upcoming Thor movie release, this episode looks at a TV movie from 1988 where Thor appears in the same universe as The Incredible Hulk...but that's not the Thor we know or remember.  Listener discretion is advised, as this was treated like a live watch.

The Fourth of July is coming early next week.  To celebrate, we look at one of our favorite episodes of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, where the gang puts on a wrestling event with a little support from Rowdy Roddy Piper's character.

Another Marvel movie will be released soon as we celebrate the return of Thor, so it's time for more entries related to actors and actresses in the MCU.  We go back to 1980 for Stephen J. Cannell's first series, with Jeff Goldblum and Ben Vereen playing detectives in the short-lived but fondly remembered Tenspeed and Brown Shoe.

We're sticking with the courtroom theme in this surprise live show where we go back to a show covered in Episode 117 as we look at a special episode of Personal Injury Court. In this episode, Gino gives us the legal sauce in a case where a lady gets blinded in an eye by a bag of peanuts at a baseball game thrown by the team mascot. Let's just say that the costume of the mascot is something that ha...

Early in COVID times, a lot of odd shows came down the pipe to entertain audiences stuck at home.  Gary Busey, Pet Judge was one of them.  Take fake court cases, presided by a fake judge, complete with fake plaintiffs and defendants, and throw in an obviously fake court reporter and...hilarity ensues?

Greg and Chico watch the first two episodes of "Obi-Wan Kenobi" the latest Star Wars series on Disney+. In Ewan McGreggor's epic return to the role of our favorite Jedi master, Obi-Wan has to deal with failing in his training of Anakin back in "Revenge of the Sith". Meanwhile, a certain Princess from Alderaan is kidnapped and it's up to Obi-Wan to save her from the clutches of the Empire and his f...

It's another police procedural from the 80s, but this one's different; it has a female lead.  And a very big gun.  And she wasn't afraid to use it.  Lady Blue was one of the most violent shows on TV at that time.  Alas, it ran for 14 episodes amongst tough competition.

FOX was the newcomer on the block in 1987, specifically when it came to primetime programming.  They threw a lot of stuff against the wall, to see if much stuck.  Women in Prison was one such program that just didn't click.  But that theme song!

It's 1985.  NBC has a little show called Knight Rider and CBS has Airwolf, while ABC has neither.  Give an LAPD cop a high-powered motorcycle during his time off-the-clock and he's ABC's response--Street Hawk, another show that was more popular overseas than domestically.

It's viewer request time again!  You wanted us to watch this sort-of spiritual successor to High School U.S.A. (Episode 158) and we did!  Why did this movie about a summer camp originally air in the not-so summer month of February 1985?  We know why it reran in July 1985, besides it was summer.

In an experimental solo episode that Greg does somewhat live from his car after work, Greg talks about the shows he's been watching so far as the summer starts to heat up. Greg talks about the new season of Stranger Things along with Obi-Wan Kenobi on Disney+. He also talks about how he thinks the finale of Barry Season 3 will go down. Afterwards, Greg looks ahead talking about future episodes of...

It's the mid-80s, the Cold War rages on, and a comedian from Soviet Russia makes it big with appearances on Carson and on the stand-up circuit, and as a semi-regular on Night Court.  In 1986, he got his own vehicle, What a Country!  Listen to who was cast as the macho ex-Marine turned principal.

"The Whammy" is your guide to one more episode related to Press Your Luck.  This time, Greg and Mike talk about some of the oddball prizes from all versions of Press Your Luck, including the current version, Whammy!, and the one-off Game Show Marathon episode.

One of our favorite revivals in recent years is returning for a 4th season.  This week, both shows are related to Press Your Luck.  To start, we look at the OG version, 6 years before the popular 80s version.  Second Chance had no whammies, had a boring board, had a weird question structure, and lasted a little over 4 months in 1977 on ABC.

In the mid-80s, the pizza wars fueled up between primarily Pizza Hut and Domino's.  Pizza Hut had a successful campaign aimed at students, with the Book It! project.  Domino's promoted fast and hot delivery, and incorporated a Claymation spokesfiend named The Noid.

In the most recent taping session, we brought up Jonathan Frakes and the cult classic Late 90's/Early 2000's FOX show "Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction". In this special live show, Greg presents an episode featuring three potential show Hall of Famers in the five stories in this Season 2 episode. At the end of the episode, Mike and Chico will determine if these five stories pass the smell test. Sinc...

NBC is on a slow rebound in 1980, after all the catastrophes we have talked about during 1979.  The powers that be decided imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, creating their own show similar to the Benji franchise from that era.  Here's Boomer was an anthology about a dog crossing the country, helping people in need.  While very family-friendly, the show didn't get enough eyes to see this...

It's almost Greg's birthday and this is his Money in the Bank show.  A very young Jon Cryer plays the titular character in this show, as someone who goes from working in a mail room to being a big-time agent.

Schuckapalooza ends with one of the most forgettable shows we have ever covered.  Despite very little video available, Turnabout is one of the most painful series we have recapped, from the awkward premise to story lines which are ridiculous and even somewhat sexist.  John Schuck and Sharon Gless deserved so much better.