The 13 Most Ridiculous TV Shows to Ever Get Green-Lit
This fall, ABC will air a new show featuring the cavemen from those GEICO commercials. For those of you that haven't seen those ads, their premise is basically this:
1) There's these cavemen, see.
2) But they live in the present day.
3) Instead of being primitive and stupid, they're actually quite intelligent and erudite.
4) They get upset and prissy when people think they're primitive and stupid.
If your first thought after reading that is: "That's the stupidest idea for a show I've heard all day," then you're 100 percent correct. (We'd also give full credit for "It can't be any worse than The King of Queens.") But if you read that and thought, "That's the stupidest idea for a show ever," you're actually wrong. There have been at least 13 shows stupider than that one-probably more if we were considering Mexican TV.
We're not, so here for your amusement are the 13 stupidest non-Mexican TV shows.
#13. Automan--ABC (1983-1984)
Automan was a show about a programmer who made a computer program to help him solve the many crimes that plagued his life. What made this computer program so special was that, when fed enough power, it would manifest itself in the real world. It would also be wearing a seatbelt and have immaculate blow-dried hair. Automan is chiefly remembered for being the only show in existence to make Knight Rider look plausible and well thought-out.
#12. Beauty and the Beast--CBS (1987-1990)
You'll probably remember Beauty and the Beast as that early '90s Disney cartoon about the dancing candlestick and the gay clock, and the adventures they had selling merchandise imprinted with images of themselves. But it turns out that wasn't the original Beauty and the Beast at all. The original was a 1987 live-action television show set in modern day New York. It featured a hideous man-beast in a relationship with a beautiful woman while they worked together solving crimes. Memorable story arcs include the time they got in the fight about who used up the last of the conditioner, and the time the Beast got upset after being left alone in the house all day and flung his feces all over the walls and ceiling.
#11. Bosom Buddies--ABC (1980-1982)
Also known as "That show where Tom Hanks dressed up as a woman so he could stay in an ladies-only apartment building." Between this show and Three's Company, it becomes readily apparent that if you were unfortunate enough to be a landlord in the '70s and '80s, your life must have been one neverending maze of deceit and betrayal.
#10. Cover Up--CBS (1984-1985)
Dani Reynolds is a fashion photographer whose life gets turned upside down when she finds out two things:
1) that her undercover CIA agent husband was killed on a secret mission, and
2) that her husband was an undercover CIA agent.
The CIA-evidently being short-staffed that day-decide to offer her husband's old job to her. So she hires Mac Harper, a former green beret (now male model) to travel around the world and help her while they fight international crime.
If you've noticed a common thread here of unusual teams fighting crime, congratulations. You have all the skills necessary to be a producer for a major television network, the most highly paid group of mouth-breathers imaginable.
Beauty and The Beast was actually really good. Linda Hamilton and Ron Pearlman worked great together. AND There was no feces flinging. Some episodes were kind of stupid, but most shows have a few of those.
ReplyJohnny B. was my childhhod hero. He could run with warp speed. Colt Seavers ruled, as did The Man From Atlantis and Evie was really cool.
ReplyI actually liked Bosom Buddies as a little kid, along with perfect strangers. although I did watch perfect strangers and three's company more than I did Bosom Buddies.
ReplyUh, excuse me, but where is Andy Griffith's "Salvage 1"? I mean, years before the Space Shuttle, the guy built out of scrap part his own rocket garbage truck capable of going to the moon to pick up the space junk there, including blasting it off and LANDING IT in his junk yard. Then he used one of the rocket engines to move an iceberg to solve a drought, plus fighting crimes and such.
ReplyThe man from Atlantis was my childhood crush. He swimmed funny and wore bright yellow trunks. His krytonite was staying to long above water and his hands turned the color of rotten fish if this happened. A very funny, bald, fat guy was his nemesis. He was played by an actor called Victor Buono. I remember watching without understanding a damn thing because I was little, but I remember knowing it would be terrible if his hands became all blue.
ReplyThe last name of the title character on "The Greatest American Hero" was Hinkley not Hinkey. When Reagan was shot by John Hinckley, Jr., the people in charge of the show changed the character's last name (for a while) to Hanley.
ReplySeriously, no "18 Wheels of Justice"? As the spectacularly good name might suggest, it's about a former government agent who goes undercover as a trucker after a mob boss kills his wife and children. He's given an 18 wheeler loaded with James Bond gadgetry that he can aimlessly drive across the US helping people in the towns he stops in. All played completely straight.
Reply14. "Work It"
Reply15. "Homeboys In Outer Space"
A lot of the shows like "BJ and the Bear", "Greatest American Hero", "Bosom Buddies" were very popular gimmick shows for a short while, until the jokes based on the shows gimmicky premises wore thin real quick and you didn't really have much of a show left. The Fall Guy, as ridicules as it was, had a strong weekly audience for quite a few years. I guess Lee Majors + fun theme song + Sexy blond assistant + occasional celebrity cameo's can keep a silly series going for awhile?
ReplyShows like Quark began as a Star Wars parody that was actually really funny, as recall watching it when I was 9. But after the premier Star Wars parody episode. It never had enough laughs or parodies to keep it going and the series was basically done by the 4th episode.
OH, and the reason Quarks got an Emmy Nominations had nothing to do with the sexy woman in revealing costumes, or that it had a great premier episode. But because Richard Benjamin was the star of the series. You see, Richard Benjamin seemed to be in every critically acclaimed movie and box office hit of the late 60's, the entire 70's, and early 80's. So if he's in a television series, I assume The Emmy's assumed that it must be a good series as well. I guess the Emmy judges never watched the series after the premier episode?
Man from Atlantis had a generation of kids trying to swim the length of pools, underwater and in one breath. Misfits of Science was Heroes 20 years before Heroes.and these are just a few. I miss the old shows. Every second TV show back then showed us what might be possible with computers etc these shows created the tech we have today by planting a seed in the minds of the kids born in the 70's.
ReplyI LOVED half these programs growing up.For a kid these are a fantastic set of shows to have in your childhood. BJ and the Bear... IT HAS A f*****g CHIMP AS A MAIN CHARACTER!!! Back when no-one was scared shitless of chimps going apeshit on a face-ripping-off bender. It does not get better than that! . Automan showing what it's like to make a left in a UFO. Greatest American Hero was a more realistic Superman, because he was a man first. Most ridiculous? nah! MOST AWESOME SHOWS EVER!
ReplyOh man! I totally watched the pilot of 100 Lives of Jack Black Savage when I was a kid, but I'd forgotten about it until now. I remember thinking it was a cool idea... when I was a kid.
ReplyThanks for posting #8, now I know what that Tshirt of Sheldon's is about.
ReplyI think you're talking about Sheldons Green Lantern shirt, I've seen every episode and never seen him wear a "Greatest American Hero" shirt (because I'd recognize that instantly and lose it...)
Obviously no real research here. I'll give you a few, but the top 13? No WAY! You evidently just searched for some random dumb shows and decided that was enough, time to write a pointless piece. Fail.
ReplyThat is more or less the mode with 80% of these articles. The other 20% are what keep me coming back.
Quark was the Lexx of it's time. That scene where Gene/Jean poses as a scientist in a symposium on The Device comes to mind every time someone mentions global warming.
ReplyI'm impressed you can recall a specific episode of Quark, but I'm also glad to see it defended in a number of comments. It actually was a pretty decent show.
WHAT?! Nearly Departed didn't make the list?!
ReplyQuark was certainly memorable. For all the wrog reasons. It was suppossed to basically be a parody of Star Trek, but the word LAME comes to mind. It was The Cleveland Show of its day and like, to say it again, LAME.
ReplyA good majority of these were hits that went 2-3 seasons. I have a feeling you probably are not old enough to remember any of them. Quark was funny.
ReplyHey, space garbage is serious business. In fact, there's another series called Planetes that's also about a space garbage cleanup crew who also sometimes solve space crimes, and it's really good.
ReplyBecause I'm older than I like to admit & I was raised by a TV set, I've seen every one of these shows during their original run.
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