The Final Episode #91: Step By Step (1991 - 1998)

 

This is my sixth foray into the world of TGIF on ABC. You know the block of situational comedies on Friday. I've done Dinosaurs, Full House, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Family Matters and Boy Meets World. I don't know what else I can do or say for opening paragraphs on shows that appeared on the block. Did I mention the other blocks ABC tried to do like I Love Saturday Night or The Hump (Wednesday is the sexiest night of the year!). I actually don't think that I did because I would remember making a joke that awful. The thing is I don't remember these nights of the week. We would watch TGIF together as a family and I don't think my dad would have taken 2 nights of this stuff. Of course he likes The Big Bang Theory which even portnoyd can't argue is better than anything on TGIF. I know there's a few shows on TGIF that I still want to talk about, but only one big name one left. I really don't care about The Hughley's or whatever the fuck the second Olsen twins show was, but I'm sure I'll cover them because what the hell else do I have to do with the precious God given gift of life but talk about D.L. Hughley.

Step by Step for those not in the know was uh The Brady Bunch for the 1990s. Except they got the guy from Kickboxer 2 to be a big doofy goof in it. And the characters actually had something of a personality. Seriously. They at least made one of the girl characters stupid and vain and one of the boy characters a big old perv. A little bit of effort was put into the show and it makes it better than The Brady Bunch, but really is it a great accomplishment if you are better than what is possibly the worst long running sitcom of the 1960s AND 1970s? Not really but Step by Step did it. (Despite what it sounds like here I do find this show amusing but it's not exactly the most creatively made sitcom.) So yeah, Patrick Duffy marries Suzanne Sommers and everyone moves into one big old house. Suzanne Sommers mom and sister join in but they are forgotten about by the end of the first season. Is this the first time I've mentioned characters they just got rid of in a sitcom? Wow! Step by Step wins the cake! Oh and for some reason because it was the 1990s they had two characters that were real life Beavis and Butthead. Weird.

So I, as a child, would watch TGIF throughout its entire run pretty much. At one point we'd watch it as a family but I think my parents just got too annoyed by Urkel. I even followed this show and Family Matters over to CBS. I had to click the remote control at least several times to do that so you know it was a huge arduous ordeal but I did it! I pretty much enjoyed all of the shows as a kid except for whatever reason Full House. That one just annoyed the piss out of me. I guess it was because my sister made me watch so much of it in reruns. Anyway despite that I have no real hard memories of Step by Step other than I'm sure I watched it. I did however go and watch the vast majority of the series in like 2020 and I have to say that yeah, it's silly and corny but that's TGIF. It's still a lot of fun to watch and I enjoyed myself. I also have a lot of thoughts about some of the weird shit that happens within this show that I gotta talk about because I put the effort into putting them into a text file and letting a text file go to waste is too big a crime.

The first thing mentioned is a joke the character JT makes "OJ WALKS and I get detention!" Clearly I do not have to look any further because that is the most 1990s joke of all time. Step by Step keeps on winning! I also did not realize how absolutely horny this show was. Carol and Frank do all kinds of role play sex. There's an episode where he dresses up as Garfield! Well he only puts on the ears but still who the hell does Garfield role play except furries. I guess Patrick Duffy is a furry. More proof is that Carol has a tattoo that says Wolfy and Frank likes it but only if she calls him wolfy. Wow. I didn't think we'd see stuff like that on here because why not. At least every other episode someone is doing goofy ass shit with a giant prop or wearing a stupid costume. I respect that, this cast was up for EVERYTHING.

I think I'll take a look at the guest stars because that's also in the text file and well this show had some doozies! Michelle Williams when she was just a kid. I don't even know what she's popular for but that name is very familiar so good enough. John Astin from The Addams Family who plays a guy who wants to kill himself until Cody the goofy idiot from Kickboxer 2, 3 and 4. They didn't even have the money to hire him back for 5 thats how bad Kickboxer 5 was. Yeah Cody the goofy idiot of the show not that he was a goofy idiot in Kickboxer. He was a serious man in those films. Yeah he saves the guys life. It was a wild episode. Doris Roberts, Raymonds mom from Everybody Loves Raymond. Urkel appears in several episodes and thus connects Step by Step and the other shows into a TGIF Shared Universe. I can't wait till they make movies out of these shows! Oh and David Graf, better known as Tackleberry from Police Academy, Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment, Police Academy 3: Back in Training, Police Academy 4: Citizen's on Patrol, Police Academy 5: Assignment Miami Beach, Police Academy 6: City Under Siege and finally Police Academy: Mission to Moscow. I did all that by memory alone because I'm the coolest person on this planet.

I guess it's finally time to discuss The Final Episode which graced our television screens on June 26th, 1998. It was called "Movin' On Up" and no they sadly do not crossover with The Jeffersons which I think would have delighted port very much. He's all about that Webster crossover. Well this show gives us the usual family sitcom ending plot of the house is going to be sold. There's a bit of a twist but I'm sure that twist was already done before. Yeah, sitcoms if they are lucky get the big grand ending of either "selling the house the show took place in" or "character gets married". It's kinda sad but so many of the shows I talk about Final Episodes could literally be placed in the middle of the shows run and you'd never know the difference.

This Final Episode was directed by Steve Wittling. He was big in the late 80s for being on the show Valerie. I don't even know what show that was. He apparently was in Batman Returns AND the main actor in a probably shitty Sega CD game called Wirehead. You know one of those full motion games that looked neat but weren't fun to play. You know I'm right and those games were shitty, but yeah apparently he directed the Final Episode of Step by Step. This world of ours is a beautiful and weird place. This episode was written by Merideth Siler who wrote and worked on such shows as Gimmie a Break, and Empty Nest (Richard Mulligan is an underrated treasure). Also something called Dear John. 

As I said before this is a "OH MAN WE MIGHT GET A NEW HOUSE WOO" final episode. It starts with Frank telling the family that he came in under budget and under time for his latest work that his boss says he can build another house and it will be sold to him for what it cost to build it. We see Lily, the new cute child (the original cute child had grown up and was not even really in the show anymore at this point) leave the kitchen because she doesn't want to leave the house. At first Carol (Suzanne Sommers) doesn't want to move either until Frank goes IT'S GOT A FIREPLACE BABY! and she's instantly into it.

Well Lily is now getting into trouble in kindergarten. Even throwing balls on the roof. Carol even asks her if she could have found a better way to fix her problems and she says I COULD HAVE PUNCHED HIM. little kids being violent is good comedy. Uh, anyway Carol sends her to her  room. They then go check out the new house and everyone is into it. Except the little joykilling rugrat named Lily. The Fridge AND Dishwasher appliances TALK to you! It's like living in the damn future! Then we go back to Carol showing two yuppies the house. Do people even still use the word yuppie. That was a fun word. I hope it's still in use somewhere.  They mention swedish meatballs and these people go "We're Vegan! we don't eat meat" and then Frank goes "That's okay theres some Catholics next door and some Jews across the street!" 

So Lilly gets into trouble again and there's a fun scene where they are snarky assholes to each other. That's another reason why this show is better than The Brady Bunch. Snarky asshole comments are way better than OH I LOVE YOU SO MUCH STEP SISTER rubbish. Anyway the Vegan Yuppies (that would be a good band name) come back and they want to pretty much change how EVERYTHING in the house looks! Carol ends up not being able to sleep and is looking at old photo albums. She confesses to Frank about how she doesn't want to leave and he tells her he feels the same way.  Lily comes down and tells them how she also doesn't want to move. They decide they aren't moving and it's time to show the Vegan Yuppies the door!

How do they do this you might ask? Well they have to do their final walkthrough the house and they have everything get screwed up. They have the faucets not work. Mark the nerdy kid comes down and says the toilets back up and they mention how it's not really the toilets but the sewer system and it only happens about.......twice a week. Then they talk about the termites and the bulgarian wood eating worms that are also destroying the house. That still doesn't get them to go so the kids start howling like ghosts. Frank mentions how they lost their sheepdog and THEN they give up and call the house a hellhole. 

The show ends with Frank giving the family gifts because they were all set on moving but it didn't happen. This is a really nice little ending to the episode and the show as a whole.

FINAL VERDICT: Yeah it's the ending that Blossom had, and I'm sure other Family sitcoms have but I think the fact they decide not to sell is a nice little twist and the episode was amusing enough. Maybe I'm just jaded by the fact so many shows either ended on a fucking clip show or a cliffhanger that I'm like "Yeah this was a nice way to end the series" for Step by Step. Oh, the text file also said to mention Cody and the goat. Yeah Cody ended up hanging out with a goat at a frat house. It was sure something!