It’s been quite a bit of time since I went hog wild on a random television show from the 1950s to the 1990s Final Episode and I feel like getting back to that. I have a list of shows that are related to other shows that I’ve done in the past and I feel like I gotta do these too. Several of these shows do not sound like exciting watches and several of them I have nothing to talk about when it comes to nostalgia so you know what that means. I’m going to pull some garbage straight from my ass hole like some kind of disgusting magician.
I figure I feel like talking about the Rise and Fall of Saturday Morning Cartoons or Saturday Morning Kids Programming. If you are my age or even say 30 years older you’d probably have some fond ass memories of Saturday Morning. It was when they put on all the cartoons. It started more or less sometime in the 1950s. You know Howdy Doody and all that shit. I think Howdy Doody was a real show and was syndicated but it was around the same time so shut up. I’m just blathering before getting to the real point. Anyway those shows would just more or less show old Disney, Looney Tunes, Terrytoons, and probably that fucker Casper. It was like this until Hanna Barbera got into making TV shows and then most of that stuff was by them. And Filmation. It was literally those two for like the 1960s and 1970s until Ruby Spears made their own animation studio.
Still in 1979 the first sign of a crack in the foundation was formed. It was called Nickelodeon. Not something they really had to worry about in 1979. Not until 1991 they really had to worry. Then in 1983 another crack formed in the shape of Mickey Mouse due to the Disney Channel coming out then. They also didn’t have to really worry until it became a Cable channel you didn’t have to go out and get a satellite for. Then in 1992 several cracks formed. Cartoon Network came out and then NBC stopped showing Cartoons and Kids stuff realizing that they could make money from Teenagers by ripping off Saved by the Bell and yes I’m calling these shows a ripoff even if they were created by the same guy. They are the same damn show. I didn’t get into Saved by the Bell until like TBS would start rerunning it forever in like 1996? 1997? 1998? some time when I was close to being a teenager. I was way too into Ninja Turtles and Ghostbusters in 1989 because I was four.
Anyway NBC would show a three hour block of Saved by the Bell and Saved by the Bell ripoffs. Not something I really found all that interesting until I was like again probably eleven. I also never did watch any of the ripoffs in syndication because I don’t think TBS or any other channel showed them. Actually I think they were still on TV at the time and I was clearly more interested in One Saturday Morning in 1997. Another problem that came around the middle of the decade was that a decent amount of the programming had to be educational and informative. Sorry but the large majority of edutainment programming was always forced. Sure The Magic School Bus and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego were really fun but the majority was like those PSAs at the end of a cartoon that meant it was time to get up and some more Oreos or something.
CBS I believe ended their Saturday Morning stuff sometime in the mid 1990s. Sometime when the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles finally left the airwaves for the first time. (Also I just remembered another show that I feel like I have to do but don’t really want too and will put on the list and yes it’s connected to TMNT) also if I had any talent for video making I would probably be like those YouTubers who make 85 hour videos on things like this. Anyway it was just ABC and having been just been bought by Disney they did get a shot in the arm. Recess, Pepper Ann, Brand Spanking New Doug and other stuff made it a fun thing that I just had to watch at the time. It would change names and stuff but they would pump out new content until like 2006. It just ended in 2011 or 2012. Which is way recent.
Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network and The Disney Channel helped kill Saturday Morning Cartoons but they are now being killed slowly by streaming services. Wouldn’t it be hilarious if streaming literally completely pops because there are so fucking many services and we all go back to cable and renting movies. That would legit be fun but probably not. We do not get to enjoy fun in 2023. Anyway back in 1992 NBC created TNBC and finally we are getting to the fucking point because in 1995 they put Hang Time on the boob tube. In 2023 I watched it so I can discuss it with portnoyd who probably never watched it.
As you know with television programs I did not watch as a child or even in the insuring years of my life I will talk about two episodes for this blog post. The one thing I will say about this show is that it’s kinda weird to see a show literally have three Final Episodes one after another. Like the last three episodes of this show could have easily been the end episode of them. One of them was even a fucking clip show and no if I do not have to I will not discuss another fucking clip show. The clip show wasn’t even the last episode either! Still I am skipping it because I do not want to talk about it.
I think when it comes to tv shows based around high school Saved by the Bell is the only one I can think of that I enjoyed. Well, I also liked Student Bodies which was just Canadian Saved By The Bell but still stories about Proms do not interest me. Unless it has like some kind of crazy horror movie connection. I’ll watch Prom Night but if I have to watch another story where some girl goes BUT PROM IS SO IMPORTANT I’ll eat my hat. And that means I’ll have to buy a damn hat to eat! Saved by the Bell had like 82 proms but every one of these shows seemed to save Prom for the end of the show. Yet Saved by the Bell is still more creative and fun.
Anyway I think we already have a new contender for the bottom list because holy shit this show stinks out loud. The characters are all unmemorable, the plots are all unmemorable. Dick Butkis the fucking football star was literally the best actor in the fucking show! That’s not good AT ALL. Oh, and whoever taped this off TV originally did aterrible job. One of the set ups for a joke is missing (Literally one character ends up talking about how hes dating a supermodel but they never show him making a date or anything! The joke ends up being the supermodel was a model in 1949! The lady who he ends up going to prom with was literally Betsy Palmer more famous as Jason Voorhees’ mom from the Friday the 13th movies. She’s also totally the best part of it. Oh and another plot point never gets fixed. I don’t know if its because the person didn’t record it or what.
Anyway we start with the three girl characters who apparently do a lot of vaulting because that’s a gym activity women can do?!? The guys do basketball and I guess the girls vault. I do not know for sure and you should be able to tell that after I finish this show I will not be returning. I knew there was a reason I never watched these shows in the first fucking place. Curiosity gets the better of you in the end. They do the normal shit like argue about what they will do at prom but here’s another problem. These kids can’t act worth a fuck. I’m not Dustin Diamond was a master thespian up there with Laurence Olivier or something but you know what he could out act every single one of the people who regularly appeared on this show and yes that includes Dick Butkis. He actually got laughs at least.
So here comes the plot point that may not even have an ending. You see one of the girls I’m gonna call her Tiffany because I don’t care enough to look up her real name and her mom sent her shitty clothes to the thrift store!!!! It had all the prom money in there!!!! The girls then go to the thrift store and find the shirt but no money! The next scene literally has them at the prom. I’m going to just pretend this is how it aired and not because the person taping it off the TV was probably 14 at the time because it’s really funny. Oh and I forgot to mention that the stuck up girl ended up having to date a nerd due to hi-jinx! also more hi-jinx made the black guy have to end up dating a girl nerd!!! and Yes the two nerds get together because no one was really trying to break the mold here with this show. This was season six of a show that clearly ran out of whatever ideas they had in season one.
There’s also a tornado and the prom is ruined! Only the girls save the day by singing Gloria Gaynor’s song I Will Survive! Woo! Prom Saved!!!!!!!!!!! I know I’m 38 watching this goofy shit for teenagers but trust me even at the time I would have been like “I’m going to watch a Saved by the Bell rerun instead”. Trust me this show would not have won me over at any time in my life. Everyone dances and they say they were happy to enjoy this day because they got to enjoy each others company. This could have been the final episode and I could have gone off to do something else but nope.
The Final Episode of this show was called “Graduation on Three” and appeared on our Television screens for the first time on December 16, 2000. Nearly one year after the Y2K bug had destroyed all computers! Yes I made a Y2K bug joke. I’m not bringing my A game to this material, sorry. What little A game material I have is not being wasted by this show. Anyway the characters are graduating and OH NO one of them is worried they will never see the others again. The boys also try to prank the coach. If you are using a well worn plot like that you either need good comedic acting or a nice twist on it. This show does not have the good comedic acting and I doubt it will have a twist.
I’ll be nice and say the Coach being in on the pranks no matter how hard they try might have been a twist in 2000. It probably wasn’t but I don’t like being that mean to a tv show. Anyway they keep trying to prank him and failing! Oh and two of the boring non discript boys are leaving to go to Arizona! how will this make Tiffany feel! She’s sad and thinks she wont see her high school friends ever again which in most cases you don’t! This was just like the California Dreams ending except that did go into the Future to show us stuff!
Tiffany is sad and runs off to the bathroom and the other two girls go to cheer her up and let on that they are worried about CHANGES in life!!! Life is one big fucking change after another so get used to it twinkle toes! They will be away from their friends and boyfriends! SUCH SERIOUS DRAMA! They then graduate and have a final goodbye with the coach who they finally bpranked! It wasn’t the boys tho! The shitty mean rich girl did it!!! She was also the team manager apparently! I love all of this Hang Time lore!!!!!!
FINAL THOUGHTS: This show was not good at all. I wasn’t all that amazed by California Dreams but it was better than this. Where will City Guys rank? Who the hell knows but we will find out soon enough. Wonderful.
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