Benjamonster's TV

Here's a look at the Top 5 TV news stories of the week! I will be taking a two week Spring Break from the blog so posts will return on April 11! #1 - OSCARS PREVIEW This Sunday is the Oscars and while this is a TV blog and I don't really watch movies (I have only seen West Side Story of the nominated films), this is a big TV event. The Oscars are trying to rebound from last year's record low ratings in one of the many pandemic-tinged awards show. This ceremony looks to be closer to normal though it has courted controversy with the removal of certain categories from the main telecast. It also has an interesting list of presenters that includes not as much big time movie stars as other years with more focus on "young and hip" presenters. We'll see if all of this works out but if the ratings go up, I think it's more a reflection of "back to normal" than the changes made. If they go down... yikes. Some of the odds on favorites include Coda for Best P...

Here is a look at all eight seasons of Perfect Strangers  including the ultimate countdown of the best and worst episodes! PERFECT STRANGERS March 25, 1986 - August 6, 1993 150 episodes Starring Bronson Pinchot as Balki Bartokomous  (150 episodes) Mark Linn-Baker as Larry Appleton  (150 episodes) Melanie Wilson as Jennifer Lyons  (103 episodes) Rebeca Arthur as Mary Anne Spencer  (94 episodes) Ernie Sabella as Donald Twinkacetti  (21 episodes) Lise Cutter as Susan Campbell  (8 episodes) Belita Moreno as Lydia  (41 episodes) Sam Anderson as Sam Gorpley  (37 episodes) Jo Marie Payton as Harriette Winslow  (33 episodes) F.J. O'Neil as Mr. Wainwright  (19 episodes) Belita Moreno as Edwina Twinkacetti  (5 episodes) Season by Season Ratings: Reminder: 9-10 is Exceptional, 7-8 is Strong, 5-6 is OK, 3-4 is Mediocre, 0-2 is Terrible Season One (1986): 6.4/10 Season Two (1986-87): 5.4/10 Season Three (1987-88): 5.3/10 Season Four (1988-8...

On Wednesdays, I take a look at a series that lasted one season or less. This week, I am looking at  The Building ! THE BUILDING August 20, 1993 - September 17, 1993 5 episodes CBS Starring: Bonnie Hunt, Michael G. Hagerty, Richard Kuhlman, Don Lake, Tom Virtue and Holly Wortell Created by: Bonnie Hunt Plot: Bonnie Kennedy (Hunt) is an actress who moves back to Chicago after a breakup. She deals with friends and neighbors in an apartment building across from Wrigley Field including best friend, Holly (Wortell), downstairs neighbors Brand and Stan (Lake & Virtue), maintenance man Big Tony (Kuhlman) and bar owner Finely (Hagerty). Brief Pilot Review: I'll start by saying that the setting for this show is really fun. Bonnie Hunt was always inclined to make Chicago a character on her vehicles and it doesn't get more Chicago than being set at an apartment building across from Wrigley Field (where you can see the stadium outside Bonnie's window). Hunt also has a very specific...

My Top 10 this week is Top 10 The Mary Tyler Moore Show Characters. This is my all time #1 show so it was a list I took quite seriously! 10. GORDY HOWARD The Mary Tyler Moore Show only had eight regular characters during its run and back in those days, recurring characters on shows were few and far between. One of the few was Gordy the weatherman played by John Amos before he hit in big with Good Times and Roots . Gordy was always good for a few quips and the show occasionally dabbled with him being the only black character in a white sitcom/ensemble. I'm sure he would have had more to do if the show was made today but he made the most of his limited opportunities. 9. IDA MORGENSTERN Nancy Walker only appeared in four episodes of The Mary Tyler Moore Show but boy did she make her presence known in a role she then shined in on Rhoda too. Her first two appearances ("Support Your Local Mother" and "A Girl's Best Friend is Not Her Mother") are among the all-time...

On Mondays, I take a look at schedules from yesteryear. Here's a look at Fridays in the 1993-94 season! After this week, the blog will be taking a two week spring break! ABC 8:00 8:30 9:00 9:30 10:00 Sep Family Matters Boy Meets World Step by Step Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper 20/20 Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr Sister, Sister May Since TGIF launched on ABC in 1989, they had some things that worked and some things that didn't on the night but the 1993-94 season gave them the winning formula with four sitcoms that would air for much of the next three seasons on the night. Family Matters continued leading off at 8pm as the highest rated show of the block while the other returning show on the night, Step by Step , slid half an hour back to become the 9pm anchor. ...

Here's a look at the Top 5 TV news stories of the week! #1 - CRITICS' CHOICE AWARDS The Critics' Choice Awards were held on Sunday after the Omicron variant delayed a planned January date. As we march towards Emmy season, there were some expected winners and a few surprises. To no one's surprise, top honors went to Succession and Ted Lasso while other non-surprising winners were Kate Winslet and Mare of Easttown and a comedy acting quartet of Jason Sudeikis, Jean Smart, Brett Goldstein and Hannah Waddingham. Just as with the SAG Awards, Lee Jung-jae of Squid Game triumphed over Succession 's Jeremy Strong and Brian Cox who may be victims of some vote splitting. Melanie Lynskey of Yellowjackets  pulled off a big win in the Drama Lead Actress category while The White Lotus went two for two in the Supporting categories for Limited Series with Murray Bartlett and Jennifer Coolidge winning. This might bode well as Mare of Easttown gets out of the mix soon since it was pa...

On Thursdays, I take a detailed and critical look at a TV show. Here's a look at the short eighth and final season of Perfect Strangers ! PERFECT STRANGERS: SEASON EIGHT 1993 6 episodes The final season of  Perfect Strangers  is an abbreviated one with only six episodes and it aired more than a year after the seventh season. It's hard to know what would have happened over a full season but being only six episodes and with a clear focus (the pregnancies of Jennifer and Mary Anne), the series does have a stronger end to the season than it appeared heading towards with the underwhelming seventh season. Several recurring actors from previous seasons like Sam Anderson, Belita Moreno and F.J. O'Neil do not appear at all. Starring Bronson Pinchot as Balki Bartokomous  (6 episodes) Mark Linn-Baker as Larry Appleton  (6 episodes) Melanie Wilson as Jennifer Lyons-Appleton  (6 episodes) Rebecca Arthur as Mary Anne Spencer-Bartokomous  (6 episodes) 145. The Baby Shower...

On Wednesdays, I take a look at a series that lasted one season or less. This week, I am looking at The Sinbad Show ! THE SINBAD SHOW September 16, 1993 - April 21, 1994 24 episodes FOX Starring: Sinbad, T.K. Carter, Salma Hayek, Erin Davis, Willie Norwood Created by: Gary Murphy & Larry Strawther & Sinbad Plot: David Bryan (Sinbad) is a bachelor who decides to adopt two orphaned children, Zana & L.J. (Davis & Norwood) while still hanging out with his friend, Clarence (Carter). Brief Pilot Review: Sinbad is not a comedian I'm very familiar with. I haven't watched any of his stand-up or really seen him in anything aside from passing clips over the years. Watching this pilot, I don't feel like I missed much. I found Sinbad to be harmless at best and pretty annoying at worst. The studio audience seemed to disagree with me though. They really loved anytime Sinbad did anything remotely resembling a physical gag. I can deal with rowdy studio audiences but not when...

My Top 10 this week is Top 10 Superstore Characters ! 10. KELLY WATSON Superstore shares a lot of similarities with The Office and Kelly is certainly the Karen Filipelli of this show. She got a little bit of a bad rap for coming in between the main love story on the show through no fault of her own. I liked that she still held her own and they made her a teeny bit crazy but enough of her own personality and not just a cog in the Amy-Jonah story. Kelly Stables played it well. 9. BO THOMPSON Bo was such a great "small dose" character. Had he been a series regular, he might have been a more annoying character than Marcus (who you'll notice is not on this list). But because Bo was such an infrequent character, he made his mark much like Jean Ralphio on Parks and Recreation . He was such a man child who tried way too hard and Johnny Pemberton had an incredible way with his delivery.

On Mondays, I take a look at schedules from yesteryear. Here's a look at Thursdays in the 1993-94 season! ABC 8:00 9:00 10:00 Sep Missing Persons Matlock Primetime Live Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar The Byrds of Paradise Apr Birdland May Matlock ABC's Thursdays in 1993-94 started with a new drama featuring a familiar Thursday night face. Missing Persons marked the return of Daniel J. Travanti to TV six years after the end of his critically acclaimed Hill Street Blues . The drama was centered on a missing persons unit in Chicago. Travanti didn't experience the same success with this show. It made it to February but was then cancelled and replaced by The Byrds of Paradise . Starring Timothy Busfield and featuring a young Seth Green and Jennifer Love Hewitt, Byrds was about ...

Here's a look at the Top 5 TV news stories of the week! #1 - "THE MUPPETS" RETURN TO TV ON DISNEY+ The Muppets are getting another go at series television and it's on an obvious home, Disney+. The new series, which was ordered this week, will focus on the house band (The Electric Mayhem) and will be called The Muppets Mayhem . The series will be written by The Goldbergs creator Adam F. Goldberg and star Lilly Singh. This is the first foray back into series television for the beloved Jim Henson property since the ill advised 2015 mockumentary sitcom The Muppets on ABC. The more specific approach on a platform that is a perfect fit makes me think this could be a better way forward for the property.

On Thursdays, I take a detailed and critical look at a TV show. This year, I will be splitting full seasons into two posts. Here's a look at Season 7 (Part 2) of  Perfect Strangers ! For Part 1,  click here . 134. Missing (1/17/92) Balki's inspiration for his Dimitri drawing goes missing when he has to complete a cartoon on a deadline. This is a rare episode where all the main and recurring characters appear. It's a pretty silly premise but it's not quite as predictable as you might think. Larry and Balki on a stakeout (yet again) has some funny moments. Ultimately though this is just sort of a middle of the road episode. It sort of has the opposite problem of some other episodes where they is a pretty decent resolution but the path to get there isn't all that funny or interesting. The other way around seems to happen more often in  Perfect Strangers . RATING: 5/10 135. Going Once, Going Twice (2/1/92) Balki and Larry accidentally buy a very expensive bottle of wine...

On Wednesdays, I take a look at a show that lasted one season or less. This week, I am looking at 1993's The Trouble with Larry ! THE TROUBLE WITH LARRY August 25, 1993 - September 8, 1993 3 episodes CBS Starring: Bronson Pinchot, Courteney Cox, Alex McKenna, with Perry King and Shanna Reed Created by: Andrew Nicholls & Darrell Vickers Plot: Larry Burton (Pinchot) has been presumed dead for a decade when he returns home to Syracuse to his wife, Sally (Reed). Sally is re-married to Boyd (King) and has a daughter, Lindsay (McKenna). Larry falls for Sally's sister, Gabriella (Cox). Brief Pilot Review: Well, this pilot got off on a rough start. The first scene was set on a boat and sets up the exposition that Larry has been missing for a decade. It was a unique way to start a TV show but there were seven, yes seven, fat jokes in the first two minutes and ten seconds. Once it got back to Syracuse, the fat jokes stopped but the episode didn't get any better. I think the show ...

This week for my Top 10, I am counting down my Top 10 The People vs. O.J. Simpson Characters ! I should mention that I am basing this off the characters in the series, not their real-life counterparts. 10. F. LEE BAILEY I always enjoy seeing Nathan Lane do dramatic work because he always blends it nicely with comedy and that was the case with his role in this series. F. Lee Bailey was one of the many larger-than-life lawyers involved in the case. Lane wasn't given as much of a chance to give the character depth which is why he only comes in at #10, but as a later addition to the proceedings, he still made a pretty strong impression. 9. MARK FUHRMAN Before there was such a thing as Cancel Culture, Mark Fuhrman was cancelled in the court of public opinion and with good reason. But the series and actor Steven Pasquale did a great job of conveying how his own words and choices in other parts of his life limited what was a pretty damning testimony. He lost all credibility and Pasquale d...

On Mondays, I take a look at schedules from yesteryear. Here's a look at Wednesdays in the 1993-94 season! ABC 8:00 8:30 9:00 9:30 10:00 Sep Thea Joe’s Life Home Improvement Grace Under Fire Moon Over Miami Oct Nov Dec George Various Programs Jan Birdland Feb The Critic Mar Home Improvement Thunder Alley Turning Point Apr These Friends of Mine May In the 1992-93 season, ABC Wednesdays had Home Improvement at 9pm but a lot of the rest of the night was peppered with ending series like The Wonder Years and Doogie Howser M.D. and cancelled fare like Laurie Hill and Home Free . So it was back to the drawing board in the 1993-94 and ABC put Home Improvement as the centerpiece and surrounded it with n...

Here's a look at the Top 5 TV news stories of the week! #1 - SAG AWARD WINNERS There were a couple big surprises at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday night. Going in, it was assumed that Ted Lasso and Succession would be the big winners and while they did win the prizes and Jason Sudeikis won as expected for Ted Lasso , there were surprises in the Drama acting categories. Squid Game stars Lee Jung-jae and Jung Ho-Yeon upset Succession actors. It seemed like it was going to be Squid Game 's night but then Succession still won the top prize for Drama Ensemble. It will be interesting to see if this has any ramifications on the Emmy race. Elsewhere, Jean Smart won Comedy Actress for Hacks and Michael Keaton ( Dopesick ) and Kate Winslet ( Mare of Easttown ) took him the Limited Series acting prizes. Weirdly, there is no award for Limited Series Ensemble. The overall awards ceremony was just ok with a couple highlights including Romy & Michelle's High School Reunion r...

On Thursdays, I take a detailed and critical look at a TV show. This year, I will be splitting full seasons into two posts. Here's a look at Season 7 (Part 1) of  Perfect Strangers ! PERFECT STRANGERS: SEASON SEVEN 1991-1992 24 episodes Season seven is the last full season of  Perfect Strangers  and its clearly a show that's gotten pretty tired. There are some attempts to spice up the stories with Larry and Jennifer finally marrying and them moving to a new house. But the plots feel tired and the actors look a little tired and the result was this season grading out as the lowest scored season for me. There's a couple attempts to break form like there was in Season Six, but it isn't as effective. The show was moved from its long-time Friday home to Saturday nights during this season. Starring Bronson Pinchot as Balki Bartokomous  (24 episodes) Mark Linn-Baker as Larry Appleton  (24 episodes) Melanie Wilson as Jennifer Lyons-Appleton  (19 episodes) Rebecca Ar...

On Wednesdays, I take a look at a show that lasted one season or less. This week, I am looking at Phenom ! PHENOM September 14, 1993 - May 10, 1994 22 episodes ABC Starring: Judith Light, Angela Goethals, Ashley Johnson, Todd Louiso, Jennifer Lien, William Devane Created by: Dick Blasucci & Marc Flanagan & Sam Simon Plot: Angela Doolan (Goethals) is a 15 year old tennis prodigy trying to manage being a teen with being an athletic superstar with help from her mother, Dianne (Light) and new coach Lou Della Rosa (Devane). Rounding out the main cast are Angela's siblings, Brian and Mary Margaret (Louiso & Johnson). Brief Pilot Review: Phenom had an interesting premise. I'm pretty sure it's the only show in TV history that focused on a tennis prodigy and it naturally lent itself to a different background for a teen/family sitcom. As a tennis fan, I wanted to like the pilot but there's a big problem. The aforementioned prodigy may be playing a tennis star, but she...

My Top 10 this week is Top 10 The Sopranos Characters ! 10. LIVIA SOPRANO Early on in The Sopranos , before actress Nancy Marchand's death, Tony Soprano's mother was a very prominent character. Though she was only in the first couple years, her character gave us plenty of interesting material in her own right and set up our understanding of Tony through the rest of the series. A different show would have found ways to make her more sympathetic. Not The Sopranos , they delighted in showcasing the mental torture she put others through and they never backed away from that. 9. JANICE SOPRANO Another actual family member of Tony's, his younger sister Janice also makes the list. She provided more comedic relief on the series as she was so often a complete hot mess. She gets into ridiculous relationships and can't move forward in her life, which drives Tony crazy. There's probably a Janice-type character somewhere in your family so Tony's frustrations with her were alw...