| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History |
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WhatWereTheyThinkingThe100DumbestEventsInTelevisionHistory |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History |
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2004 book by David Hofstede celebrating the worst of television. Anything goes: individual plot points or elements, or even entire shows. It's an interesting reading to know what some people consider irredeemable, or at the very least incredibly controversial, TV. |
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2024-03-09T17:00:46Z |
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2024-03-09T17:00:46Z |
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DBTropes |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_20314beb |
type |
Cousin Oliver |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_20314beb |
comment |
Cousin Oliver: Entry 47 is on the Trope Namer himself, while Entry 98 discusses the trope in the Buffyverse. It's noted that Oliver himself isn't actually ungodly annoying like his reputation would suggest, but rather that the writers themselves seemed to have complete apathy to him, with the few episodes after his arrival giving him nothing to do and shoving in the audience's faces how pointless he was. |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_20314beb |
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Ironic Name |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_23781532 |
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Shelley Hack taking over for Kate Jackson on Charlie's Angels note (The TV commercial actress was chosen over Barbara Bach, but her poor acting eventually doomed the show. She was replaced by Tanya Roberts for the show's final season.) |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_23781532 |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_23781532 |
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The Scrappy |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_2b7ec38e |
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The Scrappy:invoked Entry 7 is on the Trope Namer. Dawn and Connor from Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel also get a spot, noting that they were both able to be rescued to some extent but the damage was already done. |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_2b7ec38e |
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Non-Actor Vehicle |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_49180a5f |
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The Goddess of Love note (1988 NBC TV-movie and Non-Actor Vehicle invoked for Vanna White, which proved to the world that she should stick to her most famous role as eye candy on Wheel of Fortune.) |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_49180a5f |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_49180a5f |
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Bookends |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_5313c266 |
comment |
Book Ends: Entries 100 (the Professor Price game from The Price Is Right) and 1 (The Star Wars Holiday Special) were both aired on CBS, bookending the list. Both entries also happened within 12 months of each other toward the end of the 70's. |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_5313c266 |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_5313c266 |
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Reality Show |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_53b39668 |
comment |
The Anna Nicole Show note (2002-04 E! Reality Show about the former Playboy model who became famous for marrying business and oil magnate J. Howard Marshall and taking his family to court over his inheritance. Anna Nicole Smith was clearly unbalanced and/or stoned during filming and extra pressures of the show arguably hastened her 2007 death.) |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_53b39668 |
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Jumping the Shark |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_541c0283 |
comment |
Jumping the Shark:invoked Twin Peaks' second season is cited as an example in entry 34. Interestingly, the trope-naming Happy Days episode doesn't make the list. note (The reason most likely being that while Happy Days had been declining in quality for a while and the Shark Jump was merely an indicator of how far the show had sunk, Twin Peaks was a strong show which got suddenly derailed. Happy Days' Jumping the Shark moment is mentioned in the book, however.) |
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type |
Franchise Original Sin |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_6c3c8acf |
comment |
Franchise Original Sin: invoked Entry 74 notes that the 1994 addition of Taxi to Nick at Nite's then-feelgood lineup, while generally considered an odd choice, was still largely well-received since it was already considered a classic at the time. However, it proved in retrospect to be the start of the block's controversial shift away from its beginnings as a refuge for wholesome, family-friendly programming. |
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Network Decay |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_711e9c91 |
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Network Decay: Examples are cited for AMC (see the YMMV tab) and Nick at Nite. |
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Transatlantic Equivalent |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_75588c15 |
comment |
Transatlantic Equivalent: Entry 68 is about two ill-conceived attempts to do an American adaptation of Fawlty Towers, a show that many people would consider a Tough Act to Follow, and a show rooted in very English sensibilities. |
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"Rashomon"-Style |
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comment |
"Rashomon"-Style: Entry 19 cites ABC, CBS, and NBC rushing to create a TV movie on Amy Fisher as a Real Life example of this, outright mentioning Rashomon by name and even asking the reader to watch it when "you're at the video store and they're all out of Happy Gilmore". Hofstede finds NBC's take (Amy Fisher: My Story, based on her autobiography) sympathetic to Fisher and well-acted but boring; CBS's (Casualties of Love, starring Alyssa Milano) more sympathetic to the Buttafuocos; and ABC's (The Amy Fisher Story, starring Drew Barrymore) as the most even-handed but also most lurid, but still shames all three networks for their desires to try and outdo each other on such a subject. |
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Signing-Off Catchphrase |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_87b73405 |
comment |
Dan Rather using "Courage" as his signoff on the CBS Evening News note (For one week in September 1985, Rather signed off this way due to problems at CBS, but it failed to have the desired effect and was seen as uncharacteristically insincere. After CBS fired him following the Killian Documents scandal in 2004, he signed off this way for his final CBS Evening News broadcast just for the hell of it.) |
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Recycled IN SPACE! |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_905438eb |
comment |
Recycled In Space cartoons (Josie and the Pussycats in Outer Space, Partridge Family 2200 AD, Yogi's Space Race, and Gilligans Planet) |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_905438eb |
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Variety Show |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_a36f8860 |
comment |
Variety Show: Entries 33, 30 and 11 deal with cases where networks tried to launch these as vehicles for very unlikely hosts (a Japanese pop duo with a limited grasp of English, a sportscaster known for his deadpan style and Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness, and the cast of a family sitcom hosting in-character), only to have them fail and damage the entire genre in the process. Entry 1 is about an attempt to shoehorn the world of a very expensive Space Opera into a Variety Show special, with disastrous results. |
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Bowdlerization |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_a49914aa |
comment |
Bowdlerization: Entry 91 is based around USA Up All Night doing this for B-movies from The '80s, though Hofstede doesn't really try to address the possible counterpoints that USA gave the movies mainstream exposure that they wouldn't get otherwise, or that the movies could be perfectly enjoyable for their Camp value even without the more titillating parts. He basically admits that his main complaint is that he wasn't getting the goods when he watched the show as a Hormone-Addled Teenager. |
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Totally Radical |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_aa42306e |
comment |
The XFL note (A Totally Radical, up to eleven attempt at a new football league, founded by NBC and Vince McMahon...which proved to be a sloppy, crude, ham-fisted, short-lived embarrassment. The Las Vegas Outlaws vs. Orlando Rage game in the sixth week was infamous for its blatant ratings stunt of a televised halftime segment where a cameraman named Bruno was hyped up to be sent into the Rage Cheerleaders' locker room, only for Bruno to get knocked out before he could enter. Still, the XFL would return in 2020, this time moving away from the gimmicks and focusing on re-imagining the rules of football with completely new teams. Unfortunately, despite the better reception the second time around, its second run got cut and later cancelled prematurely due to the COVID-19 Pandemic over a month after its reintroduction, leading to the company filing for bankruptcy. It was eventually bought for $15 million by Dwayne Johnson, who promoted the original incarnation of the league (though it features the return of the first revival XFL teams alongside a planned farm system for itself), and its third attempt was launched in 2023.) |
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Shipping Bed Death |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_b1ffea26 |
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Shipping Bed Death:invoked Entry 36 highlights the notorious example on Moonlighting. |
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Toilet Humour |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_b41c411e |
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QVC selling the Poopin' Moose note (A novelty toy which "pooped" candy. Surprisingly, or not surprisingly, it was a best-seller and inspired a full line of these toys with other animals until their manufacturer closed its doors in 2003.) |
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| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_b6de94d1 |
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Executive Meddling |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_b6de94d1 |
comment |
Executive Meddling:invoked Referenced in entry 23, on FOX After Breakfast - "A gaggle of new producers micromanaged every aspect of the show, certain they knew what worked on the network better than the original cast and creative team." Entry 47, The Brady Bunch's Cousin Oliver, also invokes this, noting it was ABC who insisted that Sherwood Schwartz introduce a cute younger character to the show to counter-balance the rapidly-aging original Brady kids. |
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Missing Episode |
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Missing Episode:invoked The focus of entry 69. |
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Mind Screw |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_bef696dd |
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Santo Gold infomercials note (Mind Screw jewelry infomercials featuring footage from the sci-fi and professional wrestling film Santo Gold's Blood Circus; the creator of both the film and the jewelry was later jailed for mail fraud.) |
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Chuck Cunningham Syndrome |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_c33ba0a8 |
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Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Entry 37 is about the Trope Namer. |
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Self-Deprecation |
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Self-Deprecation: The foreword was written by Tom Bergeron, who openly expresses his personal embarrassment (FOX After Breakfast). |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_c9597a03 |
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Creator Provincialism |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_d68c925d |
comment |
Creator Provincialism: Now has its own page here. |
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| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_d7f6f486 |
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The Other Darrin |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_d7f6f486 |
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The Other Darrin:invoked Entries 92, 51, and 32 are about this on The Aldrich Family, Charlie's Angels, and Dynasty (1981) respectively. Entry 79 is about the Trope Namer himself, at least in a roundabout way; see Recycled Script below. |
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Award Snub |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_e32ce9e0 |
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Award Snub:invoked Entry 15 discusses how the Emmys are horribly broken. |
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| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_e88e8a8f |
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Writer on Board |
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comment |
Writer on Board: While any book like this is going to be very subjective and tilted toward the biases of the author, a number of entries are Hofstede complaining about things he personally doesn't like, rather than moments that were widely regarded by viewers as horrible. |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_e88e8a8f |
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All Just a Dream |
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All Just a Dream: Entries 27 (St. Elsewhere) and 2 (Dallas) are derided as misuses of this trope. |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_ea85d6ea |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f37c192 |
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Wanton Cruelty to the Common Comma |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f37c192 |
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Wanton Cruelty to the Common Comma: Hofstede has a tendency to use "it's" where he should be using "its". |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f37c192 |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f4231181 |
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Recycled Script |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f4231181 |
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Recycled Script:invoked Entry 79 calls out Bewitched on this. |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f4231181 |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f4231181 |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f511ea9b |
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Product Placement |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f511ea9b |
comment |
Product Placement: Entry 16 laments the increased appearance of it in society as a whole. |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f511ea9b |
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What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f511ea9b |
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Never Say "Die" |
| | What Were They Thinking? The 100 Dumbest Events in Television History / int_f51c5f3c |
comment |
Televangelist Oral Roberts announces that God will "call him home" if he doesn't receive $8,000,000 from his flock note (He needed funding for his debt-ridden hospital, City of Faith, hence the announcement. Although he did receive the money at the last minute, the hospital closed down anyway a few years later.) |
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