TV: Would You Like Extra Cheese With That? Cheesiest 80's TV Shows

Compiled By Noah Mallin

The 80s were an innocent time -- a time of arms-for-hostages, junk bond scams, and Pac- Man. It was also the last great age of cheesy television before programmers discovered a new innovation the world would come to call ironic distance. Here are a few of the best 80's cheesy Television series for your perusal. Not for those with high cholesterol. As always, if the vids show up as not available, reload Planet of Sound (and Sight) in your browser.


1) B.A.D. Cats
This Starsky and Hutch knockoff starred two guys who are decidedly neither Starsky or Hutch, LaWanda Page as someone who is definitely not Huggy Bear, Jimmie "J.J." Walker as someone who is most assuredly not Chief Dobie, and Vic Morrow pre-decapitation (duh!) and is not to be confused with Internet scourge LOLcats. Oh yeah, there's also some unknown named Michelle Pfeiffer in it too. The important thing is that B.A.D. stands for Burglary Auto Detail which means way more car chases than Starsky and Hutch had.








2) Automan

Seeing a title like Automan might naturally lead one to say, "Hey, another show about Burglary Auto Details?" To which I would reply "Shhh! Don't speak..." That would be a patently ridiculous premise -- Automan in fact was a show that dared to grapple with the emerging world of computer technology. Nebbishy police computer nerd Walter er...Nebicher, creates a virtual superhero who can actually interact with objects and stuff in the outside world even though he's computer generated. Their pal Cursor floats along with them creating vehicles and such on demand.

3) The Powers of Matthew Star
Ever wonder what Academy Award Winner Lou Gossett Jr. did between An Officer and a Gentleman and the Iron Eagle series of recruitment films? Wonder no more! Here he played another military guy -- but from space! He's protecting alien Prince and total hunk Peter Barton (with Joyce DeWitt's hair from Season One of Three's Company).

4) Street Hawk

This show imagined a world in which lone-ish crimefighters choose superfast black motorcycles as their steeds rather than superfast black Trans Ams that talk. Our hero is played by pornishly named Rex Smith, joined by a pre - Murphy Brown Joe Regalbuto.

TV: The Sweet, Sticky Curse of Gilligan's Island

Gilligan and Mary-Anne check out the Professor's kind bud

Of all the characters on Gilligan's Island who I could picture getting stoned, naive man-child Gilligan and sweet girl-next-door Mary-Anne are at the bottom of the list. Now the Professor sure, but mainly for experimental purposes. Ginger? Hell yeah, probably while partying with Bobby Kennedy. The Skipper not so much, he comes off as more of a boozer. The Howell's? You know how the rich do it -- pill-poppin' all the way.

The point is that sweet Mary-Anne, or Dawn Wells as she's known in the flash-forward we like to call real life, has been busted for driving around with weed in her car. She joins the late Bob "Gilligan" Denver who had his own run-ins with Johnny Law over the wacky tobacky.

Design News: Boyd Coddington Dead at 63

Boyd Coddington, who brought precision machining and an unsparing eye for design to the world of custom cars and hot rods, died this morning. The cause of death has not been released. Coddington trained scores of future hot rod designers and fabricators in his shop and turned out several classics of hot rod art. More recently he brought rodding to the masses with his television show American Hot Rod.

Coddington could be prickly and irascible but his exacting notions of beauty and engineering helped to take what was a subculture into the mainstream. Though some lament the commercialization of the subculture that first bloomed in the post World War II Californai sun with his TV show and his Coddington Wheels line of accessories.

Here is Cadzilla, which he created for ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons:


Coddington's take on a classic '34 Ford, one of the staples of the hot rodder's trade:

Check out the craftsmanship on the grille and the elegant tie bar between the headlamps:


Coddington's Chezoom:

TV: Is Bitch The New Black? Tina Fey Throws it Down on SNL

Tina Fey: My kind of bitch

Cool chick who graduated Tina Fey returned to her Saturday Night Live alma mater this weekend and just had to take a turn at the anchor desk. She used her spot to make a hilarious and impassioned plea on Hillary Clinton's behalf. Her shootdowns of the anti-Hill arguments were pretty deft. For instance, on the criticism that she can't "control" Bill and would have some kind of co-Presidency:
“That would be terrible, having two intelligent, qualified people working together to solve problems,” going on to say that we need to make sure Starsky doesn't talk to Hutch. It all led up to what she felt really turned people off: They think Hillary is a bitch. "Yeah she is!" she said gleefully, "So am I...so is this one.." she said gesturing towards Amy Poehler. "...bitches get things done!" She then ended with the rousing cry "Bitch is the new black!"

Added to the (not interminable and yet one note) opening sketch which skewered the press' fascination for Obama and their disdain for La Clinton the show is sporting a refreshing against the grain Clinton bias.

The little dumb asses at NBC Universal in their infinite non-wisdom continue to embargo their material from sites like YouTube (despite the huge boost it has given SNL) so unfortunately I've embedded their inferior, NBC approved java-based player clip here:

Music: Limber Limbaugh Gets Down With His Hancock Homage on Colbert

Herbie Hancock was the surprise winner at last week's Grammys for album of the year with his Joni Mitchell tribute record. While some people were astounded by this, Comedy Central's Stephen Colbert aired a surprising Hancock tribute video on his show. Who knew Rush Limbaugh was a fan of the innovative jazzman? Also, "Rockit" is still an awesome jam.

Here's the clip from Colbert:


And here's Hancock's original video from 1983:

TV: I'm Totally Gay For Rachel Maddow -- Seriously, Without My Penis I'd Be a Total Lesbian

My friend (who is not remotely mannish though she knows her way around a toolbox better than I do) told me last night that I have a thing for "mannish" women. This was, not coincidentally while we were watching the Wisconsin primary returns on NBC's multiple-sclerosis branded newschannel MSNBC. Once again the esteemable Keith Olbermann brought on Air America's Rachel Maddow and I offered up my opinion that's she's "awfully cute." Hence the mannish observation. "Anyhow, " My friend continued, "she's a lesbian..."


Maddow with Olbermann

I was skeptical of her gaydar driven analysis but sure enough she was right, Maddow lives with her partner in domestic bliss, the artist Susan Mikula.

Perhaps it was my pubescent years in the early 80s -- the peak of the short-haired look -- that led me down this path. I remember the effect that Linda Fiorentino had on me in the paintball craze/ cold war themed spy thriller Gotcha! (check her out at :27 in the clip below):



Still, what am I if not a lesbian -- with a penis -- though I may not be a butch icon like K.D. Lang is according to this week's freckly New York Magazine . Watch Maddow slice and dice conservative hot-air merchant and defintely not a lesbian Pat Buchanan on Chris Matthew's show:

TV: Better Late Than Never -- Kellie Pickler is Dumb as a Bag of Rocks, Foxworthy is a Pig

Ok, so this has been floating around the series of connected tubes known as the interwebs for a while now but it took the elitist New York Times to draw my snooty nose around in it's direction. This trifecta of head-slapping moments is a perfectly stormy tipping point that includes Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader, American Idol winner Kellie Pickler and You Might Be a Redneck If? auteur Jeff Foxworthy. Here is living breathing proof that George W. Bush won re-election in 2004 fair and square.

TV: Suzanne Pleshette and Sam The Butcher Die

In a tough weekend for TV fans, two icons of the tube passed away between Friday and today.
Suzanne Pleshette was best known for playing Emily Hartley, Bob Newhart's smartly sardonic wife on The Bob Newhart Show from 1972-1977. That show elevated the craft of TV sitcoms as surely as All in The Family and Pleshette's intelligence and timing were an integral part of what made the show work.

She had roles on TV, broadway and in films both before and after her years as Emily, but it was The Bob Newhart Show that is her lasting legacy. She starred on Broadway in the 1950s with a young actor named Tom Poston. The two had a brief fling and went about their careers with Poston becoming best-known for Newhart's second sitcom in the 80s, Newhart. In 2000 Pleshette and Poston were married. Poston died late last year.

In what was one of the great surreal TV finales ever, Newhart ended the last episode of his second sitcom by waking up in bed -- next to Emily, his wife from the original show, and recounting the wild dream he'd had. Here is a clip of Pleshette and Newhart riffing on that classic scene:




The other big weekend TV death was character actor Allan Melvin. The name "Sam The Butcher" sounds like something you might call a Nazi war criminal but for those of a certain age it conjures up Melvin's jowly face as The Brady Bunch's favorite purveyor of chops and cold cuts. The Beastie Boys name checked him in their 1989 song "Hey Ladies" -- "I'm like Sam the Butcher bringing Alice the meat..." Indeed Sam's relationship with the Brady's maid Alice was always tantalizingly vague. Melvin was also well-known as Archie Bunker's friend Barney on All in the Family. Here's Melvin from a vintage Liquid Plumb -R ad:

TV: Letterman Makes Like Norma Rae for Striking WGA

Letterman shows off his "missing hiker" look...

David Letterman's Worldwide Pants company is the only production house to have struck a deal with the striking Writers Guild, so last night Letterman (along with Worldwide Pants employee Craig Ferguson) were back on the air with writing staff intact. Hillary Clinton provided a cold opening that suggests that as an actress she makes a great politician -- but it was a nice surprise. Much funnier were the dancing striking girls, or as Dave called them "...the Eugene V. Debs." A quick glance at Leno filling dead air with an interview of amiable zealot Mike Huckabee confirmed that Dave did the right thing. A Top Ten list read by actual striking writers (including Saturday Night Live legend Alan Zweibel and famous hyphenate Nora Ephron) cinched Letterman's status as the class act of late night television -- a far cry from 1988's strike when he was among the first to go back on the air sans writers. Owning your own show makes a difference. Here's last night's opening:




Letterman in an earlier weirdo-beardo moment...

TV: Party Mamas Episode Made Me a Self-Loathing Jew

Party mama Lisa

My beautiful and intelligent wife Tracy lived for years without cable television, subsisting solely on the 13 or so channels a shiny metal antenna could pluck from the ether. The introduction of full blown digital cable (with DVR) into our home was akin to European colonizers giving blankets to Native Americans. Where I possessed years of immunity to the depths of VH-1 and E!, my wife's neurological system was flooded with reality TV stimulus. The next step down the ladder here is a hardcore reality TV addiction -- and WE's (the women's entertainment network apparently) show Party Mamas is like the crystal meth of this particular genre.

Here is WE's own description of what they hath wrought every week:
" Gone are the days of pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey and pizza parties - it’s time to supersize! Spoiled and excess meet their match when these moms pull out all the stops to throw the best party ever for their little darlings. "

This is reality TV distilled down to it's purest form. Most reality TV falls into two categories predicated on two of the basest human emotions: pity and greed. Sometimes, as on The Apprentice there is a complex intermingling of the two. We either feel superior to the subjects and pity them, or feel inferior and want what they have.

The twisted harridans of Party Mama's fall squarely into the pity category (as do their helpless offspring) though for some people they could just as easily fall into the envy category which is where the show hit an especially tricky nerve for me.

The episode we were watching, titled "Lisa" after the nutso mom-du-jour concerned, centered on the Bar Mitzvah of her spawn Mitchell, a child with the bloated self satisfaction that comes from a steady diet of breast milk and moolah.

The sheer spectacular prodigality of the affair in question coupled with the oxygen depleting neediness of party mama Lisa unearthed a feeling in me as a rare as an a ACLU member at a Tom Tancredo fundraiser: Shame. Pure unbridled shame. I'm not a religious person. I don't wear my ethnic identity on my sleeve. But this episode of WE TV's Party Mamas made me ashamed to be a Jew.

I can't pinpoint exactly when it happened. Was it when Lisa browbeat her husband into a trip to the Jaguar dealership where they purchased a new Jag for her to offset the hefty sum they were laying out for their son's entry into manhood? Was it the son's lesson in hip-hop dancing, which he would put to use on a stage in front of 300-odd guests and backed by a group of professional dancers? Was it Lisa's counterstrike of hiring a voice coach and writing a godawful song about Mitchell growing up and learning about "Internet porn"? Could it have been Lisa's eager rumormongering that "Barbara" (Streisand, natch) was in town and just might make an appearance? Or was it the "money booths" filled with eager kids trying to snatch "money" swirling around them in a vortex -- the same fake money that would later come down from the ceiling of the cavernous space in which the celebration was held?

If I had never met a Jew and only knew what I saw on TV, I would imagine a money grubbing people who welcome their hand raised veal-like children into a privileged world with an orgy of currency porn and vapid self-gratification. I felt like Alan Keyes watching Pimps up, Ho's Down, or Mitt Romney after being subjected to a Big Love marathon. Well maybe not exactly like Romney.

TV: Mr. Feeney Out, Gob in as TV's new K.I.T.T.

Arnett practices his voice throwing

Mr. Amy Poehler, also known as Will Arnett, will give voice to the new version of K.I.T.T. on NBC's sure to be crap-tastic TV movie revival of Knight Rider. He steps into the shoes of the formidable William Daniels, a.k.a. as Mr. Feeney on the sickly sweet sitcom Boy Meets World, fussy super surgeon Dr. Craig on medical drama St. Elsewhere from 1982-1988 and of course Benjamin's father in the classic film The Graduate. Still, his career highlight, as it will be for Arrested Development and Let's Go to Jail star Arnett, will be voicing a super crime fighting car.
Also changed is K.I.T.T.'s brand identity from Trans Am to Mustang. Oh yeah, Hasselhoff will appear as old Michael Knight.

Here's William Daniels in one of my favorite films, The President's Analyst:

TV: The Best TV of 2007 Part Two

Here's the final 5 of my best of the year, televisually:


1) Mad Men (AMC)
I resisted this show mightily, mainly because its on AMC. AMC once stood for American Movie Classics but now stands for Always Mostly Crap. Once it was a haven for commercial free Hollywood classics very much like Turner Classic Movies but the braindead money grubbers came in and added commercial breaks, curtailed black and white movies, and traded in fare like Bringing Up Baby for Jaws 3. Ratings went down but no doubt profits went up as the commercial coffers filled. The last step in the MTV style brand denaturing that every cable channel seems to be falling for is the lure of original programming. It’s therefore sweetly appropriate that Mad Men takes place in the world of advertising.

What’s confounding is that Mad Men turns out to be a phenomenally great show, with a brilliant cast and top notch writing and production values. In a perfect world, HBO would have picked it up to replace The Sopranos. Set in 1960, Mad Men recreates the man's man's man’s world that James Brown sang about, red meat eating chain-smoking drinking and driving wife-is-at-home-cooking-dinner yesteryear. But under the surface there are secretaries aching to be copywriters, wives bored out of their skulls, and men’s men who really are men’s men in every sense of the word.

Jon Hamm, as brilliant and mysterious adman Don Draper, is mesmerizing. John Slattery as his womanizing rake of a boss does the best work of his career. I rooted for Elizabeth Moss all year as a secretary who starts to rise above her station and January Jones is beautiful and startlingly complex as Betty Draper.

Here’s Hamm as Don Draper pitching Kodak:




2) The Shield (FX)
The Shield is the most edge of the seat show on television. Even 6 seasons in, the ensemble cast of cops dirty and clean headed by Michael Chiklis is riveting. Every episode ratchets up the tension and like The Wire (which doesn’t qualify this year) the entire season feels like a satisfying novel. Loyalties will switch back and forth as characters reveal new depths but devotion to this show has a way of becoming total. Here’s the promo for last season:



3) It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (FX)
Like NBC’s The Office, Sunny spent its third season by expanding several episodes to the hour mark with sometimes mixed results. When they were firing on all cylinders this is the funniest envelope pusher on TV. The gang at Paddy’s bar spend their days undermining and backstabbing each other and anyone who crosses their paths. Along the way they dress up like cops, get hooked on coke, rig a dance contest, and exploit a baby found in a dumpster. Here Dee and Charlie try to sell cocaine:



4) The Office (NBC)
This has been a strange season for The Office. Jim and Pam are now officially A Couple (usually the sitcom kiss of death), and hour long episodes have led to more weird ennui and awkwardness rather than jokes – not necessarily a bad thing. This was a show I was prepared to hate, having loved the original brilliant BBC series. However the great cast and writing crew has made this a real gem. Enjoy the bullhorn dance:



5) 30 Rock (NBC)
Here’s another show that looked like a dog even through it’s first few episodes, but has grown into a real pleasure. I was never impressed with Tina Fey or Tracy Morgan on Saturday Night Live but the writing and performances on 30 Rock make them look good. The real key to the show are Jack McBrayer as a goody-two-shoes NBC page and the incomparable Alec Baldwin as the head of the network. Baldwin steals every single episode. Here's clips:

TV: The Year's Best TV Part One

This is an admittedly scattershot roundup of what I found to be the most memorable TV of the year. The writer's strike insures that I won't miss anything in December! Here's 6-10, 1 -5 will follow though they aren't ranked by preference.


6) Lost (ABC)
There was a lot of grumbling about this past season of Lost. Too many mysteries and improbabilities, non-answer answers, deviations from storylines that one or another set of viewers was committed to. Still I’m hooked. Part of it is the wonderful cast – Michael Emerson who seems to even breathe in a suggestively sinister way ought to get a lifetime Emmy. The topper was a mind blowing season finale that seems to offer an entirely new way forward for the show. Here’s a clip:



7) How I Met Your Mother (CBS)
This show is inconsistent, with great episodes interspersed with mediocre ones. But the great ones are terrific. The young cast really seem to like each other and the writing can be edgy and incisive – locking onto some of the fun things that Seinfeld used to tease out. When it’s bad its gimmicky, and hopefully some of that will be excised as they go along. Here’s the very helpful crazy/hot scale:



8) The Sopranos (HBO)
Not the best season for this show to be sure, but that’s been true since season two. What we got were some indelible scenes and moments – Tony killing Christopher, Uncle Junior in the nursing home, AJ in the pool. Still one of the best shows out there, up to that brilliant cut to black that closed out the series. You know you’ve made a mark when you become pop-culture shorthand a’la the clip below in which Hillary Clinton’s campaign parodies the series finale:



9) Weeds (SHO)
This season started out shaky but as the show went on we got to see Nancy Botwin evolve into a fledgling gangster MILF (played by the compulsively watchable Mary-Louise Parker, habitually sucking on a latte straw all season long.) This season also benefited from some great stunt casting, bagging an Olsen twin as a pot smoking Jesus freak and Matthew Modine as a slimy developer. Here’s a clip:



10) Scott Baio is 45 and Single (VH-1)
I generally can’t stand reality TV which means that I have no immunity to the most rapaciously lethal form of the bug. This show is perversely fascinating. Baio and his posse are past-their-prime versions of HBO’s Entourage. What keeps me watching is Baio’s struggle against his own awareness of himself as a cheesy womanizing has-been. The look on his face when a twenty year old calls him “Charles”—as in his 80s sitcom Charles in Charge – is haunting. No clips were available so here’s Joanie and Chachi’s wedding:

TV News: Spade Slayed

David Spade -- auditioning for his next role as Mini Beck?

Comedy Central has decline to renew pintsized snarkaholic David Spade's Showbiz Show for a fourth season. Though some industry-ites found it's oh-so-snotty take on celeb news to be a must-see the rest of us put it on the must-flee list along with his CBS sitcom Rules of Engagement (which still lives) and Dickie Roberts: Former Child Star. According to Variety the show may be replaced with a new David Allen Grier show looking at current events from a black perspective and using a spoof news magazine format.

TV Review: Reaper Harvests Grins

Reaper's Harrison and Labine: Who you gonna call?

TV pilots have become mini movies now, with name directors and expensive special effects. As Variety points out this week, many series television is getting pricier with pilots alone costing as much as $4 million dollars. The CW's new show Reaper, for instance, sports some fancy-shmancy special effects and Kevin Smith as a director. The question, as is often the case these days -- is whether episode 5 will be as much fun to watch as last night's high-concept pilot episode was. Bret Harrison plays Sam, a guy who discovers that his 21st birthday brings the consummation of his parent's deal with the devil for his soul as well as the usual drinking privileges. The superb Ray Wise plays the devil as an unctuous businessman, as ruthless as he is charming. Sam's friends are a guy named Sock (Tyler Labine) who comes straight out of the Kevin Smith/Jay Apatow arrestedly developed male factory, and is none the worse for it, and crushworthy Missy Peregrym who could pass for Hillary Swank's little sister.
It seems that Sam's new job on behalf of Satan (in addition to working at a hilarious Home Depot style hardware superstore) is to collect escaped denizens of Hell and to return them via Hell on earth portals (such as the local DMV). There is a dollop of Buffy The Vampire Slayer here but if the offbeat wry tone is maintained this could work very successfully as a hybrid of that show's buddy demon fighting with the sensibility of My Name is Earl. So far so good, now let's see what the next few episodes bring.

Reaper gets 4 out of 5 pitchforks: