Let's skip younger kids shows, so no muppets or barney

what tv show was your first tv obsession, first one you were really into into

For my, it probably was Buffy. Here in Australia, we were well behind and it aired at ridiculous hours and some episodes never aired

I had people send over episodes from the US. I remember downloading a 400 mb mpg files over dialup internet, took a day to download an episode ! (via IRC)

The first show I sat down and really got into that wasnt like the original power rangers was The O.C i was 13ish when it started and thats about when my general movie obsession started. But i had the soundtracks and tie in novels and all that stuff for the show
​​​

First thing that comes to mind is the original BSG.

The X-Files

I watched every episode live except for the season eight premier because the power went out. Luckily a co-worker had recorded it.

Happy Days

The first show I remember identifying as my favorite show as a child was Three's Company. At the time most of the more risque jokes went over my head, but I enjoyed John Ritter's physical comedy.

Teenage me stayed up late and never missed shows like Soap and WKRP in syndication.

The Simpsons. I remember watching off and on from the beginning, but sometime around season 3 or 4 I started taping every episode. I taped religiously through probably season 7, but then the show got syndication and I didn't feel quite as compelled. I watched the heck out of those tapes though and they just so happened to coincide with the absolute peak of the series. Still my favorite show of all time even though I quit watching sometime around the turn of the century.

M*a*s*h

60's Batman repeats

Including cartoons from childhood, Duck Tales.

Excluding cartoons from childhood, Cosby Show

Live broadcast was Wonder Woman which my parents endlessly taunted me about. For repeats Gilligan's Island was a favorite, I really loved Star Blazers (Yamoto) as a kid and other sci fi stuff like the OG BSG, but wasnt into Star Trek until TNG..

I seem to remember being really bummed if I was not home when The A Team aired, as I did not want to miss an episode. I also remember that I had to scramble to find a way to watch episodes of Buffy when I went to UC Santa Cruz and I was actually one of the few students in my living quarters (Kresge College) who had a VCR and learned how to record TV. It would have been crazy frustrating if I could not watch Buffy when I was away at college.

Other shows that I was bummed when I missed an episode were things like Knight Rider and Miami Vice. There were times when I was probably doing something with my family or my parents who clearly had control fo the TV when I was a child would be watching something other than Knight Rider so key shows (like the one with Goliath, the evil Kitt, Kitt being dumped in acid, etc.) were sometimes missed.

I do love that my family felt you could still be highly intelligent and love to watch TV instead of calling it the idiot/vidiot box like some folks do when they are being dismissive of folks who acknowledge that they love to watch a ton of tv shows like myself.

The original Battlestar Galactica

One where I was 100% invested in the show. Magnum PI.



Sure there were the must see type of shows, but back then there were less things to watch. So I plopped myself down in front of Happy Days and M*A*S*H* and the like because there wasn't much of anything else.
But I watched everything Magnum, including the Simon & Simon and Murder, She Wrote crossovers. 8 seasons from 1980-1988. I first moved to CA from HI in 1980, I was 12, so with Magnum PI being shot in there, it kept me close to home.

Probably Star Trek repeats in the early 70s

Classic Doctor Who. I've been watching it since I was 4 or 5 (Thank you, PBS!), and It's still one of my favorite shows. (I watch the new series, but don't enjoy it as much as the classic one)

This. As a Star Wars obsessed 10 year old back in 1978, this was the closest I could get for a regular fix. I remember one "important" episode was airing on Christmas Eve, and I had to argue with my parents to be allowed to watch it on a night where we usually didn't watch TV.

Lost in Space. Never missed it once.Wednesday night 6:30 for three years.

Yeah, that was mine, too. The PBS station showed Twilight Zone and the Tom Baker Doctor Who back-to-back, and I obsessively watched both.

Then they started playing Star Trek, and I got hooked on that, too.

KPTS Channel 8, out of Wichita, Kansas. In the 80s they played Doctor Who (all existing episodes, not just Tom Baker!), Twilight Zone, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Outer Limits, Star Trek, Blake's 7, Tripods, The Prisoner, and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. (Not to mention Monty Python's Flying Circus, Fawlty Towers, The Paul Hogan Show.) Hands-down, my favorite tv station when I was growing up.

There were three of them...

Star Trek
Land of the Lost
The Six Million Dollar Man

The PBS channels (I had access to like three) were the main channels I watched. The schedules changed, but at the height I would watch a Doctor Who episode every weekday on one channel, and watch a couple of serials on the weekend (though sometimes two stations showed them at the same time and I would have to decide which to watch, or one would show it at like 1am). I finally decided to record them and got most of the 4th and 5th Doctor eras on tape, which served me until the DVDs started being released.

And most of what I watched was British, but you had British SF (Blake's 7, HHGTTG, Survivors, Tripods), Mystery!, Masterpiece Theater, Britcoms, etc. And occasionally some educational shows.

Airwolf. So terrible in every way by today's standards, but so incredibly awesome back then.

G Force, Goes as far back as second grade. I was addicted to the big underlying mystery of Zoltar’s sexuality.

Was it ever revealed if he was a girl or transsexual? That’s a lot for a second grader to take in. Anyone?