Paff

sitcom-->TV movie-->bad TV drama, The Brady Bunch.

In the TV movie A Very Brady Christmas, Jennifer Runyon played Cindy instead of Susan Olsen.
Then when they tried to make a dramatic series, "The Bradys", Olsen came back, but Leah Ayres took over the role of Marcia from Maureen McCormick.

Count Dooku

So that would not be an example of what we are talking about then. Not only because it is outside the parameters of the question but because it is a science fiction series in which the impossibility of the Doctor's regeneration has been established as part of that world's reality, much like the Star Trek transporter example I cited earlier.

The Brady Bunch went off the air in the mid-70s and The Bradys was a TV series in the late 80s.
The Bradys was not a sitcom. It was not the same show. And they did not make the cast change while the series was in progress. So very obviously, it is not an example that applies to this discussion..

movieguru

The transporters were done because they didn't have the budget to do scenes with a shuttlecraft every time they went down to a planet on Star Trek. but that has nothing to do with the subject of topical references.

They went through the trouble to make this a period/ retro show, but then show they could care less about the time period and get things mixed up. For instance it wouldn't make sense for the show to reference the series Roseanne which came out in 1989 in the first season and then talk about the Reagan assassination as if it was just happening in season10 which happened in 1981. But there are numerous examples of this throughout the show. I like the show, but this aspect of it feels really lazy.

Count Dooku

The transporter example is still valid because The Goldbergs (again, something I explained in an earlier post) has established that one of the rules for their fictional universe is that the decade of the 1980s is just a nebulous concept called The Eighties. Every trend and pop culture touchstone just exists in a hodgepodge without any attachment to a specific year. So as you watch the series and learn its rules, you either accept it or get out.

In the third episode of the series, Adam wanted to go see Poltergeist (1982) but The Great Mouse Detective (1986) is showing at the same time, and Barry wants a pair Reebok Pumps that came out in 1989. They completely let everyone know what they were doing with the "topical references" right from the beginning.

movieguru

Which is just a way of saying the writers are too lazy to bother to get their cultural references correctly. If they don't care about what year things happened, they may as well have set in present day and just had the kid use an old camcorder and they could reference cultural references from any year like it was just happening.

As far as replacing Murray, they could just have another actor sitting in his chair watching Roseanne on tv, and he could say 'Hey look, they just replaced the actress that played Becky on the show".

Count Dooku

It's fascinating to me that you could misunderstand this show on such a fundamental level, and still have opinions about it.

movieguru

I fully get what the show is about, but to me the inaccuracy of the time period they want to project onscreen is sometimes distracting. Half the time it looks like they aren't even trying. Many of the hairstyles look more like they would fit in the 2010's or 2020's than they would in the 1980's. Aside from a few occasional cultural references from the period, the show really doesn't feel like it takes place in the 1980's.

Gizmo

It's a 20 minute sitcom. This isn't Better Call Saul.

Paff

Oh,FFS. Now Adam is taking a year off after high school so he can stay at home. That's about as lazy as you can get in the writer's room.

I know it's a problem on sitcoms; when the teen characters are at an age when they should definitely be moving out and/or away at college, but they need to keep the character at home. This is really annoying though, and I might be giving up on the show shortly. I forgave the premiere, they had to address Jeff Garlin leaving the show, and by killing off his character the first episode back had to reflect the way the family felt. So I expected a downbeat episode. But man, this is just lazy lazy lazy.

Count Dooku

I broke down and watched the first two episodes. I wasn't going to post anything, but since Paff bumped the thread, I will.

The show really is awful. Adam, Erica, and Barry are all just horrible people. They are completely selfish and treat everybody else like shit, until the end of the episode where they spout some drivel about love. It makes absolutely no sense that anyone would engage with this family and their antics, even from an "it's all in good fun" standpoint. It's not fun, the Goldbergs are more like sociopaths.

Like Paff said, Adam has decided to put college off for a year. Just fucking stupid.
Erica used to be clear-headed about her mother's extreme behavior, now she is just Young Beverly and behaves just as badly. I feel sorry for her husband.
And Barry. On my dear god, Barry. He has graduated college and is starting medical school, but is still enlisting his high school friends in crazy schemes borne from him being pathological immature and his total fucking idiocy. Someone at medical school is going to have him committed.

My fault for not leaving this behind like Garlin, but it was sitting there is my Continue Watching queue on Hulu and I got suckered.

windom

It seems weird that Erica didn't take her husband's last name. Would that have been expected in Jewish families back then?

Gizmo

Some major shit between Adam F Goldberg and the new showrunners/Wendi going on right now on Twitter.

The creator, Adam, is mad they killed off his "dad" on the show. He left a few the show/Sony a years back and is now with Disney. Anyway, he offered to co-write the season premiere (killing off Garlin/"Dad") and they said no. He in no small words blames Wendi/show runners for everything. He is not happy with the show and is mad it's now disrespecting his family and friends. I don't know how to post tweets here otherwise I would.

I've been following him for years (RIP Breaking In), and it was just so weird to see him finally attacking the show he left as he has never responded to them before. Since killing his "dad", he readily admits it's gone too far and the gloves are off. Wendi must have some serious pull.

Coral

I said I wasn't going to watch this season and that this series is essentially over in my mind (although it should've been over a few seasons back) - but I had to see how they addressed Murray being dead, so I watched the first two episodes.

I see they removed Murray from the family picture in the intro and added Jeff.... so does that mean Jeff took the Goldberg name?
Of course they made an excuse to get the other grandfather to live with them... and made other excuses for basically everyone moving back in.
Are Emmy and Dana still alive? How about Mr. Kremp?

Poor guy who plays Andy... 36 year old continues to play a 21 or 22 year old.

Let's face it, even if Murray wasn't killed off - they were going to have Adam take a year off at least anyways. The show doesn't work at all if Adam is in NY while everyone else is in Philly.

Now that my curiosity has been quenched, I'm tapping out again (although I may watch the series finale just to see how they close out the show).

Paff

Maybe they just noticed that Erica is obviously Latina, and thus couldn't possibly be their biological daughter anyway.

SmackDaddy

We (wife and I) are watching mostly out of habit. There are still some chuckles to be had from time to time, but like most sitcoms this one has fallen to the "let's push _____ as the focus" syndrome. Covey's Beverly has been terribly written the last several seasons and her shtick got old long ago. I can see why the real Adam isn't happy with what this has become.

Paff

Better than the first two episodes, but I'm a non-apologetic fan of both the Brea and Joanne characters.

Got some laughs out of Erica at dinner, and I'll even forgive the use of the modern term "hangry".

MrX

Ben recognizing Brea as the girl who didn't finish her chicken at the wedding reception cracked me up

Jason

Season ten will do that to a show.

Seriously, it's time to pack it in.

Paff

And so believable, too. I remember in high school, hanging out at a friend's house, when this one girl had her feet on the coffee table and my friend's mom had to admonish her for that. Then later on, my friend tells me, his mom would come home and say "Hey, guess who I saw in the store just now? That girl who put her feet on the coffee table!"

Count Dooku

Murial for Murray (Dad), and Alison for Albert (Pops)

GuessWho

Count Dooku

For those of you who care to get angry about this kind of thing, the latest season 10 episode time-stamped itself as taking place in the spring of 1985 because the family was watching Amadeus win the best picture Oscar.

But according to an article on the Pajiba website, searches asking what happened to Murray were trending because in this episode Beverly went out on a date (with Farmer Ted).

It really blows my mind that there are fans of this show casual enough to just tune into a random episode in the middle of January and have no idea that Murray is dead and/or that Jeff Garlin isn't on the show anymore.
...........Just sayin'.

Gizmo

Probably a lot of older fans tuned out years ago and were suddenly reading articles about Beverly dating and didn't know about Garlin leaving the show / being killed off. The whole thing makes me laugh, but Garlin has enough F U money between this and Curb to not have to deal with the show anymore. Even the creator of the show was saying Wendi runs the place.

It's gone downhill significantly, but there is still some laughs. I actually thought last weeks episode was really funny.

Coral

Yes, 1985... when Beverly commented on Tom Berenger in the 1989 movie Major League.

I've given up on the show, but I caught most of this episode as I was surfing while it was on.

whotony

I’m still wondering why the timeline matters even a little bit to anyone who still watches the show.