Today, we look at five TV shows whose titles quickly no longer matched their premise.
In Drawing Crazy Patterns, I spotlight at least five things from pop culture that fit under a specific theme (basically, stuff that happens frequently enough to be worth pointing it out). Note that these lists are inherently not exhaustive. They are a list of five examples (occasionally I’ll be nice and toss in a sixth). So no instance is “missing” if it is not listed. It’s just not one of the five examples that I chose. You can always feel free to suggest ANOTHER example that fits the theme, if you’d like, but nothing is “missing” from this list.
A lot of times, shows move past their original premise but their titles have all been locked in and you can’t really change them after the fact, and sometimes, the titles are almost inherently going to be outdated (think titles with “new” in the title). Here are five examples of TV shows whose title quickly no longer matched their premise!
BARNEY MILLER
The acclaimed sitcom, Barney Miller, was titled that because the original concept of the show was that it would follow Barney Miller in his home life AND his work life as a police captain.
However, the show quickly moved past showing Barney’s home life and so the title really didn’t apply any more once it was a workplace ensemble comedy.
EMPTY NEST
People tend to think that Empty Nest had an ironic name, since it was about a widower whose grown adult daughters moved back in with him after his wife died. However, that wasn’t the original intent of the show, Harry (Richard Mulligan) really WAS supposed to deal with an empty house after the death of his wife, but by the end of the first season, both of his daughters moved back in him, making the “Empty Nest” no longer applicable.
COUGAR TOWN
The TV show, Cougar Town, was originally about a woman who had a kid very young experiencing love as a “cougar” with her son now away at college. Very quickly, though, the showrunners decided to make it an ensemble about the woman and her neighbors (and her ex-husband, with whom she had a friendly relationship with). The show then started to mock its own title in the opening of each episode….
NEW GIRL
New Girl was obviously going to be outdated quickly when Jess, the “new” roommate at the apartment, became beloved by her roommates right away.
THE LAST MAN ON EARTH
The show was called The Last Man on Earth, but obviously it had quite a large cast of survivors.
Okay, folks, if you have suggestions for a future Drawing Crazy Patterns, drop me a line at brian@popculturereferences.com!
ABC’s current show “The Rookie” starting Nathan Fillion is another show where the title no longer fits. Now in its 4th season, Officer Nolan “graduated” early in season 3 (if I’m remembering correctly) and is not longer a rookie. There is a new rookie cop who is not featured all that prominently.
The title Welcome Back, Kotter was outdated for the fourth season. Gabe Kotter was barely on. Julie Kotter was still a regular supporting character, now working at Buchanan High, but since she hadn’t graduated from there like her husband had, there was no need to welcome her back.
Similarly, Shirley was absent from most of the final season of Laverne and Shirley.
2 Guys, 1 Girl, and a Pizza Shop springs to mind
To be fair, they changed the name from “Two Guys, A Girl and a Pizza Place” to just ‘Two Guys and a Girl’ for the last two seasons.
It had occurred to me that the title of the show “The 100” had quickly lost it’s meaning.
The 100 referred to the 100 young offenders sent down from the Ark to the Earth’s surface to see if it was safe.
Technically, the title could have been said to have become incorrect when 1 of the 100 died, however, the Ark crashlanding at the end of the first season changed the concept so much that the title had lost it’s meaning as the survivors of the crashlanding were now mixed with the survivors of the 100
Later seasons tried to bring a new meaning to the title
Scottish detective series Taggart kept it’s meaning for 10 years until the lead actor died and then continued for another 15 years not featuring any character named Taggart