Whenever there’s a new television series we like, we obviously want there to be another season. We all desperately wait for news if that one show we saw will get renewed so we can go continue to enjoy it. But sometimes, especially on shows that spans several seasons, things can change. Some characters may leave the show. New characters might come in to try to shake things up. Even the setting might change for either story purposes or just simply budgetary concerns. Whatever the reason, some alterations may happen to our show but, as long as the central premise remains the same, we either don’t mind or we don’t notice.
Of course, there are some shows that just change so drastically that it looks like a totally different thing from when how it started. I’ve already talked about how some movie franchises can “lose the plot” as more and more sequels come out. Well, it turns out the same thing can happen to television shows as well! So, let’s go check out some TV shows that radically changed from how it started out!
As I will be talking about the general plots of these television programs, I do have to put out the obligatory SPOILER warning. I mean, what do you expect as I will be talking about some of the major changes to these shows? Anyway, SPOILER warning!
Let’s get the most obvious offender out of the way early, shall we?
The original premise of Family Matters was actually supposed to be a spin-off from another sitcom, Perfect Strangers. Perfect Strangers had a character named Harriette Wilson, who was a snarky and quick-witted elevator operator in that show. Family Matters was developed to focus on Harriette Wilson’s family, which included her husband police officer Carl Winslow, who was played by Reginald VelJohnson. Around this time, a little film called Die Hard came out, which also featured Reginald VelJohnson as a cop. So, the producers decided to jump at the chance to use that name recognition into a new show.
Family Matters originally focused on the Winslow family, an African-American middle-class family living in Chicago. The first season generally followed most of the classic family sitcom tropes of the time. Honestly, it was nothing all that special. That all changed when they introduced Steve Urkel. The nerdy and awkward Steve Urkel was supposed to be just a one-off character as he just wanted to go on a date with the Winslow’s youngest daughter. However, the character proved to be incredibly popular with viewers that he was soon promoted to the main cast in the second season. After that, Family Matters simply started to write most of their episodes around Steve Urkel and his accident prone antics and his “friendly” interactions with Carl Winslow.
What’s even more weird is how the show evolved/devolved to more surreal stories, once again involving Steve Urkel. The stories became so weird that it didn’t seem out of place to see the Winslows deal with time travel, androids and magic potions. In a strange way, I have to applaud the writers for just doing whatever they wanted because, in their minds, they can put together a story for no other reason but Steve Urkel is in the show. In the end, they could’ve just renamed Family Matters and called it the Steve Urkel Show and no one would’ve batted an eye. That’s how much the show had changed.
Baywatch Nights is a spin-off of, you guessed it, Baywatch. However, as the name suggests all of the adventures will happen in the evening, you normally don’t get to see hot lifeguards running along the sandy beaches in slow motion in Baywatch Nights. Originally, the show was focused on David Hasselhoff‘s character from Baywatch, Mitch Buchannon, helping out his cop buddy (who was also a recurring character from Baywatch) to run a private detective agency.
The show was a pretty standard run-of-the-mill detective show and that was kind of the problem. It may have the Baywatch name but it didn’t have the same “spice” of the show. As such, ratings immediately started to drop during the first season. So, the producers knew they had to do a major revamp for the next season. It was around this time when a new show called the X-Files made its debut to major success. The supernatural sci-fi police procedural really started making waves and, for some reason, the people behind Baywatch Nights thought it was a good idea to copy it!
Starting in the second season, Baywatch Nights did follow the X-Files lead. Mitch Buchannon’s cop friend left the detective agency and he was replaced with an paranormal detective and they were now taking cases involving voodoo cults, time travel, murderous monsters and many more.
Despite this “groundbreaking” change, Baywatch Nights was cancelled after this season due to low ratings. Who would’ve thunk it?
Person of Interest’s original premise is a good one. A man developed a machine for the government to “eavesdrop” on all communications and that same machine will use that information to predict future terrorist attacks. However, the same man realizes “The Machine” can also deduce smaller crimes, crimes which the government will not take action on as they don’t rise up to the level of a terrorist action. So, he hires a former government agent to help him stop these predicted crimes. But there is a catch. The machine can only give them the name of the person, the so-called “person of interest”, but it will not tell them if they are the victim or the perpetrator. So, this two-man team must not only stop the future crime from happening but they must also deduce if their “person of interest” will commit it or be a victim of it.
Now, throughout Person of Interest’s five season run, numerous little changes were made to it. The original two-man team gained more members, including a former corrupt police officer, another former Special Ops soldier and a rival hacker who learns about The Machine. Characters also evolved and, in fact, The Machine itself evolved so much that it gained sentience and was more than just giving names of people. It was actively helping the team by telling where bad guys were during shootouts, for example. The threats also evolved as a rival machine called Samaritan was developed and was out to get The Machine for interfering with its operations.
However, as the threats became more elaborate, the central premise of Person of Interest, got lost. The team were no longer looking at these “persons of interest” by the fifth season. They were more in an all-out shadow war against Samaritan. They didn’t have any time to be looking at these “persons of interest” if they were a future victim or criminal by this time! While the change was slow and subtle, by the time Person of Interest got to the final season, the show had changed so radially from its original premise.
On a personal note, I was a huge fan of Person of Interest. I eagerly waited for each week so I can watch the latest episode. However, even I didn’t really notice how much the show had deviated from its original idea. It started out a “crime of the week” and turned into this big war with espionage and secret government agencies very slowly and I didn’t really see these alterations until the final few episodes of the final season.
Still, if you haven’t, you should try to give Person of Interest a try. Despite the slow burn change, it’s still a really good show.
BONUS: The Mentalist
I’ve actually reviewed The Mentalist before and I’m not entirely sure if they “lost the plot” of the original idea of the show, which is why I’m adding it in the Bonus section. In general, it still does have the same formula. They still had former con artist Patrick Jane using his powers of observation and social engineering abilities to solve crimes throughout the show’s seven season run.
In the middle of the sixth season, Patrick Jane solves the mystery behind who Red John is. As Red John is the reason why Patrick Jane decided to use his skill for crime fighting, it was necessary for the show to change as his motives would also have to change. While I understand that, I don’t understand why they had to change pretty much everything as well.
Patrick Jane was moved to an entirely new team in the FBI with only two members from the original group, his love interest and the straight shooter, returning. As such, the show lost a lot of its humor and, in all honesty, its mojo. They also tried to give him a new love interest, which totally didn’t pan out and that new love interest was gone by the start of the seventh and last season of The Mentalist. While you could say The Mentalist still had the same premise throughout, the big switch during the final two seasons made it feel like a totally different show.
What other television shows can you think of that totally changed? Let me know in the comments section below!
3rd World Geeks 