Shark Bytes

Man, NickAtNite is right on! That Kathy character was so mean AND annoying it's a wonder her own mother didn't roll her into an open man-hole. And would you believe it, Arnold actually claims that Kathy is his "best friend". What patronizing crap!

Upon further refinement of the peril factor, the following entry needs to be changed from this:
-Arnold and Willis subdue a burglar holding the entire family at gunpoint 4x1-> 4
to this:
-Arnold and Willis subdue a burglar holding the entire family (including Pearl) at gunpoint 5x1-> 5

The cumulative pereil factor now stands at 46.5.

Where do we begin? (1) Kathy, the wheelchair-bound frump whose mouth muscles, sadly, were not as paralyzed as the rest of her. She must be the most miserable character I’ve ever seen on any TV show! She only made two or three appearances but all her character ever did was get mad and insult everyone (and rev up her chair like she was going to mow them down). I remember one episode where she was nervous about attending Arnold’s junior high school. Willis tells her not to worry because she’ll be okay and, for some reason, she snaps at him, “Willis, go suck a brick!” Yep, that’s some high-end comedy from a heartwarming character, all right. What I learned from Kathy is that people with a physical disadvantage have license to take out their anger on every other person on the planet. They should have done a Very Special Episode in which a certain wheelchair gets “accidentally” nudged into oncoming traffic. (2) Did we really need the parade of live-in housekeepers? Mrs. Garrett was original and funny, but Adelaide was a snooze (the only comic relief she provided was the realization that she looked exactly like the old lady with the bun in her hair who owned Tweety Bird in those old Looney Tunes cartoons), and Pearl was more of a mixed bag of awkward smiles and cheesy one-liners than an actual character. Also, someone as hulking as Pearl would have made a better bodyguard than cleaning lady. She should have moonlighted. (3) Sam. What kind of unholy monster would unleash this insufferable moppet upon innocent viewers? When the guy who kidnapped Sam almost reduced him to tears by telling him he’d kill his parents if he tried to escape, I was siding with the death threats. “Oh, thank you, kind sir! Make that child so upset that he quits show business and spares us all! Tell him you’ll take out Santa Claus next!” (4) Nancy Reagan’s anti-drug wank session is one of the most unintentionally hilarious things ever committed to tape. I’ll never forget her standing in front of Arnold’s class, telling a story about a young, drug-addled boy in the most stilted manner possible. “And he went... to his sister to get the drug money.... And when she said no... she was... [Chokes back tears] BRUTALLY BEATEN...” Looks like Nancy should have exercised a little “Just Say No” when NBC asked her if she’d like to marginalize the drug epidemic on national television. (5) When the jaunty, simple theme song of your favorite TV show gets a dance remix, kiss it goodbye. (“The Facts of Life” cast knew from this subject, too.) To this day I’d love to ask the DS producers why they felt the music from a show about growing pains and race relations that airs on ABC deserved the synth-bass treatment. (6) Dana Plato -- the best thing about the show, in my opinion -- getting unceremoniously fired in season six was bad enough, but when they brought her back for the final season (the ABC one), they simply added insult to injury! Her name wasn’t included in the opening credits, making her a guest star on her own series, and she would go entire episodes without a single line! I remember one episode where the gang was running around organizing some party or something for Mr. Drummond. Kimberly was on screen the whole time yet the only line I remember her saying was, “Arnold!” Gee, way to endear the character to us all over again, ABC. But then again, when episodes featuring your character revolve around a half-hour long, now-you-have-it-now-you-don’t struggle with bulimia, maybe being written out of the script isn’t so bad. (By the way, isn’t doing an anti-eating disorder episode after you’ve had Nancy Reagan on your show a tad hypocritical?) (7) Mary-Ann Mobley: What, exactly, was her appeal? So, to summarize, the only thing that “Diff’rent Strokes” got exactly right in its entire eight-season run is that Abraham is a not-bad name for a goldfish.

Jumped when I found out that Gary Coleman was 22 or something like that...

Poor Gordon Jump...

He will always be remembered as the creepy molester...

To me he will always be the hilarious "Arthur Carlson" from WKRP!!!!!!!!

This show jumped during the last two seasons when Maggie and the annoying red-head kid moved in! Maggie was annoying because she was bossy and overbearing and that kid was annoying because he screamed all his lines, had that annoying accent and always held his head down whenever something didn't go his way. But watching all the episodes from the first seasons makes me happy because the best seasons were the earlier ones, right up until Maggie was brought in. This morning I was watching "No Time For Arnold" - the one where Arnold pretends to wet his bed in order to get attention - and this was a prime example of how much better the first season was than the third one. Arnold's bed-wetting was alot funnier because 1) Arnold had some zingers in there and 2) unlike in the Sam bed-wetting episode, you didn't see the pee stains on Arnold's PJ's! I know Sam really was wetting his bed, but did we really need to see it on his pajama bottoms?! NOOOOO!!!!

I remember this episode, and the episode where Kimberly and Arnold were abducted and Arnold was duct-taped bound in a back room. Cheesy as these episodes were, they put a strong foot across boundaries while still achieving audience appeal. I can honestly say these episodes saved me. They stuck in my mind, and when a man tried to lure me in and touch me once behind a building, I elbowed him in the crotch and escaped. If anything these and other shows of the era (Facts of Life, Punky Brewster) that dealt with these issues, (unlike almost all of todays shows) were the bees knees and should be revisited. As for it jumping the shark..

With the addition of any new character, like Sam for instance, kind of shows a certain desperation on the part of the show, because maybe arnold's cuteness wasn't enough any more.

The weirdest thing about the infamous Gordon Jump episode is that the whole thing is basically a "how to" guide for child molesters. The audience got see step by step how an old perv could trick little children into indulging their deviant addiction.

But the very best part was at the end when we get the obligatory "What did we learn?" meeting between the family and Detective Simpson, who is luckily the local expert on molesters. You know how it works: everyone sits around in a big semi-circle and one by one all the main characters air their misconceptions about a particular topic. Usually these statements open with a phrase like "gee, I always thought" or "I never would have guessed". These expressions invariably provide the perfect segue for the local expert to share their sage wisdom on this fascinating yet misunderstood subject. The viewing audience is highly entertained as myths are dispelled both on screen and off. Once this shiny new wisdom is imparted the main characters immediately synthesize the new data. The gestation period is typically one to five seconds, and is evidenced by the emergence of a new life lesson. Inspired by the new and deeper understanding, the main character then announces the life lesson. The life lesson announcment will often start with a phrase like "Now I see that" or "If more people understood". Just look at this example from this very episode and see if you can locate the dispelled myth(s) and the life lesson(s):

Kimerly - I just can't get over this. We've known Mr. Horton for a year, he seemed like such a nice man.
Detective Simpson - That's the contradiction with child molesters, in their own strange way they actually love children. The majority of them would never intentially harm a child. The sad part is, they can emotionally scar a child for life.
Willis - Man, I never would have guessed that Mr. Horton is, you know, gay.
Detective Simpson - Well he's not Willis, you know that's the common fallacy about child molesters. Their not gay, they're only interested little boys or little girls, not adults.
Arnold - Look I'm only 11 years old, should I be hearing all of this.
Drummond - Absolutely Arnold. If more kids knew the facts, less of these things would happen. Unfortunately child molesters prey on the innocence of children.

Well how did you do? There were two dispelled myths: one, child molesters can seem like nice people, and two, child molesters aren't gay. You should have been tipped off by "he seemed like" from Kimberly and "I never would have guessed" from Willis. And of course there was this life lesson, knowledge is the key to preventing child molestation. Naturally that came from Drummond himself, and was preceded by the phrase "If more kids knew the facts".

Gosh what crap.

Was just watching this on BET yesterday. Dixie Carter was annoying but Mary Ann Mobley was perhaps the worst actress ever! The episode where Sam gets kidnapped, that was the most unconvincing acting display ever. Yeah, the show had gone downhill before that but that was surely the moment of pending doom.

The episode where WKRP guy child touched Dudley is the funniest thing I've ever seen in my life. I remember being 8 & laughing my face off at the way he seduced them with cartoon porn & ripple. HAHAHAHAHAHA! Then Arnold ran like a girl cuz the light bulb FINALLY turned on. Oh & about 10 minutes later everything was good & there was no lingering effects of Dudley being molestered.

Even though that show jumped the shark by the conventional rules about 65 seperate times, I'll vote never jumped just because the funnies the perv special episode brought into my life can't be duplicated.

**heading off to find that episode on youtube**

Jumped the shark when Sam would sing. That was so phony: the country accent and all. And how often they would mention possum soup, that was ridiculous.

Tell me about it.
All you see on TV
today are catfights,
sex, skinny people,
sex, more catfights,
more sex, more skinny
people, more sex...and
in reruns all we see
is Jennifer Aniston's
ugly moon-face!

I don't think this show ever jumped the shark. Although, Danny Cooksey was annoying, the episodes were still fun. Alot of people make fun of the child molestor episode. I thought it was actually well done and it's not far fetched to think some parents just turn a blind eye and never catch on. This was the 80's when this stuff happened and was widely never reported. It was basically just a heads up to the viewing public that this stuff can happen and to be careful with your kids. Same with the drug problems. I enjoyed the show, mainly because whem they did tackle taboo subjects, they did it with tact and not for shock value. Hard to find stuff like that today.

Defintely jumped when Sam joined the cast, and I agree with the previous poster, the acting ws HORRIBLE! The lines were stuff adults MIGHT say, but kids never..."You'll have to ec=xcuse my brother..." "Ms. Chung, as class president, may I say a few words?"...kids don't talklike that...one of the biggest jumps was after Sam arrived, he and Arnold had a competition selling ROACH SPRAY...in their luxury apt bldg on the Upper East Side...

We all know the Maggie/Sam years were the worst because, first, Sam was annoying. Second, of course, NAGgie just stepped right in and decided to keep Mr. Drummonds' "manhood" locked in her purse. This was also around the time when Kimberly was no longer on the show (except for occasional appearances) and Willis was barely in any of the episodes. I thought the best years, truthfully, were when it was just Mr. Drummond, Arnold, Willis and Kimberly.

When Drummond went from being a strong and assertive self-made man to suddenly becoming a whipping-post for Maggie!

It's great to be able to watch a family show that addresses difficult issues, especially when there's no easy answer. (Like when Arnold is outraged about some white supremacists' right to hold demonstrations, and Mr. Drummond and Willis try to explain about free speech). Then parents have a great opportunity to talk about these issues with their kids. The show only took one of the biggest shark-jumps of all time when that annoying Sam moved in. Desperately introducing a new little kid on a long-lived show NEVER works. Cousin Oliver, Chrissy Seaver, Seven Bundy, Sam-and-David Camden, Lisa Bonet's little troll stepdaughter on Cosby...it's a show's road to doom.