Bad TV Shows that should be given another try

[No brains]

ReBoot would be nice for a reboot... sans the guardian code stuff and bizarre hostility toward the old fanbase.

These days a greater percentage of the population understands more computer stuff, so the show has a potential to be smarter. It may even help people catch on to how certain things work by explaining it from the perspective of computer faeries.

I didn't watch much of it but from what I've heard the guy who had to replace Tony Jay wasn't doing a bad job. I thought hearing a new voice out of him would be like nails on a chalkboard, but I wasn't instantly repulsed.

[Reddish Mage]

Might I point out, given Fox's handling of it, Firefly's TV release would count. It was never given a chance in the first place.

[Peelee]

ReBoot would be nice for a reboot... sans the guardian code stuff and bizarre hostility toward the old fanbase..

I'd imagine a coder of the Sourcerer's abilities would be able to hold down a profitable day job. Or find some other way to get enough day-to-day money to not look like he has meth for breakfast.

[factotum]

Might I point out, given Fox's handling of it, Firefly's TV release would count. It was never given a chance in the first place.

I don't think Firefly counts as a bad show, though.

[Lvl45DM!]

Stranger Things: make it shorter, remove the filler and cliches, and make it more than just "Nostalgia: the Netflix Series"

>remove the cliches
>remove the nostalgia
What are you left with?
Because kids riding around solving mysteries is a cliche.
Girl raised to be human weapon with telekinesis is a cliche
Monster and the hero (Eleven) having a connection is a cliche.
Teens getting their monster fighting gear and having an elaborate series of traps and weapons to take on the monster is a cliche.
The setting, plot, music, cinematography, characterization and world-building is all Nostaliga.

I mean, im curious what exactly you DO want from it.

[Eldan]

Good question. I think I may just not like Stranger Things. Though the acting and atmosphere were occasionally nice.

[BeerMug Paladin]

Good question. I think I may just not like Stranger Things. Though the acting and atmosphere were occasionally nice.

As far as I watched it, it was pretty decent until they started to do the superpowers thing. Still, I wouldn't call it bad, the presentation just made it appear initially to be various normal folks take out cthulhu and it eventually turned into something pretty different.

I would've preferred the mundanes vs cthulhu angle, which is why I haven't cared about the latest season. But something like what I initially imagined it would become would probably be pretty hard to write well. Disappointing expectations is kind of hard to recover from for any writer.

The nostalgia-hammer didn't intrude as badly as some things I've seen, but I certainly think that played a role in its popularity.

As for redos of shows? I can't honestly think of many things to suggest. Most ideas for shows are pretty heavily recycled from past ideas to begin with. Like as has been mentioned before, Is Battlestar Galactica (new) a recycle of Voyager? Is Firefly a recycle of Blake's 7? Hard to really say. Especially the latter as I'm not familiar with either and going off on what a previous poster said.

Are there series which had a disappointing ending, or veered away before ending into a bad direction? Sure, there's lots of them. Heroes season 1 didn't end in a way I thought was worthy of continuation. Lost season 3 was where I became convinced it was doing mystery-for-the-sake-of-mystery. In these cases if the writers had just gone in a different direction, then I could have liked them still. But they went into a direction I just didn't care to follow.

I don't normally think of wanting to see another attempt at a "bad show", but I suppose those would be my candidates. Just do most of the same kind of thing, but fix the problem(s) I had the second time around.

[Rodin]

I dunno if I can agree about Firefly being a reboot of Blake's 7. Other than "a bunch of yahoos on a spaceship", what is similar about the premise? The Liberator was a powerful alien ship that outclassed anything else around, where Serenity was an unarmed transport vessel that was the equivalent of a 60s Chevy pickup. The crew on Blake's 7 were united in trying to overthrow the evil Federation, while the cast of Firefly were mostly just trying to stay out of the way of the uncaring Alliance. The Blake's 7 plots were generally darker, and were focused around damaging the Federation. Firefly plots were generally heist related.

Etc. Etc.

A Blake's 7 remake specifically may not be a good idea, but I would like to see a show with the same premise and tone. Evil Empire/Federation, and we're following a starship full of rebels trying to overthrow it. The plots from week to week are them trying to find ways to strike at the Federation and help other rebel groups. The cast don't really trust each other. The show has major characters getting killed regularly. The core idea of Blake's 7 was solid, and where it suffered was due to budget and being a Sci-Fi show in the 70s.

[factotum]

The crew on Blake's 7 were united in trying to overthrow the evil Federation

The crew on the Liberator were united? First I've heard of it...

[ImperiousLeader]

Despite hanging on to a few 1990's tropes for way longer than anyone wanted, as well as indulging the alleged ego-maniacal tendencies of Kevin Sorbo, I kind of liked Andromeda.

It suffered a mostly by association. Being one of the first space opera/adventure shows to follow Star Trek: Voyager which was generally not as well received as its predecessors, and was also competing on the sci-fi front with Stargate SG-1 at the height of it's creativity and popularity, Andromeda struggled but nonetheless had charm in its world building and characters.

I liked all of the characters, and the setting and the premise - the "one guy who is overwhelmingly better equipped than everyone else" theme has started picking up traction in recent years, with shows like Overlord, One Punch Man and the various Marvel/DC spinoffs, and I think there's still a lot of scope for something similar in sci-fi... Although preferably without the quirky slang and godawful early noughties' haircuts.

If I were to redo Andromeda, I'd remake it as a Star Trek series. Start the series with the USS Andromeda (Ascendant? Maybe) roughly 75-150 years after Voyager, and then kick the ship a several hundred years ahead. Rebuilding the Federation is a far more interesting goal than rebuilding the Commonwealth. I'd also make a mystery out of the Federation's fall. So Andromeda's crew is both trying to rebuild, but also figure out what happened in the first place.

This is a more substantial revamp, which takes only really the premise and the sentient starship (I was never a fan of Andromeda's design, but I liked Lexa Doig). I'd probably keep Trance Gemini, make her a Traveler in the Star Trek universe. Then rebuild a lot of the rest from scratch. Keep a few more Starfleet officers on board, make it more a mixed crew like Voyager, ironically. Definitely scrapping Dylan Hunt, I wasn't a fan of Kirkules, he's up there with Archer on the list of starship captains that really bother me.

[oudeis]

Since several people jumped on Andromeda before I could, I'll go with another Roddenberry creation: Earth: Final Conflict. I loved this show when it first came out. One of the most evocative and effective intros of all time, a clever premise that avoided many of the most overused sci-fi cliches, at least for the first season, and some genuine tension to the mystery of the Companions. I particularly liked how they didn't depict the arrival of the Taelons, but instead picked up the story a few years after first contact. Alas, executive meddling turned into just another alien invasion after the first year. I never watched Andromeda but the concepts for it and E:FC showed some real imagination. In the right hands, they could both be the foundation for some viable alternative worlds to Trek and BSG.

I'd also like to see someone make a real attempt at reviving a failed 1980- fantasy pilot Fugitive from the Empire, sometimes seen as The Archer or The Archer and the Sorceress: Barbarian tribes vs Evil Empire (or Dynasty, in this case), armies of snake men, mysterious magi, and the Heartbow, a sentient weapon that fires exploding arrows and will destroy any wielder it finds unworthy. It didn't have much of a chance when it first aired, but in the post-GoT era it might actually find an audience. You can lo-res versions on YouTube if you are interested. See if you recognize the ferryman, er, cow.

[Aotrs Commander]

If Andromeda had held the quality it had in the first couple of season or so, it'd have been fine. But it started to slowly nose-dive in quality about, what mid-season to onwards? Season five was pretty bad, and it was only that at the time, I was rather still in the stage where I was prepared to watch not very good things that I'd started (I watched all of Mortal Kombat Konquets, for frack's sake) that I went through to conclusion. I actuially have it all on DVD, but aside from watching some of the first seasons again, I've never felt the urge to go back and watch it yet.

[Kitten Champion]

Andromeda started off with Robert Hewitt Wolfe who just came off of DS9 and wanted to do more complex and serialized story-telling with this Roddenberry adjacent franchise, but the studio wanted... not that.

Andromeda's so time-capsule now with that edgy Matrix-esque costumes and hairstyles along with the super-slo-mo wire-fu fights, it is sometimes difficult to recall that it occasionally had more to it when they got the right writer. Personally, if I were going to mark a turning point where it went from enjoyable-for-what-was to kind of tedious was when it made Tyr a straight villain.

As for Earth: Final Conflict, I thought it was a much more interesting version of "V". Most of its issues seem to stem from the studio, they kept losing actors and creative staff creating a wildly fluctuating product. I mean, they start from Childhood's End and what are the plans of these enigmatic and highly alien beings and end with sexy Space Vampires for some reason.

Now after mentioning Childhood's End, that's a miniseries that could've been so much better. The insistence on having an every-man protagonist and following him through events was probably it's biggest mistake, it needed to be more like that Taken miniseries from 2002 where they follow several families through the generations and spend a lot more time on the most interesting part where humanity is coming to grips with the Overlords and less on the baby psychic apocalypse.

[darkrose50]

Stargate SG-1 [my absolute favorite show] where:
[1] exploration was key-and-center
[2] there were many different races and powers [goa'uld everyplace made my heart sink]

I would set up the Stargate in a room under an Olympic swimming-pool set to flood the Embarkation room at a push of a button and/or a pull of a switch.

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Sliders with better writing and less stealing ideas for movies and making them an episode. Exploration is fun!

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Anything by Joss Whedon should be given at least a 5-year contract.

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I have no idea what the Chicago accent sounds like, so with that caveat, I think Marsters does a fantastic job on the Dresden Files audiobooks.

I am from the Chicago area. We tend to have a Midwestern accent, and tend to sound like the TV broadcasters.

Now traditionally we apparently sound like this . . .

https://owlcation.com/humanities/Chicago-Accent

. . . and to be fair I have a few relatives that do to a strong degree.

My grandmother used to pronounce three as tree.

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Chuck:

For one Halloween I shopped for an unmarked green polo shirt, went to the mall and had them embroider BUYMORE on it, and then I made a nametag.

One person remarked "I though you came straight from work" and my heart sunk a little.

[Aotrs Commander]

Stargate SG-1 [my absolute favorite show] where:
[1] exploration was key-and-center
[2] there were many different races and powers [goa'uld everyplace made my heart sink]

Apropros of nothing at all, it's not a TV show, but I did a write up once of the start of an RPG party that is like that, except it is Liches...!

[Telonius]

Chuck was one of the saddest casualties of the Writers' Strike (along with Heroes). There was just so much disconnect in the "before" and "after," that it couldn't survive.

[Rogar Demonblud]

It wasn't a bad show, but Almost Human could use another shot. The only major changes you need to make is replace Minka Kelly with someone who can actually act, and keep it away from FOX and their habit of grabbing episodes at random to broadcast. Seriously, They did it with Almost Human, Herman's Head, Firefly, even Space Above and Beyond.

[Hopeless]

Blake Seven except set it aboard an aging q-ship that was left behind with its sleeping owner when a human generation ship dumped excess cargo to be recovered later only for the location to be lost once they managed to establish new colonies when they encountered a near human empire.
Awakened to discover herself lost she barely manages to find a safe harbour where she is recruited by a small trading company to whom the armed freighter is a useful ally.
Eventually hired by an adventurer and her small group of allies she finds herself having to rescue them as she tries to figure out what's going on and where the other colonists are.
Meanwhile it appears someone prophesied her coming along with the usual she will end the empire trope.
Of course some imperials believe that mess, whilst others who actually bother to talk to her think she's actually their saviour.
The usual insane capers insue!

Well it's an idea after all!

[TripleD]

Legend of Zelda cartoon. I'd really like to see a better version of that. I'd also like a better d&d series, live action or animated, though I appreciate the original for what it was (particularly at the time).

As a huge fan of the D&D cartoon, I would love to see a reboot or a sequel.

The original pushed a cartoon about as far as you could go in 1983, but there were still so many constraints of the time they kept running up against.

Serialization for example. There were the recurring background elements of Venger’s parentage, Dungeon Master’s former pupils, and the weird out-of-sync time that the realm existed in. Because of the episodic nature there was only so far they could go with the ideas.

A modern, serialized story could really dive into those ideas over multiple episodes.

[ImperiousLeader]

As for Earth: Final Conflict, I thought it was a much more interesting version of "V". Most of its issues seem to stem from the studio, they kept losing actors and creative staff creating a wildly fluctuating product. I mean, they start from Childhood's End and what are the plans of these enigmatic and highly alien beings and end with sexy Space Vampires for some reason.

I really liked the first season of Earth: Final Conflict. Didn't hate the second that much, I had a crush on the new lead, but that show really plummeted over it's few years. Also they lost a lot of the ambiguity of the first season pretty quickly, which was one of the best parts.

In many ways, Earth 2, another of my favourite 90s sci-fi shows was spared that fate. It was killed after a really good first season, but I remember reading some of the plans for season 2 and realized it was probably a mercy it had been cancelled early.

[Algeh]

I really liked the first season of Earth: Final Conflict. Didn't hate the second that much, I had a crush on the new lead, but that show really plummeted over it's few years. Also they lost a lot of the ambiguity of the first season pretty quickly, which was one of the best parts.

In many ways, Earth 2, another of my favourite 90s sci-fi shows was spared that fate. It was killed after a really good first season, but I remember reading some of the plans for season 2 and realized it was probably a mercy it had been cancelled early.

I bought and re-watched Earth 2 on DVD a few years back. It was...not as good as I remembered it being. I would enjoy a new try at the idea of a high-tech group of people trying to make their way across an alien planet with limited supplies, but most of the specifics of the Earth 2 worldbuilding were from the deep end of the "this does not have to make sense because magic" fantasy pool and I would have appreciated it more with a more science-focused approach.

[Wardog]

Although preferably without the quirky slang and godawful early noughties' haircuts.

Those were hardly the biggest problems with Andromeda.

IMO, the two really fundamental problems (other than Kevin Sorbo) were:
* The series kind of lost its way after the Commonwealth was restored. A lot of the time, it seemed they were trying to do the same kind of plots as before, but then remembering that the Commenwealth existed and would get in the way of the plot. Oh, and the Andromeda now has a crew, so, erm, add in a few one-shot characters who make no real difference to what actually happens. And then kill them, so the cast can be sad about it.

(Also, the post-restoration title sequence was so utterly bland and generic).

* Everything coming to a massive climax at the end of the penultimate season, after which most of the final season was spent scratching a living on a (seemingly) insignificant planet. That could have been an interesting plot earlier in the series (e.g before restoring the Commonwealth), but putting it *after* the (apparent) final battle with the Big Bad was a real anticlimax.

[Avilan the Grey]

I have a hard time coming up with any, because the only ones I can think of also did squander their potential on purpose.
Be it Invasion, or Lost, or Defiance, or any other... their very premise as envisioned by the writers made them bad. If we "correct" the writing (aka change the story) of Invasion it would not be that series anymore. I mean SitComs are easier to fix I guess; Two and a Half Men should either have been cancelled when youknowwho left, OR stuck with the concept they quickly ran away from when Kushner joined: HE was the naive one that needed help and that would have been an amusing turn of events. Instead he quickly became Charlie 2.0 with more money and less angst.