The Tick comic book had not one, but two great adaptations: one animated and one live-action. The producers for the live action version couldn't get the rights to all the characters for the live-action version so American Maid and Der Fledermaus ended up being Captain Liberty and Bat Manuel. But both variations were hilarious. And the same network cancelled both series long before they had a chance to really catch on. All together now: Suck it, Fox!

And then they go make us Eliza Dushku fans suffer by *not* cancelling the Totally-Unworthy-of-Eliza's-Talents Tru Calling. :-(

[Buffyism] "I think I speak for everyone here when I say....HUH???" [/Buffyism]

Getting off-topic.

There was a Fawlty Towers adaption years ago (I think late 70's) with Bea Arthur. I can't think of the name, but I think the place was called Snavely Manor or something.

The Bewitched spin-off Tabitha was an abortion. Horribly acted, written, and executed. It also upset the time frames. Tabitha clearly took place in the mid 70's and that she was early 20's. That retroactively set Bewitched in the 50's, and that doesn't jibe. Shag Carpeting does not lie people!

I understand that the newly imported British crime series "Wire in the Blood" is based on a series of novels. Haven't read the books or seen the series myself, but if anyone has, I'd be interested to know if either are any good, and how they compare to each other.

It was Amanda's, or Amanda's Place, or something. But I know her name was Amanda.

I don't think this has been mentioned since the first page but Pride & Prejudice. Colin Firth. Those stares. The wet shirt. My drool.

How about a remake that never aired? "Charlie's Angels '87" It was supposed to be on Fox. The premise was 4 actresses were on this private investigators show, which gets creamed in the ratings by "The Cosby Show". Apparantly, after this happens, the women decide to chuck thier acting careers, and become actual P.I.'s.

Now I can understand why this never went through :), but the point I'm trying to make is, they hyped up this show through nationwide open-call casting searches, cast the show, (Tea Leoni was one of them) and then it fell through.

I have to chime in as enjoying the Malcolm McDowell "Fantasy Island" much, much better than the original. It seemed darker, more textured. Plus, Malcolm McDowell rocks.

Is this a place for what I think of as "boomerang shows": shows that go away, then come back in some other form. It's not truly a spin off or adaptation, but almost a "reimagining" of the show. Typically, this is as a result to either replace gaps in the cast for the time it went away, or to make the show more "marketable" in the eyes of its new patron.

Two come to mind. First, "Due South," where season 1 & 2 was on Canadian TV and CBS, with Dave Marciano as Ray. This is listed in IMDB as Due South (1994).

Canceled on CBS, it went away for a bit, then came back for season 3 (and 4, I believe) as Due South (1997). It was on Canadian TV, as well as syndication in the US. This had star Paul Gross in charge, and Callum Keith Rennie as Ray. The show had a different feel to it at this point, though it had the central elements. It also represents a schism among Due South fans.

"Forever Knight" also had a similar fate. Its final season swaps some of the original, well loved characters for new ones. Again, it didn't feel the same.

What I hate about this is that for fans of the original, you don't have that happy memory, but the memory of this empty shell that doesn't resemble what you had before.

On the subject of Remakes that were better than the original...

Totally heretical opinion here, and I firmly expect to be stoned, but....

I liked the second 'Twilight Zone', which aired in the early 1980s, better than the classic original.

A couple of pages back, somebody mentioned that Roseanne Barr-Arnold-Whoever had optioned Absolutely Fabulous and planned to do an American version. While that thankfully never materialized, there was an American re-make of AbFab that ran on CBS in 1995. Called High Society, it starred Mary McDonnell as the Eddie character and Jean Smart as the Patsy character. The uptight, conservative teenage daughter was replaced by an uptight, conservative teenage son (wow, creative!). it didn't last long.

One of the worst adaptations of a classic book was the recent MTV rock-and-roll version of Wuthering heights. Its only valid reason for existence is the very funny re-cap by Montykins over in Mondo Extras.

small voice: I liked that show.

I liked High Society too. But similar to my relationship with AbFab, I liked the US version of Coupling before I saw the British version.

examples:

• Charles in Charge replaces the family. Pembrokes into Powell's.
• The friends go away on Those Friends of Mine and becomes Ellen.
• The much bitched about turning of Duet into Open House.
• In the pilot of Blossom wacky hijinx ensued when the children thought their parents were getting divorced because they went to see a lawyer and hadn't had sex in six months (Whoa! Joey was shocked. Sex in marriage should be like an all-you-can-eat salad buffet). Turns out they were just writing their will. Of course, when the show was eventually picked up, the parents were divorced. The managed to work in clips in a later episode as a flashback of when they found out the parents were splitting up.

Has anyone else heard that there is a television version of The Parent Trap coming soon. I hope it's a drama where they explore how bad the parents were, keeping the kids apart and never telling them that the other one existed, super that they got back together, but that kind of parenting can leave one with issues.

The Parent Trap is sort of embodied in Sister, Sister, isn't it?

Great. Because all I've been wanting lately is to see The Parent Trap beaten to death.

Maybe you're onto something, steering fish...how 'bout a Pay-Per-View event where the people in The Parent Trap get beaten to death?

I just realized how many different ways my post could be taken. :)

God, I hate The Parent Trap with a lot of passion. It was a hokey premise, and now it's being remade?

Remake I'm most looking forward to: Dark Shadows on the WB next fall. I watched the reruns of the original series on Sci-fi and laughed at the camp-factor. Hopefully this will be a very dramatic turn.

Oh dear - Dark Shadows will be on the WB of all places? I watched a bit of the original ones on Sci-Fi and I was looking forward to seeing a remake, but, not one where everyone is under the age of 25. Hm, I thought they would have taken it to some place like NBC or ABC, or possibly cable.

There was a remake in 1991 on NBC. I'm sure it's been discussed already.

I recall the NBC version, and recall wondering why people on TV call their cousins "Cousin Barnabas" or whatever. I just call my cousins by their names. My question is, did the WB version ever come about? This thread has been dormant a while.




A "re-adaptation" of an existing show that I recall was The John Laroquette Show. It started off with John working the night shift at the bus station, Gigi Rice's character was a prostitute, etc. The suits wanted to make it audience-friendly. It ended up with everyone on the day shift, and Gigi's character owning the restaurant. It still bombed in the ratings and was far less entertaining.

The Kojak redo on now seems to be pretty good, though I'm sure not abandoning Desperate Housewives for it now. Brilliant, USA.

Maude spawned Good Times.
All in the Family spawned The Jeffersons.
The Cosby Show spawned A Different World.

I think all of those kiddies did their parents proud. I loved all those shows. As I kid I totally thought Maude ruled and here I was a little black girl. I still thinks she rules. (OMG, why am I using the word rules?)

Does anyone remember 702 Hauser St, a remake of AitF? I liked the one episode I saw. ABC should have given it a chance. Trigger-happy bastards!

Actually, NicePebbles, All in the Family spawned Maude which then spawned Good Times.

Really? Was Edith & Maude friends? I can see that. Oh now I remember. Wasn't there an episode of Maude where Archie & Edith came over? for dinner?

Isn't King of Queens a spin-off of Everybody Loves Raymond?

A pilot was shot, but it wasn't picked up. Apparently, there was a huge generation gap between Dan Curtis (producer of the original) and the writing team (who penned Smallville), and the result was a truly terrible pilot.

Edith and Maude were first cousins. AITF had two episodes that featured Maude. One was when Maude came to take care of the Bunkers, who were sick with the flu. The other episode was when Archie and Edith went to attend the wedding of Carol, Maude's daughter (this ep served as the pilot for Maude).

Val McDermid is a very out Scottish lesbian writer, who became a little famous for feminist crime novels, but then really famous for this series. The books are very dark and British - good if you like serial killer stuff (it's intense - there's torture of a main character at least once), good sense of atmosphere I think. The first couple of adaptations were surprisingly close to the originals, considering the limitations of the 2-parter, primetime format. Robson Greene was a middle-of-the-road, heading for middle age sex symbol when he developed the series; I was impressed that he was prepared to play such a dysfunctional, slightly creepy hero. And in the first season, there was some great sexual tension between the 2 emotionally weird leads: the sort of stuff British TV doesn't do very much. So I'd say it's worth checking out - it definitely puts a dank English spin on the psycho crime genre.

But as the series has gone on, and they've started to develop stories from scratch, it's all gotten a bit silly I think. They've stopped taking risks, and it's becoming more and more disappointing. Like, the tension between them was fun at first, but now they just seem to be wussing out of the hard work of actually seeing what would happen if they got together. And the murder plots are lazily OTT.

Any idea whatever happened with Ross the Interns show on Bravo? Did it get canned so fast that I just missed it or...?

Ok I have to agree. The 1995 version was absolutely wonderful *add more gushing here* Colin Firth....hmmmm.

I refuse to watch the 2005 version of Pride and Prejudice.

Friday Night Lights the tv series is not really an adaption of the book and the movie but more of a reinvention if you will. Kind of like the current Battlestar Galactica if you will only more so since it does not even retain the names of the book/movie characters.

Very quickly going through the evolution of Friday Night Lights;

The book is a non-fiction book detailing the story of the 1988 Permian Panthers. It detailed racism and other non-flattering things about the town of Odessa which made the author very unpopular with the town to say the least.

Then came the movie which was a pretty faithful adaptation of the book minus some of the more controversial themes (racism) as well as filling in some gaps (like the life of the quarterback and his mom).

Now comes Friday Night Lights the tv series which does not have any of the characters from the book and the movie and is competley fictional. It has it's own original characters but they do share some characterisitics (the underpressure coach) as the book and the movie.

All I can say is I'm going to like the tv series much better than the movie because:

A: I like Kyle Chandler better than Billy Bob Thorton

B: The TV series has a lot of female characters, which I thought the movie sorely lacked.

C: No Tim McGraw.

Suddenly I feel a need to pop in disc 2 of my P&P DVD...

Perhaps it's pre-emptive, and it's definitely early, but HBO has acquired the rights to George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series and I was excited enough to wade through pages of this forum for this thread. There's little information beyond the parties involved, but I think HBO is a perfect fit. Anyone have an idea of how long it takes to go from this stage to actual production?

Variety reports:

ITA with this statement, but would also add that I was a kid when the Montalban version aired and I kind of got with the silliness because I was young. As an adult, I did prefer the MacDowell version. (And Malcolm MacDowell definitely does rock!)

I completely agree. I was mildly amused by the original but I totally loved this version. I was distraught at it's cancellation. Fuck ABC (they're almost as bad as FOX).

I loved the MacDowell version too. I found him very sinister but also fascinating. And hot. I don't know why but he'd get a twinkle in his eye during some of the eps and I'd be like, "Hmm, he's hot."

This is great news! I love the A Song of Fire & Ice series. And I'm glad to read that George R. R. Martin himself will be very much involved. That pretty much guarantee high quality scripts.

I loved the MacDowell Fantasy Island, too. The original was entertaining for its day, sure, but that one had a nice darker edge to it that I liked.

Anyone else looking forward to HBO's upcoming adaptation of Preacher?

I am! I just finished the comics last month and I loved them so much. I am really interested to see what HBO does with them. But I have no idea who could be cast in some of the roles. Is there any casting news yet?

From a few pages, but many years ago... I agree. I was sad it was so short lived. I really liked this show. And I'm not a huge MM fan (don't hate him or anything, though), but this was just plain good.

I didn't think I'd like the "re-imagining" of Battlestar Galactica. I didn't even watch it's first season even though most of my family and friends did. Then somewhere in the 2nd season, I started watching one of the marathons they did. I have been hooked since. I wasn't sure what "re-imagining" was - even with the definitions I was given. In this case, at least, it has the same premise (rag tag fugitive fleet on the run from the cylons) but it's pretty much a different story. Yes, there are some similarities, but the differences go well beyond human looking cylons and gender differences in mail characters.

For spinoffs, I got hooked on Torchwood long before I got hooked on Dr Who. I had tried to watch DW a few times, because of hype, friends, etc, but I just couldn't get into it. I'd turn it on then realize it was over and I hadn't watched much at all - getting distracted by such fun things as laundry and bills. Of course, the first few episodes I'd tried to watch were the two that featured that talking skin. And whenever I'd give it another try, it would be one of those same two eps. Then I finally saw a different ep - Daleks in Manhatten. So, yes I didn't get hooked. Back to Torchwood, when I first started watching, I didn't even know it was a DW spinoff. It wasn't until I started reading some of the forums that I figured it out. And I have to admit, Captain Jack is what got me giving DW another chance.

I now object to anybody touching Jane Austen again. You will not get better than the 1995 Ehle'n'Firth 'Pride and Prejudice', Ang Lee and Emma Thompson managed to make 'Sense and Sensibility' rather unstaid (Alan Rickman is an unsung hero for redeeming Colonel Brandon in my eyes), the Patricia Rozema film of 'Mansfield Park' starring Frances O'Connor is one of the most intriguing and mature takes on Austen I've yet seen. I really love the version of 'Persuasion' with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds in it, it feels right for the story. And the Gwynie Paltrow version of 'Emma' wasn't that bad, Juliet Stephenson pinches the film from under everybody's nose as Mrs Elton.

Every new Austen adaption stars some bland, uninteresting young thing, and I include Keira bland as hell Knightley. Its one thing to cast younger actors who are actually nearly the age of the characters, but then none of them can pull it off, better to stick with thirtysomething Lizzie Bennets and Emma Woodhouses, just ignore that they are too old and enjoy people who can, I don't know, act. And that's just a start. If it ain't Andrew Davies, well there's a major disadvantage already....