This week saw the passing of yet another television legend, as Monty Hall died, aged 96. At our partner website, In Other Words, my colleague Bobby has a very nice tribute to the long and illustrious career of America's biggest dealer.At Comfort TV, David offers a fine apologia for Here's Lucy, the 1968-74 successor to The Lucy Show and, before that, I Love Lucy. It doesn't get either the notoriety nor the credit that its predecessors do, but David offers ten episodes that suggest why you shouldn't underrate it.
Now that we're in October, Christmas technically is the month after next (even though it's actually more like three months away, so don't panic if you don't have your shopping done yet). That means we're in the mood for Joanna at Christmas TV History as she looks back at the '83 Loretta Swit telemovie The Best Christmas Pageant Ever.
Eric Senich, the cohost of the podcast The Bob Crane Show: Reloaded, is bringing back the spirit of Crane's landmark radio work with his Saturday Forecast Funnies on WRKI in Brookfield, CT. You can check out his show online every Saturday, and now's as good a time as any to let you know that I'll be interviewing Eric at this space later this month!
It's been awhile since we've visited British TV Detectives, so let's take the opportunity to check in on this review of the 2009-2012 series Above Suspicion, the story of a rookie detective and the cases she deals with. The first two series can be viewed on Acorn.
Let's continue with the British theme - Cult TV Blog returns with a look at Steptoe and Son, the forerunner to the American series Sanford and Son. John has some very insightful comments, the kind I love to read, on the offbeat episode "Porn Yesterday."
If you follow the weekly TV listings here, you know that from time to time we visit the Philadelphia TV market; this week, The Broadcasting Archives at the University of Maryland visits one of those stations, WFIL, with a look at the WFIL Studio Schoolhouse Teacher’s Manual, 1955-56. WFIL-AM, WFIL-TV, and School District of Philadelphia. PA Board of Public Education. Fascinating look at how television used to be utilized.
I always enjoy the "Retro Review" feature at Television Obscurities, and this one is obscure even to me: It's a Man's World, a 1962-63 NBC drama starring Glenn Corbett as a college student raising his 14-year-old brother. The series never went into syndication - no wonder it's so obscure.
What's not obscure is The Twlight Zone, and in this week's edition of The Twilight Zone Vortex, Jordan dips back into the archives with Volume 1, Number 4 of the Twilight Zone Magazine.
As I often think, if you can't find something interesting in this list, you aren't trying very hard. See you back here tomorrow, or whenever you show up.