The Lookback: Arthur 25: Seasons 12 and 14 : Matchmaker , Match Breaker/ All the Rage

Arthur PBS 

              Now on to season 12 of  Arthur  and to episode 6b, which is a b-side to the episode we did in 2016 called "The Cherry Tree" 

            The Cold Open:   Arthur has a diary (oooh) and Francine wants to see what he's writing but you know privacy and Francine gets annoyed by this.  Muffy shows up  and does the same thing, but Arthur climbs and tree and they walk away.   Arthur tells us somethings are just private. 

    The Episode:  Muffy's brother , Chip, shows up home from college.  Muffy is very excited  and throws him a welcome home dinner.  Francine's family is also there , because of course, but it seems that Chip and Catherine (Francine's sister) seem to be getting  along.  Fun fact: this is the first episode Chip actually shows up in the series, he's been mentioned before. 

            

                  This gives Francine and Muffy the idea that their siblings should get married so, they can become sisters. (What?)  The show even gives us Laverne and Shirley parody.  Anyway, they decide the logical thing to do is to get these two to be in love with each other. (This is too much work)  They convince their siblings to go to a movie and they nitpick stuff the two siblings do, but they notice that they are seemingly doing well. 

                Later they find out that their siblings are going out to lunch.  While they stalk them , Francine and Muffy start to get into tension with each other and the Laverne and Shirley Parody seems to have gotten angrier too. They decide to help end the relationship between their siblings.  This is not a good plan.  Especially since what they do can be easily traced back to them, which is for the best.  Catherine sees Chip and they talk and figure out that their siblings were doing stuff.  They admit what happened and realize that maybe they shouldn't be sisters anyway.  

My family has some weird decorations/ Copyright WGBH

  

                 The Laverne and Shirley parody was funny, the episode was alright. There was some fun charm to this episode and Francine and Muffy wanting to be sisters was sweet.  The episode goes as expected the moral of not  meddling in others affairs.  

          

     More after the jump

The Lookback: Arthur 25: Seasons 10 and 11: D.W Aim's High / Germophobia

Arthur PBS 

    

       We've made it to the tenth season (again!) Season 10 of "Arthur" first aired on PBS in 2006, during the show's 10th anniversary. They had these little Easter eggs in episodes based on the number 10; the season also had 10 episodes but that's not because of an over active 10 theme.

  

   Anyway, I've covered the partner episode to this one before,  now we are looking at  episode 5a the first aired in May 2006.

              The Cold Open:  It starts with Arthur telling us about Albert Einstein and D.W interrupts, but he continues talking about Einstein's  life but then D.W comes in and she wants to know when the show is going to start.

    

        The Episode:  It starts now!  At D.W's preschool and there's something they have to do, to talk about what they want to be when they grow up.   Back at home, Arthur and DW's dad is  watching a show about Space.  D.W gets inspired and wants to be the first to walk on Mars. (Ha Mars)   D.W "Goes to Mars" with her imaginary friend, Nadine until the dog messes up the "space ship".  (woof) 

          She goes to see the Tibble twins and they mention that Martians are on Mars and she shouldn't go, this causes her to not want her dream to be that anymore. Her dad wants to her to see some stars and then look for Mars to show her. Arthur figures out that she heard about Mars from the kids who were watching a movie, thanks to Buster making him watch it. (True friends aren't made to do anything) Glad she believes Arthur, so that's nice. 

   

The space program has gone too  far/ Copyright WGBH

   I'm also confused the dad had the book The War of the Worlds just sitting there ready for the moment to mention about people had worries about Mars. (He saw the plot)   The next day he takes her to the museum to learn about Mars, then gets a Mars model.  Now she's inspired to go to Mars to prove what lives on Mars if anything.   She also teaches her class the truth about Mars. (The truth the CIA wants you ..hey owww help help)   

             

      So the moral is don't listen to movies, good. That and it's better to research and not just accept the first thing you hear for someone because it might not be true.

 More after the jump

The Lookback: Arthur 25: Seasons 7 and 9 : Buster's Amish Mismatch/ It Came from Beyond

Arthur PBS 

   

      Our Arthur 25 years journey continues with some notes about this blog post first. First, you may notice it says seasons 7 and 9 and there's no 8. There you go, ok ok,  since these posts up to certain point are doing the episodes that were paired with episodes we covered in 2016, there was one problem. The episode we came up with for season 8, by the randomizer thing gave us  a half our special "Post Cards from Buster" so that means there's no b or a side episode with it. The best solution was to skip season 8, instead of just taking a random one and cutting  it. We will be doing a season 9 post instead.  

   In speaking of that original season 7 and 8 post you can read that here. 

    We are with Season 7 episode 7b, with this episode from 2002, we're going Amish. (Well not, really, that' d be hard to blog)  

  

           The Cold Opening:  Arthur explains that every time his class takes a field trip he takes something with him. (What?) 

          The Episode: This episode Buster rejects modernity and embraces tradition. So the class is going to an Amish farm. The episode uses Buster's not pay attention to school to explain who the Amish are and what they do.  So the episode has a tour of this Amish farm because PBS wants you to learn too.  Buster apparently falls in love with the Amish world and decides the logical answer to be Amish at home. (What?)  

       

         Buster is going to reject modernity and embrace tradition. The Brain tells him it's hard to live without modern  stuff.  He starts to not ride in cars and not answer phones. His mother doesn't want to live Amish, so he decides to be Amish in his room thanks to his mom.  His mother wonders if he could a little Amish but of course this episode is weird.  

     

I'd watch a farmer in space series/ Copyright WGBH

           Buster continues his fun at school and things go wrong because of course.  Anyway, Mrs. MacGrady tells him  that the Amish don't refuse car rides and eat food from anything, and that they do it together and helps him understand that maybe he shouldn't do this. He goes back to living in the current times,  but does offer the fun of having his friends come together and build a dog house. 

 Not a bad episode, a little odd, but not bad. 

More after the jump

The Lookback: Arthur 25: Seasons 5 and 6: The Big Dig / The Good Sport

Arthur PBS 

     Now to an episode from the futuristic year of 2000. (Wow)  We start with "The Big Dig", which is partnered with "Just Desserts" which I  covered in 2016.  This is episode 9b of Season 5.

The Cold Open: Arthur talks to us about how cool is grandpa Dave is, he's coming for sometime and Arthur and D.W are excited. 

       The Episode:   Wait, this episode is about a grandpa and called the big dig, oh no! nooo!  Anyway, it seems the kids are not happy that grandpa Dave is there after all because he's been boring and for the  plot to work, he over hears the kids talking to their mom about how boring he's been. (Painful) 

           Grandpa Dave plays checkers but he isn't fun because he sleeps during the game. Which is not as fun as it sounds.  Then a map falls out of grandpa's pocket and the kids are interested. Dave tells them abut their great (many) uncle who was a pirate. (what?) Anyway pirate dude hid his treasure and couldn't find it. It's buried in Elwood City. Dave says he intends in finding the treasure and he hopes to find it when them when he feels better.

This watch does everything but tell time/ Copyright WGBH

        Arthur and D.W dream of what they can do with the treasure, so the plan is to take the map and go and find it for themselves.  Arthur finds it and they go on the search and think the treasure is buried by the tree house. When they dig and figure out there's no treasure. Dave said the story wasn't real then he was going to hide some candy, but things got out of hand.  He feels bad and gives them a real treasure , a gold compass.  He tells them the story of how it saved their great uncle, Matthew. It ends with grandpa telling the story and the kids being entertained. 

   It's a basic episode, not bad, maybe the idea is for delayed anticipation for something, I don't know but it was an alright episode.

 

More after the jump

The Lookback : Arthur 25: Seasons 3 and 4: Buster's Back /Prove it

Arthur PBS 

             For the Arthur 20 I looked at season 3's  Ballad of Buster Baxter, since that's what came up in the random draw. The strange thing is that episode which is Season 3 episode 1b, is connected to this episode season 3, episode 1a.  While that episode focuses on Buster feeling left out after coming back, this one is about Arthur being worried that Buster might not want to be friends anymore. It's a good contrast mixture. 

  

    It is interesting how "Arthur" held continuity where in most of season 2 , Buster is away after the episode "Arthur's Faraway Friend"  and now comes back at the start of season 3. 

       

   The  Cold Opening:  It starts with NASA where Arthur is running mission control while Buster is in a space ship and re-entering Earth.  Then Buster gets out of the space ship and Arthur was happy to see him but people notice he's changed. 

         The Episode: As, I mentioned above, the season 3 premiere has the idea of returning Buster back after committing him to being gone for a while. Arthur finds out that Buster is coming coming home. Arthur goes around the town yelling this message.  The gag that Arthur goes in a swimming pool just to tell  Muffy is funny.  Arthur is excited and sets up everything at home for Buster to get ready to play and have fun with his best friend.

            D.W sets in his mind that Buster has been to fun places around the world ,like Wisconsin, and that might mean the Buster has changed and won't want to do stuff they used to together. Arthur's other friends are also of no help. (Poor Arthur) We also get Arthur's fun imagination.  Then Arthur decides that he would like to learn 2 hours of anything to make sure he can be with "the new buster".  

    

     When Buster doesn't show up at the time he thought he was; Arthur feels that maybe Buster really doesn't want be his friend anymore. It's a sad scene and one can feel how he feels. Many times you might or someone you know you might lose contact with and later see them and there's a strange awkward difference or the worry that tastes have changed and you might not get along anymore. 

Oh great. Arthur and Buster died and won't go to the other side/ Copyright WGBH

  

  Buster shows up, and I like that he interacts with D.W's running gag of mentioning the wrong names for Buster and calls her P.W that's a good touch.  Arthur tries to impress Buster with his knowledge but he finds out that one thing Buster missed was playing checkers with Arthur. He explains that he fell asleep after the ride home and that's why he was late. Buster didn't really change.  

     This is a good episode and a nice return to Buster being back in episodes. Like I said, this episode connects with a the one after it and provides how Buster feels once he gets back. These are good pair of episodes.  Good way to start a new season as well.

 More after the Jump!

The Lookback : Arthur 25: Seasons 1 and 2 Arthur Accused/ The Short , Quick Summer

Arthur PBS The Flashback

            This year, 2021, marks the 25th anniversary of the PBS series "Arthur". Back in 2016 on this blog we did a series of posts celebrating the 20th anniversary   and now it's time to do the same for the 25th.   

"Arthur" first premiered on October  7, 1996 and has been on the air ever sense, at least as of this writing. Anyway, back in 2016 we did a series of posts and these were based off episodes of Arthur using a randomizer. It picked one segment from each episode since most of the episodes are 2 segments; this also meant that we have pairing segments that didn't get picked, so this project will start with picking episodes that were paired with the episodes we did back in 2016.  Also since 2016 there's been a few more seasons added on so, we will have to do those present those a different.

     First off, we start with Season 1, this season is the largest season of the series with 30 episodes or 60 segments. We are looking at Season 1; episode 6b, which is "Arthur Accused". It was paired with the season 1 episode we wrote about in 2016 for Arthur 20: "Locked in the Library" .  

      Since most episodes start with a monologue or a cold open I will describe that segment then do the rest of the episode.  

Pictured: Arthur being accused of murdering Buster/ Copyright WGBH 

         The Cold Open:  Buster Baxter introduces the episode as a private detective starting with a story about Arthur who is in detention and a mob is coming to the door, but Buster says we have to wait as he going back to the beginning. 

     

        The episode:  Buster narrates and the episode introduces Arthur doing some fundraising to buy a puppy for the fire department. (An interestingly random cause) The donations are in quarters (the best currency) and  Buster is dressed up as a detective.  Arthur has to drop the quarters off at Mrs. MacGrady's lunchroom since she's in charge of this whole thing. The woman seems busy on the phone so, he just leaves the quarters there.  (Arthur makes you feel like when your mom is on the phone and won't pay attention.)  Arthur and Buster goes to the arcade with Buster's Mom. Arthur hits the high score on a game. 

   The next day,  Mr. Haney, the principal, reminds Arthur to drop off  the quarters to Mrs. McGrady, which is confusing we just saw him do that yesterday. (With our own peepers we did)  Buster starts to mention that Arthur won a high score yesterday and principal thinks Arthur stole the quarters. If the money doesn't show up he'll not be allowed to picnic and have a week of detention. Buster decides to use his detective self to be on the case.

    

       Buster goes to question Mrs. McGrady  and she tells him that didn't anyone but Mr. Morris, the janitor was there. He was there to clean up some brownie mess. Buster goes to see him and gets answers mentioning the brownie mix mishap.  Buster decides to check out Arthur's home and D.W defends Arthur, kind of. (That's cool)  It wasn't looking good for ole' Arthur. 

Sadly in real life, you can't do this, you will probably die / Copyright WGBH 

      Buster  goes through his suspects list. Buster being Buster thinks that robots stole the quarters, because he's buster. (Oh no)   So yes, Arthur can't go to the school picnic, and Buster still wonders where the answer and he gets an idea.  The overflowing brownie mix.  This makes him figure out that quarters were in brownies!  The quarters didn't fit, Arthur must be acquitted. Now back to the mob, they came to get Arthur.... and take him to the picnic. (And not boil him in hot oil) 

          A fun episode giving Buster the lead role. I liked the little clues in the episode to make you think what happened.  Though the episode made sure we knew already that Arthur had given the quarters to Mrs. McGrady, so we just had to figure out what happened to them. Buster brings his humor as well and I love the image he had of Arthur Scrooge McDucking the quarters and the robot taking the quarters.   

 More after the jump

It Was Not Your Network, It was My Network, My Network TV

My Network TV 

   January 2006.  The start of the year meant a new company had kind of just popped in the media world. That being, Viacom.  That's a weird thing to say, but in 2005, Viacom and CBS broke up, a marriage they felt was a failure. (They still had the same arching major shareholder though.)  CBS Corp was the old Viacom, the new Viacom took the cable assets.  There's one asset that was created by the old Viacom, that would be UPN.  UPN had turned turned 10 in 2005, it made it!  

   

  UPN had a competitor, the WB network, owned primarily by Time Warner.  In the world of pie (stay with me)  network TV was 6 major slices. (ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX, UPN, the WB) But now let's pretend that pie wasn't cut in equal shares, because it's not, and some have the bigger slices. (ABC, CBS,NBC, and even FOX) So two have to fight over the remaining smaller slices, well, why not combine two smaller pieces into one bigger piece. (This analogy is weird.)   That was the idea of the announcement on January 24, 2006.  CBS and Warner announced that they were shutting down their networks and working together on a new network called The CW (CBS -Warner)  The media called it a merger but it was more a combing of resources and making a subsidiary company/network.   

  

          The idea was that UPN and WB were fighting each other, plus cable, plus other broadcast networks, so instead of fighting each other they join together like a World War and fight the others.  Then, it became a gym class, where shows with the better perceived strength would get line up and the rest would be cast into the sea of sadness. Also the stronger stations , since WB and UPN, in most markets were on two different stations, why not put your network on the stronger station? (There's more that soon)  I grew up in an area that had no CW station on broadcast TV, it was piped in on cable from the nearby city (Denver), we had a UPN station that launched in 1999.  (KXTU)  The CW ended up on that UPN station meaning the people without cable could now watch the final season of "7th Heaven". (oh) 

          Let's go back to the WB, back when it launched, Warner didn't own any broadcast stations at all. Most networks have a core of stations owned by themselves, (Owned and Operated Stations or O&O's) Viacom and Chris Craft had this for UPN in the early days (more on that soon). Most networks have owned stations in the top major markets: New York , Los Angeles, and Chicago. This is a heritage thing but also a core for the biggest audiences of the three biggest time zones in the US.  The WB had to make an agreement with Tribune Broadcasting to distribute their network on their stations which included : WPIX-11 New York, KTLA-5 Los Angeles,  and WGN -9 Chicago, plus other stations.   They were the key stations for the WB. WGN's cable feed aired WB from 1995-1999 for those that didn't have a station.   Meanwhile, UPN didn't have that problem at the start.  In New York and LA Chris Craft owned WWOR- AND KCOP ,plus few other stations, but Viacom, the other UPN parent company owned stations  as well. 

  

  In 1999, Viacom wanted to own CBS, after that , thanks to new rules where you have duopolies (two stations owned by the same company in the same market) in many markets with other rules applied. Viacom also made an ultimatum with Chris Craft: Buy UPN fully or sell it to us.  Chris Craft decided to sue and try and stop the Viacom purchase of CBS. This didn't work.  C.C couldn't find someone who wanted to run UPN with them so they sold to Viacom. But wait the stations? C.C owned those and found a different buyer: FOX.    

   

          Either C.C wasn't intentionally going to sell them, Viacom didn't think to buy them, or this was a power spite move they sold these stations like KCOP, WWOR, KUTP (but not KTVX or KMOL) to FOX  (Viacom did end up getting what is now KBCW-TV, so? Victory?)  This means that a company that owns a broadcast network owns affiliates of a network owned by someone else. (FOX later also bought WPWR-TV in Chicago from Newsweb, this was also a UPN station). By default, the largest owned station in UPN from the parent company was market 4, Philadelphia's  WPSG-TV.

      Any speculation that FOX would just up and kill UPN's reach did not happen. In 2003, they renewed the contract with UPN for 4 more years (source)   which math is a sign here.

  

   This is the story of My Network TV. When the CW was announced an automatic agreement with Tribune landed the top 3 markets plus many others (like Denver)  to a 10-year agreement with the CW.(Bold to assume that 10 years later the CW would exist, I mean yeah it did but, bold)  This meant that the CW while, not owning their own stations in these markets did have some stable footing for 10 years.  In markets where CBS owned the UPN station they ended up with the CW, except in Boston and Miami, while Tribune's WB stations ended up with the CW, except in Philadelphia and  Seattle.   Hold on, what about FOX?  Apparently, that 4 year agreement with UPN could be voided if no UPN existed (guy taps forehead).  They were left out in the cold.  FOX took this not well. Most of the FOX UPN stations were branded as UPN Number and maybe UPN (City name)  like WWOR was UPN 9. Quickly FOX removed all references to UPN on their stations WWOR's logo was cut to a "9" the UPN box removed.  UPN was dead to them.

         It wasn't just UPN stations owned by FOX many UPN and WB around the country were going to be left network-less. The idea was maybe they would go back to be indepdent stations. (KTXA in Dallas actually did)  FOX had another idea.  

 

           February 22, 2006.  My Network TV. The name is kind of stupid, but can't throw stones at it too much.  Around this time, Myspace had taken off as a big social media site and Newscorp (then owners of FOX) had bought it. This network's name is from that idea, maybe.  ( https://www.nexttv.com/news/news-corp-unveils-my-network-tv-78935)   Makes it feel personal, like hey look CBS isn't your network, we are?! Don't  touch! 

  

        So, you got you a network? That doesn't impress me much, you have to air stuff.  They were going to use UPN's 10 hours, 2 hours a night, 5 nights a week format then add one  more night for Saturday. (The former UPN stations  would lose a weekend night of couple hour's syndication, while the former WB stations would be getting Sunday night back in exchange)  It doesn't seem FOX just randomly got mad that the CW was announced and also iced them out, because they had plans for syndication version of English language telenovelas. 

  

           Paul Buccieri,  the head of Twentith television (the then FOX owned syndication studio) thought that maybe audiences wanted soap programming but telenovela styled formats but in English for those who might not speak Spanish.  This is around the same era where a new network soap hadn't been launched since 1999. The idea was to syndicate them which was bold one, as first-run scripted shows on syndication as a market were wavering and especially programming that would require stations to clear 1 hour of time to air them. 

More after the Jump

CBS This Morning to become CBS Mornings

CBS TV News 

        

       CBS announced Tuesday that their current breakfast time show CBS This Morning will be rebranded as CBS Mornings from Tuesday, September 7th.  This coincides with other changes to the program including a new studio and co-host. 

  

           CBS Mornings  is said to be continuing the mission CBS This Morning had to be a more news-based morning show versus it's NBC and CBS rivals.  They want to expand featuring reporting during the 2nd hour (8am) with things news, sports, etc , and notably culture pieces with now former co-host, Anthony Mason. 

  

           A  big change will also be a change of location, CBS will be doing their morning show from Times Square, the former home of  MTV's Total Request Live , the studio was used by CBS during the 2020 election.  The current studio was launched with this morning show in 2012, after a move from 5th Avenue. 

   

     Another change will be a new co-host joining Gayle King, the only of the original CBS This Morning Trio from 2012 to still be on the show, and Tony Dokoupil will be  Nate Burelson.  CBS This Morning Saturday, will be rebranded as CBS Saturday Morning will still have  Jeff Glor, Dana Jacobson, and Michelle Miller as hosts, and CBS Sunday Morning will continue as is with Jane Pauley. 

    

       A preview was played on the program seems to indicate the show will be taking an influence from the popular Sunday series on CBS, which unlike CTM on weekdays is #1 in ratings against ABC and NBC. 

     This is many in a long list of names and morning shows for CBS going back to the early days in 1950's. CBS has used  The Morning Show, Good Morning! , The CBS Morning News, Morning (which ironically they seem be harkening back to with this move), The CBS Morning News, The Morning Program, CBS This Morning (The old one) , The Early Show, CBS This Morning (the current one). 

       While CBS This Morning has seen some good ratings days  , it's still the third place show out of three and CBS wants to try and not be, morning shows have become the main core of the main 3 networks' focus as a way to make sure viewers still tune in and get the sweet ad money. These are the money making shows and with ratings down across the three they are trying to stick something to hope it works.   (Plus, they have more competition with cable news channels  and local stations that have local news past 7 AM that  in much of the country are local and live when the network shows are taped delayed out side the east coast as an more attractive option.)  

    

             CBS always seems to be trying to reinvent their morning shows with name changes, format changes, and staff changes.  (Gayle King as seemingly taken the Harry Smith role of being a constant while chair shuffle around her) Hoping that something will stick, their morning is somewhat more enjoyable than Today and GMA to me,  it's good they did try a different option that just being GMA/Today 3 , and it seems they want to stick with that while hoping a new name and look will do something. Will it? I don't know, maybe they'll change the name in a few years ago, and the Early Show is back or something. 

   Anyway, Press Release after the Jump , the new "CBS Mornings" starts September 7th on CBS at 7AM (in most time zones)