Crossovers & Spin Offs Master Page
With a writers' strike possibly postponing new episodes of some of your favorite TV shows, this may be a good time to dig into reruns of "Cheers" and "Law and Order." While there, why not revel in the many ways old shows crossed over or were spun-off from each other?
We turned to the expertise of Thom Holbrook, who has been meticulously cataloging the infinite labyrinth of TV shows that mix it up. We first reviewed his Crossovers & Spin Offs Master Page in 2002 and were amazed to find five different spin-offs for "All in the Family" plus seemingly countless connections for the "Star Trek" franchise.
Thom has diligently updated his site ever since, bringing us commentary on oldies like "The Beverly Hillbillies" and newer shows such as "Law and Order: Trial by Jury." He also delves into non-crossover crossovers in series like "Lost" and "The Office." What, you don't know what a "non-crossover crossover" is? We tuned in to Thom's station to find out what it all means. Luckily, he's not on strike for the foreseeable future.
Have you watched all of these shows? Every single one of them?
Uh oh. First question out the gate, and you're destroying my carefully crafted deceit that I have watched them all. The fact is I haven't seen every one of them. I try and make sure to see every one I can though.
How many categories do you have for show intersections? It's a little
hard to keep track.
The categories aren't hard and fast and there is some grey areas where they sometimes overlap. I think these seven are the big ones:
Crossover: This is your basic. Characters from one show pay a visit to another series. Fonzie visits Laverne and Shirley so they clearly are part of the same "world."
Spin-Off: Again, basic stuff. You have one show that is a hit. You want another hit show. So you take a couple characters from the first show and create a brand new show around them hoping the viewers will follow.
Or, lamer, you introduce a group of characters very briefly on the first show (for an episode or so) and then launch them into a new show.
Franchise: A franchise is a group of shows all with the same "brand name." They are really a big group of spin-offs but taken to the extreme where spin-off didn't seem the right term. "Star Trek" for example.
Franchise is for when the world in question gets so big that you don't even have to say a new show is coming off of a specific show but just from that franchise "universe" in general.
Minor Mention: The cheap "wink wink, nudge nudge" crossover. Usually not even something officially sanctioned by The Powers That Be as an official crossover.
It's when one show verbally name-checks elements of another show in a way that says they share the same reality. I'm pretty picky on these, since it can be a fine line between a real connection and a something that is just a reference joke.
Revival: Any time a long dead show is dusted off and put back on the air as a new show. Doesn't always fit the mold of shared worlds, but I can't not list them.
Shared Reality: Kind of similar to the Franchise thing only without a big common "brand name."
Series Revamp: This would be a show barely counting as a spin-off. This is when you have one show that tweaks something about itself and so changes its name. Technically it's the same old show but, well, not quite.
What's with the non-crossover crossover?
Oh. That would be "Mr. Sterling" and "The West Wing." It was such a weird situation it seemed worth a page.
Here's the deal. The shows never actually crossed over. However, Lawrence O'Donnell, Jr. creator of "Mr. Sterling" said he felt the president on his show would in fact also be "West Wing" President Bartlet. I quote: "I think there should be one fictional president at a time on a network."
So even though the shows never got around to a real official crossover, the creator himself said, yeah, same world. Then they went and complicated things by saying the "Mr. Sterling" president is a Republican whereas Bartlet is a Democrat...
Do you have a favorite crossover? What was the neatest one to watch?
I like any crossover that is really creative and inspired. From when I was a kid, I loved all the "Bionic Man"/"Woman" connections and all the "Happy Days" spin-offs and crossovers just because as a kid the idea that characters from one show could pop up on another show was just so cool.
Today the ones I really love are the ones that shouldn't even happen. Anytime someone manages a crossover between shows on different networks I think it's awesome. I mean, for the networks, part of the point of a crossover is to help boost their shows' ratings. So it's not like they want to do an event that will boost another network's ratings. David E. Kelley is really crazy with that. Different networks? He doesn't care. If the shows are both his shows, cross 'em over.
I also enjoy the surprise ones. Like on "St. Elsewhere." A minor character on the show, Warren Coolidge, was actually a character from "The White Shadow" only they never really went out of their way to mention it or point it out. Then in one episode of "St. Elsewhere," Timothy Van Patten pops up. He had also been a star on "The White Shadow" as a guy named Salami but was playing a different character.
So they put in this scene where Coolidge runs into Timothy Van Patten, and Coolidge just yells out, "Hey Salami!" The guy looks at him and says, "You must have me confused with someone else." It was so shocking and unexpected. A comic sucker punch. Then you sit there going, holy crap, that character has been Warren Coolidge from The White Shadow this whole time, and I never even realized it!
What about a least favorite, the one you wish had never happened, and you hate to mention on your site? Honestly, it seems like a lot of your write-ups start with "Why oh why?" or "This hurts."
I don't know that there are any I just wished hadn't happened. I think if one ever reached that level of bad I would almost like it because of how bad it was.
For instance, there is one that is so strange I loved it. In the late '90s, there was a show called "Nightman." It was a cheesy made-for-cable series based on a semi-obscure comic book. Not exactly an Emmy contender to start with.
So what do they do? They do a crossover with "Manimal"! OK, "Manimal" was a goofy one-season show from the '80s about a guy with the power to turn into various animals. It was quickly cancelled but never forgotten by TV-philes because of the funky name and premise. But... who would ever think to revive that character for a crossover a decade later? "Nightman" hooking up with "Manimal"—it's so crazy it's cool.
Some entries have caused me pain, but with crossovers, it's usually because a crossover is just so cynically done. It seems more like it was some exec's idea for a programming stunt that gets foisted on the shows against their will. That's just a bad place to start from. There was one case where I said that's what felt like was behind a certain crossover, and I actually got an email from someone on the show saying, yeah, that's exactly right.
I think I probably have more angry comments about spin-offs for a variety of reasons. It could be that the spin-off seems like a bad idea. Or there are so many where it's a case of the spin-off being based on characters that were introduced on the original show for 10 seconds just for the expressed purpose of spinning them off. Sort of cynical. Many classic shows did start that way but so did many real video boogers.
Mostly with crossovers, I'm at least writing about two reasonably successful shows (because who wants to watch two bleh shows cross-over?), but with spin-offs so many of them just turn out to be no good.
And I have to write about allll of them. And in the case of the older ones, I have to try and research them. Trying to find good info. on a decades' old show that lasted less than a season and that nobody cares about? It can make me grouchy.
While I'm on it, I should mention that sort of thing is partially where the tone of my site came from. When I started, I was going to write the site more straight-forward and without a point of view. Just flat facts.
But to get started I knew I needed to get a lot of pages ready to go. A list of crossovers/spin-offs with an article for just a few of them would be weak. So I sat hammering out page after page after page. It made me ornery after awhile.
And then I hit this point where I had to write up a page for an old failed spin-off that nobody even remembered, and I just went goofy. I'm working really hard to write this page and in my head, I'm thinking, "Nobody is even going to read this page. Nobody remembers this show, nobody is going to be looking for a page on it... I'm kicking my own arse to create a page NOBODY will read."
So I said, screw it, and let some of my attitude into that entry. Nobody would read it anyway, right? So then I showed some friends, and they thought that page was much more engaging and interesting to read. So I figured, okay, I'll let the site have a point of view.
And to anyone upset because I've sniped at their favorite show, if you love a show I don't, good for you. Enjoy what you like and don't think I'm trying to ruin it for you. In the end it's just TV and nothing to get really mad about. Even when I'm getting snarky, I'm never really angry about any of the shows. Well... mostly.
Is there a crossover or spin-off you've always wanted to see happen, but it never did?
I have a couple I'd like to see.
There has been talk of the U.K. version of "The Office" crossing over with the U.S. version. It will likely happen, but I hope they do something close to how I picture it.
The whole conceit of both shows is that they are documentary series being filmed for television. In the British version's second season, the idea was that the first season had aired and that had an impact on the characters.
My idea for the crossover would be this: It turns out the whole reason the U.S. version of "The Office" exists is because of [British ex-boss] David Brent. Still trying to exploit his fame, David decides to become a producer and create an American version of the show that made him famous. It worked in Britain so he decides America would also enjoy a weekly documentary series about the paper industry.
The crux of the crossover would be David Brent bringing over a number of cast members from the original series as a publicity stunt to attract more investors to keep filming the show and, hopefully, to attract a network to air the show. That would give them a solid starting point for getting the casts together and then from there they can just go crazy.
I also think it would be fun to match up OCD/scared-of-everything Monk with the easily annoyed but equally obsessive-in-his-own-way Dr. House. The two greatest problem-solvers who also would each drive the other bonkers working together? Awesome.
What show has the most connections?
Depends on how you define "connections."
The show that has the most spin-offs would have to be "All in the Family." The show has five spin-offs ("Archie Bunker's Place," "Gloria," "The Jeffersons," "Maude," "704 Hauser Street") plus two spin-offs from those spin-offs ("Good Times" and "Checking In").
Overall, the biggest shared "world" would be the one I've labeled Group 2. Due to multiple shows each doing multiple crossovers, Group 2 has around 91 shows all interconnected in a "six degrees of Kevin Bacon" sort of way.
For an individual show with the most direct connections to other shows, I think "Law and Order: Special Victims Unit" wins by being directly connected to 11 different shows. That is largely due to the hard work of Richard Belzer, whose character Detective Munch has had more crossover appearances than any other character.
He even manages to make his crossovers work harder. For instance, since he was a regular character on "Homicide" as well as "Law and Order: SVU," each of his crossovers kind of counts for both shows.
And he did a crossover with "The X-Files" where he had a big scene with "The Lone Gunmen" characters. Well, they got their own spin-off too so when you see the scene with Munch and The Lone Gunmen, it's really four shows connecting up. Impressive.
What about the "St. Elsewhere" / autistic kid's dream theory? So many shows are connected into that, it kind of blows up a big chunk of TV's shared reality.
Ah, the metaphysical time bomb brain destroyer of all things crossovery. So, all of "St. Elsewhere" was the dream of an autistic boy. Only "St. Elsewhere" did tons of crossovers before that was revealed. So, does that invalidate all those crossovers? Did the doctors from "St. Elsewhere" only go to "Cheers" because the autistic kid watched "Cheers"?
Here's my take. When the crossovers happened, clearly the intent was they were legit and valid. Plus over on "Cheers" they actually mention the hospital from "St. Elsewhere" as a real place so in that case it isn't so simple to disentangle them.
So the only answer, as insane as it is, is that the kid is dreaming everything on "St. Elsewhere" and all the shows connected to it as well. He really needs to be given a network development job because he has some major hits in that head of his.
But of course it goes deeper and weirder than that! "Newhart" had a similar scenario. The last episode of "Newhart" revealed that Newhart was all the dream of Bob Newhart's character, Bob Hartley, from "The Bob Newhart Show." So those shows are connected in a very different sort of way.
Only thing is, "St. Elsewhere" did a crossover with "The Bob Newhart Show." Careful here because you could hurt your brain.
That means that Tommy Westphall, the autistic kid, dreamed that Bob Hartley dreaming the show "Newhart." Your brain may implode—now. Although it would explain why the world of "Newhart" was extra surreal.
What kind of feedback do you get about the site?
All kinds. I get a lot of people sending in new info. Just so everyone knows, that new info. doesn't always go up right away. I've gotten burned by bad info, so I really like to confirm information is accurate before I add things to the site... I also, once in a blue moon, even hear from folks on the shows. Not enough but once in awhile. That's always a fun surprise.
And, given the snarkiness of my writing, I do get the occasional, uh, less than happy emails. Not too many but some. For instance, some "BJ and The Bear" fans take their show very seriously.
There was another time I got an email over a piece I wrote where a guy actually said, "I hope your family gets killed by a dirty bomb." No fooling. Not like I felt it was a real threat or anything but you do want to say, whoah, calm down.
For the record, if you email me, I'm pretty reasonable, and being cool will go farther with me than threatening hot death from above. There have been a couple times folks have written to me saying, "Hey, I think you went too far with this." I look, and if I think they're right, I'll make a change. Not always but sometimes.
Do people contradict your definitions of crossover and shared reality? Like "No, on "Seinfeld," George talked about watching "Mad About You," so Kramer couldn't have been subletting his apartment from Paul the character in "Mad About You"!"
Oh yeah. The thing is crossover connections do contradict themselves all the time. Two shows link up in a crossover, and then two seconds later a character on one show is watching the other show on TV. To me, if they did a crossover, they're connected.
My favorite is David E. Kelley. He did a big crossover between "Boston Legal" and "Boston Public." Then only a month later he had a character on "Boston Legal" testifying she knew what time something happened because when it happened she was watching her favorite show, "Boston Public."
I mean, "Seinfeld" and "Mad About You" is one thing. You have different writers doing their own thing, not knowing they are contradicting past episodes from way earlier... But in this case David E. Kelley was personally contradicting something he JUST DID. Like, "Yeah I'm contradicting myself. So what? Also got another plug in for "Boston Public." Booyah!" Just so ballsy, ya gotta admire it.
How often do you "break down to peer pressure" like with the "Cheers"-"Simpsons" crossover?
Usually just when I keep getting the same email over and over from different people and I get tired of writing the same response repeatedly. That's why I am eventually adding a "Not A Crossover" category to the site.
There are so many "crossovers" that don't fit on the list, like Blossom dreaming she meets a Golden Girl, that I will get tons of email about and I have to explain why it's not on the list. Once I add "Not A Crossover" I'll be able to put up articles about that stuff and only have to explain my logic once.
Do you think crossovers are over or will they come back? For a while, it seemed like every network did big stunts where characters crossed over shows all on one night, and more shows had typical crossovers written into them.
They'll always be around. It's just too much fun to do. And it does serve as a good stunt for the networks. I think maybe they burned themselves out by doing so many stunts nights just for the sake of doing them instead of doing them because they make sense. Or for the pure fun of it. But those stunts will come back.
I think you also need to find a way to link disparate shows that are on the same night. Like, an event linking "Scrubs," "My Name Is Earl," "The Office," and "30 Rock" could be fun, but how do you connect four shows all set in very different settings?
The one-off crossovers though will always pop up.
Likewise, many recent spinoffs haven't been spinoffs that take a character from one show to make a new one—networks have done more franchise shows like "CSI this city and that." Do you think the old-fashioned spinoff is dying?
No. They won't go away for the same reason we keep getting sequels. It's so hard to get a show on the air and have it work they'll take any advantage they can get. Being able to launch a show with an established and popular character and, maybe, a built in audience is a pretty big advantage.
I think the networks are just being more careful about making sure the spin-offs they launch are going to be winners. You want to launch the next "The Jeffersons" or "Mork and Mindy." You don't want to launch something and have it be the next "Flo" or "Enos."
One of the 2007 season's most anticipated shows, "Private Practice," is an old-fashioned spin-off. From across the pond, the BBC's "Dr. Who" spin-off "Torchwood" is gaining quite a following and now coming over to BBC America.
Any new plans for the site?
I'm working on a whole area having nothing to do with TV. I grew up in neighborhood full of kids of various ages, and every summer we would run around outside playing what we'd call yard games—from the classics like straight-forward Tag to lesser-known stuff like Ghost in the Graveyard or Witch in the Well.
So the new area will be all about those games. The intent won't be just to list out "how to" instructions to the games, but also bring in the flavor of the memories those games bring up. The plus to this area is that I don't have to write it all on my own. I have a number of "kids" from the neighborhood who will all be contributing.
It's not ready to go yet. I'm still trying to make sure I like the look of the area, plus I'm trying to work some art elements into it, which is a little more time consuming.
As with the crossovers I'd like to get a good number of articles ready before fully going online with it. But for anyone curious, here are links to a couple preliminary pages.
Thanks for the sneak preview, Thom! Those games will give us something to do outside when we get tired of TV reruns.
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