Thursday, April 21, 2011

Thursday Top Threes: Spinoffs

J: Your top three TV or movie spinoffs!

Mira:
Haha, Wicked was a spinoff of a movie (Wizard of Oz), does that count?
1. Pinky and the Brain: Haha, loved Animaniacs and thought Pinky and Brain were two of the best characters on the show!
2. Saved by the Bell: Apparently a spinoff of Good Morning, Miss Bliss. Never watched the original, but *loved* Saved by the Bell!
3. Private Practice: I love soap opera-like hospital dramas and I liked Addison Montgomery in Grey's Anatomy. So yes, I like Private Practice, too.
Movie ones I'm looking forward to: X-Men: First Class, The Avengers.

Jennifer:
1. Angel (spinoff from Buffy the Vampire Slayer): For some reason I actually haven't watched every episode (though I do have all 5 seasons on DVD) but in general I thought Joss Whedon did a great job taking quite a few existing Buffyverse characters into a new show with its own unique identity. I do want to go back and watch it all from the beginning...though who knows when I'll have time!
2. Degrassi the Next Generation: I didn't watch the original series but this spinoff has been crazily resilient. I haven't watched in a couple of seasons but they've managed to successfully turn over cast members as they got older and broach all sorts of timely and controversial subjects.
3. The Hills (spinoff from Laguna Beach): Back when I still watched trashy MTV reality shows, I was really into the Hills. Eventually Heidi and Spencer got way too annoying for me but for awhile there it was just as engrossing as scripted TV. It spawned its own spinoff too, The City, with Whitney, which somehow turned out to be more of a workplace drama than a soap like its predecessors...

3 comments:

mira said...

Considered Frasier, NCIS, and Project Runway. Could not think of any movie spinoffs that I liked. Kept thinking of worst spinoffs instead, too. (ie. bad movies being spun off into worse movies!)

Surprised Jenn didn't include Serenity. :)

Jennifer said...

I didn't think Serenity was a spinoff since it's all the same characters...more of a continuation of the story in a different form.

There have definitely been a lot of BAD spinoffs...perhaps another Thursday Top Three topic =)

burkie said...

1) Frasier. Cheers was a good show, but Frasier was a great show.

2) Star Trek: The Next Generation. not as iconic as the original, but all in all a better show.

3) Iron Chef America. does this count? i think so. kept some of the cheesiness of the original japanese series but made it more...watchable...over the long haul.