The It Was a Thing on TV Podcast Network

We close the door on yet another pilot month with this amalgamation of pieces and parts from various game shows from the Bob Stewart family, mixed with the theme from a past and future Stewart show, and add a shuffleboard table for good measure.  The end result was Twisters, a truly unique concoction that didn't make NBC's schedule in late 1982/early 1983.

Hot off the heels of How I Met Your Mother’s finale—and 8 years before appearing on Hulu—CBS & Fox began work on the next chapter, involving original creators Carter Bays & Craig Thomas, a future Oscar-nominated writer, a Golden Globe-nominated actress, a night of hard partying, a blue typewriter, and a girl named Cricket.

It's Greg's 40th birthday and to celebrate the occasion, Greg has chosen the short-lived comedy from 1983 about a guy who buys a lamp which has a genie in it, who causes all sorts of mischief.  Maybe it was Just Our Luck that this show ran for only 13 episodes.

This episode is uncensored.  Listener discretion is advised.

During last year's pilot month, we covered the 1992 Red Dwarf pilot for NBC in Episode 375.  A second pilot, of sorts, was done shortly after.  Running a mere 11 minutes long including previews of two episodes, this ambitious endeavor looked like it was shot in a broom closet, and that was before the lackluster quality of the video available online.

One of the most anticipated sports video games in a long time just released its first gameplay trailer. Mike, Greg, and Chico in this Instant Reaction watch the trailer for EA Sports College Football 25 trailer, the first entry in the EA College Football franchise since 2013. 

As we have said in the past, Jay Wolpert is the master of the overly complex but unique game show format.  In this show, two people build a team of players with the end goal of winning that captain $10,000 and making some fast friends.  Apparently, NBC passed this up for a show that John Davidson predicted would be on for a very long time.

1982 was a time of flux at NBC in the daytime.  Game shows were out earlier that year minus Wheel of Fortune, replaced with soaps and sitcom reruns.  NBC had a pilot that was part-game, part-psychological analysis with Let's Get Personal, hosted by a familiar face to NBC game show watchers, but also with an acting troupe of three big names around these parts.  

In 1998, the variety show as we know it had been a dead format for close to 20 years.  However, what if you could revive one of the greatest variety shows ever with a host who had been deceased for nearly a quarter century?  That was attempted by UPN with a virtual Ed Sullivan, voiced by John Byner.  The result was this one-off pilot which was reminiscent of a more recent format, and with star power packing arenas to this day.

One of the amazing technological marvels of the mid-1980s was the story telling teddy bear Teddy Ruxpin.  A cartoon was later created around the world of Teddy Ruxpin but before that, a live-action pilot was created.  Coincidentally, this pilot aired in two parts in late 1985, just in time to purchase Teddy Ruxpin as a holiday gift.

View the pilot and follow along at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAyeKcKC4Xs

It's a western!  It's a comedy!  It has legends including Joel Higgins, Meeno Peluce, and Leonard Frey!  And occasionally Christopher Lloyd!  It can't fail!  There is one small problem--half the nation didn't see its first episode because of football.  Maybe it would have truly been the Best of the West if the western half of the country saw it.