One Day at a Time

August 26, 2024September 4, 2024 / thewritelife61 / 2 Comments

For this Reboot series, we are ending with One Day at a Time. This show was about a divorced mom, Ann Romano (Bonnie Franklin) whose father is not in the picture much anymore. She moves her two teenaged daughters, Barbara (Valerie Bertinelli) and Julie (Mackenzie Phillips) from Logansport, Indiana to Indianapolis. Barbara is the funny daughter who is always doing the right thing, while Julie is rebellious and angry. Schneider (Pat Harrington Jr.) is their building supervisor, and he takes on a bit of a parental role with the girls.

In the early seasons, Ann dates her divorce lawyer David (Richard Masur). However, after becoming engaged, Ann realizes David wants children of his own and she is not ready to go down that road again, so they break up. Her ex remarries and he eventually enters their lives again.

Julie marries Max (Michael Lembeck), a flight attendant, and they eventually have a daughter. Barbara marries a dental student Mark (Boyd Gaines). In the finale, Ann decides to take a job in London and Schneider moves to Florida to take care of his niece and nephew.

The series was created by husband-and-wife team Whitney Blake and Allan Manings. Blake was Dorothy Baxter on Hazel. Blake based the show on her experiences as a single mother raising three children. It debuted in 1975 and aired until 1984.

Franklin was not happy with the scripts in the first season. She said that she threatened to quit unless the quality improved for the second season.

Phillips dealt with substance abuse, and she was fired after the fifth season. She did come back later for a few appearances. When she entered rehab in 1980, the plot was that Julie and Max moved to Houston. In the seventh season, she returned for a two-part episode. In the final season, she collapsed on the set. When the producer asked her to take a urinalysis test, she told them not to bother and she was fired for the last time. Lembeck continued with the show, and he raised their daughter after it was said Julie left them. While Phillips was unkind, to put it nicely, to Bertinelli early in the series, they eventually became closer. Bertinelli was one of the few people who stood by her after she released a shocking autobiography. Later Glenn Scarpelli joined the cast as Alex. His father had been Ann’s boyfriend and after his father dies in a car accident, Alex asks to move in with Ann and Barbara.

Family members Nanette Fabray and Shelly Fabares both took roles in the series; Nanette played Ann’s mom and Shelly was a coworker. Howard Hesseman also joined the cast as Sam who would marry Ann.

The show was filmed before a studio audience. That surprised me a bit. I went back to watch a few shows for this blog, and I was surprised how dark the series was for a sitcom. Many of the shows, especially Norman Lear shows, were not very light-hearted. I remember liking this show as a teenager/young adult, but I must admit, they were hard to sit through the second time around, and it is not a show that I would choose to watch again.

The theme song was “This Is It.” Brill Building composed the music with lyrics by Jeff and Nancy Barry. Polly Cutter sang the song.

It is amazing that the show did so well in the ratings because it was moved around on the schedule eleven times during its run. For most of its life, it was in the top 20.

The show still had decent ratings after its nine seasons, but Franklin decided she was ready to be done. Harrington was the only cast member to win an Emmy. A 1984 spinoff was discussed for Schneider, but that show never came to fruition. It seems fitting for Harrington to win the Emmy. He has 166 acting credits, and appeared in movies with Elvis Presley and Robert Redford. He said 100 actors auditioned for the role of Schneider. He said that he was a family man with four kids and needed to put food on the table, so he went for it.

In 2005, there was a One Day at a Time Reunion on CBS. Franklin, Phillips, Bertinelli, and Harrington discussed their time on the show. The documentary featured private interviews with Masur, Fabares, Fabray, Lembeck, and Scarpelli.

At least three seasons were released on DVD, but I have not seen any references to seasons four-nine.

In 2017 a reboot was made of One Day at a Time. Three original cast members showed up on the new series. Phillips appeared as a counselor and former veteran leading a support group with PTSD, Glenn Scarpelli was in season three, and Lembeck directed the season one episode “Sex Talk.”

The remake was developed by Gloria Calderon Kellett and Mike Royce with a Latino cast for Netflix. The stars were Justina Machado, Todd Grinnell, Marcel Ruiz, Stephen Tobolowsky, and Rita Moreno. The Cuban family lives in LA. A single mother and former veteran dealing with PTSD, Penelope Alvarez (Justina Machado) lives with her daughter, Elena (Isabella Gomez), and son Alex (Marcel Ruiz), and her mom Lydia (Rita Moreno). Pat Schneider (Todd Grinnell) is the supervisor. Penelope works for Dr. Leslie Berkowitz (Stephen Tobolwsky). The reboot also focused on some tough subjects including mental illness, immigration, sexism, homophobia, gender identity, and racism. It aired for four seasons.

The critics were all on board. It was listed as one of the best shows of 2017 and received a variety of awards including four Emmy nominations. Robert Lloyd of the Los Angeles Times wrote that it was “lively without being rushed” and David Wiegand of the San Francisco Chronicle felt it “was nicely written . . . and the performances are almost universally engaging.” Verna Gay of Newsday called Machado “flat out terrific.”

This time around, Gloria Estefan sang “This Is It.”

The series was canceled after four seasons. The network said it did not have enough viewers, despite the fact that Rotten Tomatoes gave it a 100% rating for every year. It was praised for dealing with many hard subjects and featuring a matriarchy of three generations of women who make their way through life and support each other even when they don’t agree with each other.

I think that the failure of this show to make it to five seasons is a common factor that we will see in streaming shows. Networks had more of an incentive to keep shows around when there were fewer options. Now there are so many shows available that it’s almost impossible to know what is available to watch. Considering that three networks used to get most of the viewers tuning in, now you can multiply that by hundreds. I’m not sure what it will take to keep a show running more than three years anymore.

I hope you enjoyed taking a look at four reboots that succeeded in bringing back original viewers and building a new fan base for themselves. I’d love to hear if any of these were shows you would root for.

MacGyver: Noun or Verb?

August 19, 2024August 14, 2024 / thewritelife61 / 4 Comments

Before I get into our topic today, I just want to thank all of you who have been supporting my blog. Today marks the first blog of my ninth year. Not sure where the time went, but it has been so much fun and I have learned an incredible amount of television knowledge. I spent some time this summer putting together new schedules, so I’m committed to 2030 for more fun and learning.

This month we are Rebooting. Almost every month I mention some reboot or another about a show that was on in the fifties, sixties, seventies, or eighties. Many of them have been on and off the air in a blink. Some of them stuck around for a season or two. Others rivaled the original in the quality of the scripts and characters in the reboot. Those more popular shows are the shows we are zeroing in on this month.

Today is all about MacGyver. The original show was on ABC from 1985-1992. Created by Lee David Zlotoff, this show starred Richard Dean Anderson. Henry Winkler and John Rich were the executive producers.

Angus MacGyver (Anderson) was a secret agent. MacGyver works for the Phoenix Foundation in LA. He is an agent for the Department of External Services, a made-up agency. He had been a bomb team technician in the US Army Special Forces in Vietnam and was a scientist majoring in Physics at Western Tech. The show started out with moderate success and gained a loyal following. MacGyver creates things from ordinary objects to solve complex problems. These creations were vetted by scientists before being integrated into the plots.

Arsenio Hall mentioned in 1989 that he heard “MacGyver” used as a verb meaning “to do the impossible.” In 2015, the term did become part of the Oxford Dictionaries to mean “make or repair an object in an improvised or inventive way, making use of whatever items are at hand.”

MacGyver prefers not to carry any firearms due to an accident in his childhood which resulted in the death of a friend. Instead, he packs a Swiss army knife and a roll of duct tape.

MacGyver lives on a houseboat which was credited to Winkler. His favorite sport is hockey, and he often sports a Calgary Flames hat. He also enjoys racecar driving, chemistry, and baccarat. What he does not like are heights.

Joining MacGyver was Pete Thornton (Dana Elcar), his boss and best friend. When Thornton was made director of operations at the Phoenix Foundation, he brought MacGyver into the program. His other friend is Jack Dalton (Bruce McGill).

In a weird meeting of the minds, Rich was working on a sitcom called Mr. Sunshine for ABC, Winkler was finishing his run as the Fonz on Happy Days, and Zlotoff was producer for Remington Steele on NBC. The three got together to propose MacGyver, and ABC found room in its schedule for the series.

Winkler convinced Anderson to audition for the role of MacGyver after seeing him on The Love Boat.

During its second season, MacGyver became a bigger hit.

So, what are some of the fun inventions MacGyver came up with: using jumper cables, a generator, and 2 quarters, he invented a welder. With satellite parts and a plastic shield, he made a hang glider. A blood pressure pump and alarm clock became a lie detector test. A bazooka was made from a muffler, gear shift knob, seat cushion stuffing and a cigarette lighter. And sunglasses with nail polish remover and a lamp equal a spectroscope.

From 2016-2021, a reboot series debuted on CBS which owns the rights to both series after acquiring the original series from Paramount Television. In 2015, Winkler signed on to produce the reboot with James Wan and R. Scott Gemmill for CBS. The reboot was canceled in 2021. In this version, Lucas Till became MacGyver.

Anderson was asked if he had seen the reboot in 2019. His response was that “I have, and I’m not real crazy about it, I’ll be honest. They approached me early on. They’d done a test for the show and found it wasn’t as attractive as they wanted it to be, so they called and asked if I wanted anything to do with it, and I said no. It’s a business, but . . . I don’t think they’ve been fair or true to the series. They’re shooting up everybody and there’s so much going on that you don’t see the thought process that we prided ourselves on. You know, MacGyver sees the problem, he sees the solutions to the problem, you see him gathering the solution, and then solving the problem. In this new one, its boom-boom-boom, and it happens so fast.”

Perhaps this lack of letting viewers in on the process and adding more violence hurt the reboot. The series was never a huge hit. I read several reviews from fans of the original show that referred to some of the issues. One said that George Eads isn’t the same free spirit that Jack was on the original. Making MacGyver part of a team instead of a maverick agent was also mentioned. A couple reviewers said that the original not only explained the scientific processes but there was a moral embedded into most episodes about the use of technology or social behavior.

While these are all valid viewpoints, other factors that might have had more to do with the series ending was the decline in numbers and the dysfunction on the set. From season four to five, the series lost 20% of its audience which is quite a bit.

After learning about the show’s cancellation, Till wrote on his Instagram account that “the past five years have been what I will look on later as the most formative years of my life. Lots of tough, lots of love. I made lifelong friends, actually no, family. I learned to push myself to new limits, breaking through and through and through. Was nervous to take up the mantle of an icon and you guys allowed me into your homes and accepted me. I’m like the Roger Moore of MacGyvers now thanks to your support.” While he dwells on the positive things that came out of the show, the “tough” things he was referring to was probably the toxic work environment created by executive producer Peter M. Lenkov. I read many articles that discussed the difficulties he created in filming before he was fired in 2020.

Given the difficulties of the show and the differences between the original and the reboot version, it’s probably not surprising it was cancelled, but I think the fact that it went five years before being cancelled is a win for the cast.

Book ’em Danno: Hawaii Five-O or 0

August 12, 2024May 18, 2024 / thewritelife61 / 2 Comments

This month we are looking at some recent reboots of popular shows from the the past. We are ending our series with what I think was the best of the reboots in recent history: Hawaii Five-O.

Originally, one source said the show was developed with a house detective for a chain of Hawaiian hotels. Someone on the production team thought it would limit the plots too much, so it was expanded to crime throughout Hawaii.

From 1968 to 1980, Hawaii Five-O was on CBS. Created by Leonard Freeman and set in Hawaii, it starred Jack Lord as Captain Steve McGarrett, former Korean War veteran. McGarrett heads a special task force appointed by the governor. His team includes Danny Williams (James MacArthur), Chin Ho Kelly (Kam Fong), Kono Kalakaua (Zulu). Police officer Duke Luekla (Herman Wedemeyer) lent a hand often. The task force is run out of offices at the Iolani Palace.

Richard Boone was offered the part of McGarrett, but he turned it down. Gregory Peck was also in consideration for the role. Eventually, Jack Lord auditioned on a Wednesday, received the part, and was in Hawaii filming on Monday. Lord was the only actor to appear in all 281 episodes of the series. A couple members of the cast came on board with little-to-no acting experience. Zulu, who played Kono, was a beach boy and local DJ. Fong, who played Kelley, had been a police officer in Honolulu for sixteen years before retiring to work in real estate.

McGarrett and his team investigated crimes by international secret agents, organized crime syndicates, and ordinary criminals. Some of the villains were played by celebrities including Gavin MacLeod, Ross Martin, and Ricardo Montalban.

McGarrett’s ongoing battle throughout much of the series is with Wo Fat (Ihigh Dhiegh), a rogue intelligence officer from China. In the finale, “Woe to Wo Fat,” McGarrett is finally able to land him in jail. However, the series ends with Wo Fat retrieving a file from his boot, making us wonder if we might be able to escape. The name “Wo Fat” came from a restaurant in downtown Honolulu.

In the original show, little time was given to the personal lives of the team; the plots all centered around solving the crime of the week.

The show was filmed in Hawaii: the first location was in Pearl City in a hut where the roof leaked and rats gnawed at cables; then it moved to Fort Ruger and for the final four seasons, a set was built at Diamond Head. Hawaii had only been a state for nine years when the series started, so most Americans were not familiar with the islands.

Fans often talked about the beauty of the scenery for the show. They also appreciated the intelligent writing and believable plots.

Many locals were used in the show, partly because the television and movie industry was not well represented in Hawaii, so everyone learned along the way. This made the cast much more diverse than most shows in the sixties.

The show was known for its theme song written by Morton Stevens. The Ventures recorded the theme, and it reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. It was popular with high school and college bands across the country; when I was a majorette in the mid-seventies, it was one of the songs our band performed.

One of the most popular catchphrases from the seventies was “Book ‘em Danno,” a phrase used sparingly in the reboot.

The original Five-O was the longest-running crime show until Law & Order surpassed it in 2002. In began on Thursdays but moved to Wednesdays later in the year. From 1971-1974 it aired on Tuesdays. In 1975 it started out on Friday nights, moving to Thursdays where it stayed till 1979. That December it moved to Tuesdays for two months before switching to Saturdays for the rest of its run. This doesn’t seem like a great strategy for keeping fans.

While the show was popular with viewers, its only two Emmy wins were for music composition. It received ten nominations, but the only person to be nominated for acting was a special guest appearance by Helen Hayes in 1976. There were no nominations for acting, writing, or best series.

A one-hour pilot for a reboot was made in 1996 but never aired on television. Written by Stephen J. Cannell, it starred Gary Busey and Russell Wong as the Five-O team along with MacArthur who returned as Danny Williams, now governor of Hawaii.

The reboot we are discussing today began in 2010, also on CBS. To distinguish it from the original show, it was Hawaii Five-0 (using a zero in place of a capital letter O). Most of the characters are similar to the original. They are still a special task force appointed by the governor who is now a woman, Pat Jameson (Jean Smart). Steve McGarrett (Alex O’Louglin), a former Navy SEAL and son of Jack Lord’s character, partners with Danny Williams (Scott Caan) in this version. Other teammates included Chin Ho Kelly (Daniel Dae Kim) and Kono Kalakaua (Grace Park). Kono’s gender switched from the a male to bring a female perspective to the team.

For the eighth season Tani Rey (Meaghan Rath) and Junior Reigns (Beulah Koale) came on board. Several other regulars during the years included Lou Grover (Chi McBride), medical examiner Max Bergman (Masi Oka), Jerry Ortega (Jorge Garcia), Chin’s classmate and a local conspiracy theorist whose vast knowledge often comes in handy, and Sgt Duke Lukela (Dennis Chun) is still around from the original show.

A season or two into the show, Steve’s girlfriend, Lt. Catherine Rollins (Michelle Borth) works with the team and Adam Noshimuri (Ian Anthony Dale) joins the group. When Dr. Bergman heads overseas, he is replaced by Noelani Cunha (Kimee Balmilero). Another member of the surrogate family is Kamekona (Taylor Wily) who owns a food stand. He often helps the team because he knows almost everyone and has great intel for Steve and Danny. In this version, Steve’s father was a cop and Steve is still hunting down Wo Fat to avenge his father’s death. Chin and Kono are cousins and eventually Kono and Adam marry.

O’Loughlin was born in Canberra, Austrialia on August 24, 1976, and Caan was born in Los Angeles on August 23, 1976, but since Australia is twenty-four hours ahead of the US time, they were essentially born on the same day. Perhaps that’s why they had such great chemistry. Their witty bantering is fun to listen to. They remind me of an older couple who have been married a long time. They know each other so well, and can afford to be critical, because you know they have each other’s backs and would die for each other if they needed to.

This new version continued to show the beauty of the Hawaiian Islands. Viewers learned more about the culture of the state.

In the reboot we also got to know the characters much better; half the show concentrated on their personal lives and how those lives sometimes had an effect on what they did as detectives, right or wrong.

Peter M. Lenkov, who was one of the creators of this reboot, was also part of the team that debuted MacGyver and Magnum PI reboots, all of which are set in Hawaii.

The show was popular with viewers when it returned to the schedule. The Honolulu Advertiser wrote that “a smart script, slick production values and maybe a splash of nostalgia got the remake of Hawaii Five-0 placed on the CBS prime-time lineup this fall.”

One fun carryover from the original series was the character of August March. Played by Ed Asner in the original show in season two, March was a jeweler who was arrested by Lord’s character. In season three of the reboot, August March is back played by Asner again.

📷inner toob.com Asner on the original . . . and

The series debuted on Monday nights. Season four found it on Fridays where it stayed for the final seven seasons.

Viewers had strong reactions to the theme song. For the early shows, the original theme song was used but updated which fans did not appreciate, so the original theme was used for most of this series as well.

The new show had a positive impact on Hawaii’s economy. Businesses that were featured on the show saw an increase in visitors. When McGarrett mentioned Kona Brewing Company beers were his choice of beverage, sales shot up 60%.

One fun fact for those car collectors is that Jack Lord drove a Mercury Marquis in several seasons of the first show. On this edition, Steve works on his father’s car. The owner, stuntman John Nordlum, allowed the show to use the car, which still has its old license plate of F6-3958.

Comparing these shows is a little tough because television culture and shows changed so much during the 42 years that the show was off the air. The original series had 281 episodes while the reboot comes in with 240. I remember watching the original as a kid, and it was just another police drama to me. Personally, I like the reboot. Continuing to portray the culture as another character adds a lot of charm to the show. I would rather see the personal lives of the characters especially because they spend a lot of time out of work together and that adds to their team chemistry. I also like the banter between Steve and Danny.

There have been many reboots of classic shows, especially on other streaming services, and most of them do not live up to the original standards at best and can be plain awful at worst. This is one of the few that did it right and succeeded for all the right reasons. If you never saw the original, check out a season or two and compare the shows for yourself.

Magnum PI:

August 5, 2024July 18, 2024 / thewritelife61 / 2 Comments

This is Reboot Month, and we are comparing and contrasting several shows that got rebooted after 2000. For the next three weeks we are traveling to Hawaii. Today we get to stop at the home of Magnum, P.I.

Tom Selleck starred as Thomas Magnum, a private investigator living in Oahu. The show first aired on CBS in December of 1980 and went off the schedule in May of 1988.

The role of Magnum was offered to Kevin Dobson who turned it down. Tom Selleck had been the star of six different pilots that were unsuccessful in becoming shows, but he was offered this role after Dobson declined. After Selleck was given the role of Magnum, he was offered the role of Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark. He had to decline due to his show, so the part was given to Harrison Ford. However, an AFTRA/SAG strike in 1980 delayed the production of the television show, so if he had a crystal ball, Selleck would realize that he could have finished filming Raiders before the television show began filming.

Magnum lives in a guest house on an estate, Robin’s Nest, owned by Robin Masters, a famous author. We understand that Magnum helped Masters out and now Masters allows him to live on the estate for no charge. Masters has also provided Magnum with his car to drive, a Ferrari 308 GTS. The only person he really reports to is “Higgy.” Higgy is ex-British Army sergeant major, Johnthan Quayle Higgins III (John Hillerman).

In the first show, Magnum is not a fan of Higgins but as the series continued, a respect and fondness was built between the two men. Other cast members include T.C. Calvin (Roger E. Mosley), a friend who owns a helicopter charter service and Rick Wright (Larry Manetti) who owns a local bar. Mosley was a licensed helicopter pilot, but he was banned from doing his own stunts. Both men help Magnum out on cases quite often. They are former Marines whom Magnum served with in Vietnam. The Vietnam connection was an important part of the show. Previously most shows about Vets portrayed them as dealing with post-traumatic syndrome, but this show featured three competent, close comrades from the war, and it changed the way the Vietnam War and the veterans were regarded by popular culture and American viewers.

Rounding out the cast were Lt. Yoshi Tanaka (Kwan Hi Lim), a police lieutenant in the homicide division and Agatha Chumley (Gillian Dobb), Higgins’ friend who obviously has a crush on him.

Higgins lives in the main house on the estate with two Dobermans named Zeus and Apollo. Higgins also bargains with Magnum for favors to get use of the tennis courts, wine cellar, and other amenities of the main house. Higgins considers Magnum an inconvenience; he was living at the estate to write his military memoirs.

In reality, the Masters estate was known to Hawaiians as the Anderson Estate, Pahonu, owned by a local politician. The grounds were used by the royal family to raise green sea turtles, and the pond is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It had an 11,000-square-foot house; a boat house, which served as the guest house on the show; a gatehouse; and private tennis courts.

In January 2014, the then owner Barbara Cox Anthony sold it and in April of 2018, the estate was demolished.

For the first nine episodes, the theme music was a jazzy piece written by Ian Freebaim-Smith. However, it was replaced by a more up-tempo theme by Mike Post and Pete Carpenter, and it hit the Billboard Hot 100, ranking 25^th in 1982.

The show was very popular with viewers. Men wanted to be Magnum and women wanted to date Magnum. The show received 17 Emmy nominations, picking up a win for Selleck in 1984 for Best Actor in a Drama and for Hillerman in 1989 for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama. It ranked in the top 20 for its first five seasons.

📷onlyinyourstate.com lagoon used on Magnum PI

One of the reasons the show was set in Hawaii is because CBS had its Hawaii production offices running for Hawaii Five-O. Since that show ended in 1980, it made sense to film Magnum there and continue the production division.

Thirty years later Magnum was back in Hawaii. This time it was Jay Hernandez as Thomas Magnum, former Navy seal. While he still lived at Robin’s Nest, he worked with Juliet Higgins (Perdita Weeks), an ex-MI6 Agent who runs the estate. Kumu Tuileta (Amy Hill) also lives onsite as the estate’s cultural curator. Magnum allows Robin Masters to write about his life as a Navy seal in exchange for living on the estate, but he has no income, so he becomes a private investigator with the help of “Higgie” who becomes his partner in season two.

In this version, Magnum also has use of Robin’s Ferrari. The shows were filmed in Hawaii. Robin’s Nest was Kualoa Ranch, a set where Jurassic World was also filmed. Several beaches throughout the island were also used, and the show received a traditional Hawaiian blessing before it began.

Like the original show, Rick Wright (Zachary Knighton) and T.C. Calvin (Stephen Hill) are friends and former Marines. Rick owns a bar the friends frequently visit and T.C. does island helicopter tours. They both pitch in to help Magnum when their skills are needed on a case. Another ally is Gordon Katsumoto (Tim Kang), a Honolulu police detective.

Magnum and Higgins have a definite sexual attraction and they become close friends working together, but for the first few seasons one of them is always involved with someone else. Eventually they realize they both have feelings for each other and start a relationship.

The series was on CBS for four years. When CBS and the producers couldn’t reach an agreement for a fifth season, the show was canceled. The cancellation was bad for the cast and crew, but it also affected many of the locals. Hawaii’s film industry planned on firing 350-400 employees.

I’m not sure why they could not come to an agreement. While the show never achieved the ratings of the earlier show, it had a decent following.

NBC picked it up with a two-season, twenty-episode contract. NBC ended up going with ten episodes per season. They showed the ten episodes of season five by April 2023 and then fans realized that the sixth season would not be shown until some time in 2024. The entertainment industry was facing a writers’ strike as well. It’s interesting that writers’ strikes affected both of the Magnum series.

The network had three options: renew the show for a sixth season, extend the cast’s options, or release the actors and cancel the series. NBC decided to cancel the show. Unfortunately, after the months-long break between the fourth and fifth season, the network change and schedule change, the show never did very well. You also have to consider that the “should we, shouldn’t we” relationship between the two stars had lost some of its magic when they got together and had to discuss more practical matters. The show was canceled again in June of 2023.

I’m not sure why the reboot of Hawaii Five-0 did so well (which we will talk about next week), but the reboot of Magnum did not. The original Hawaii Five-0 was definitely about the investigations while the reboot included the officers’ personal lives as well. I think people liked Jack Lord, but the show was about solving crimes. Magnum P.I. says it in the name, the show was about Magnum and, more specifically, it was about Tom Selleck as Magnum. It was hard for Hernandez to follow in those footsteps no matter how good of an actor he was. I’m guessing a lot of the fans who turned on the show the first time for nostalgic reasons did not bond with the show in the same way they did the original.

I will admit I watched some Hawaii Five-0 and Magnum episodes from the originals, but I was busy during those years, and I didn’t see many and they weren’t shows on my “must-watch” list, although I liked the episodes I did see.

I thought the rebooted Magnum was a decent show on its own. It probably would not be one I would have continued to watch, however, while Hawaii Five-0 definitely made me a fan of the new series.

thewritelife61

How pop culture influences us

Month: August 2024

One Day at a Time

MacGyver: Noun or Verb?

Book ’em Danno: Hawaii Five-O or 0

Magnum PI: