80s Television

Do you remember 80s television - when it didn't run programs from 24 hours instead at a certain time the test pattern was shown like this -

Test Pattern on TV on Table by ElectricPopSpot
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More importantly, of course, were the programs.   There were so many great programs during the 80s it's hard to know where to start with a favorite - ALF, Different Strokes, LA Law, the A Team, the list goes on.

One man who was responsible for quite a volume of 80s television was Aaron Spelling and because of him we watched a myriad of programs such as Hart to Hart, Charlies Angels, Hotel and TJ Hooker.   Check out all of his contributions to our television set during the glorious decade that was the 80s - Aaron Spelling's 80s TV.

Of course he couldn't get all of the good programs and there's one with a catch phrase that will continue until all of the children of the 80s are gone - get the shirt and tell me the name of the program in the comments -

That's What I'm Talkin' 'Bout Willis T-shirt by BrightSparkTees
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K is for KITT

I can't believe I've still managed to keep up with this challenge - for new readers I'm competing in an A-Z Blogging Challenge where every day (except Sundays) we have to blog out way through the alphabet.   Today we get to K which just has to be KITT as in my favorite star of Knight Rider.

Michael Knight was the character that David Hasselhoff played before he started sporting swimming trunks in the popular Bay Watch television series.   Although he was supposed to be the star of the show in my eyes KITT was always the star :D   KITT stands for Knight Industries Two Thousand and was a car that could drive by itself and talk as well!

I can't tell you the amount of times I would watch Knight Rider and think to myself one day I'm going to own a Kitt all of my own.   A few years ago I would've thought that the time was a long way off, but with in car navigation systems and the like maybe, just maybe I will own my very own Kitt.

Which Knight Rider character was your favorite?

G is for Gordon

I was trying to come up with an idea for the letter G and I didn't feel like writing about Go West or Ghostbusters and then it hit me - the two Gordons!   My favorite Gordon of the 80s was Gordon Shumway - do you know who he was?   Well if I called him Alf you'd remember him instantly as the loveable alien from the planet Melmac who ends up living with the Tanners after crash landing in their garage.   I've spoken about my love of Alf in a previous post so it's hardly surprising I should grab the chance to mention him again :D

Of course another Gordon was famous in the 80s and we all know who he was - Gordon Gekko!  I actually watched Wall Street on the plane to my new life in New Zealand and when I saw a rerun last year I couldn't believe the size of his mobile phone - LOL.

Gordon became a poster boy for 80s corporate villains - with his line - 'Greed, for lack of a better word, is good,' encompassed what a lot of people who did well in the heady days of the 80s.   Wealth was nothing to be ashamed of and nor was the concept of having it all.  

Of course we can't leave without mentioning another Gordon and it goes a little like this -

Flash A-ah

Saviour of the universe...

Yes I'm talking about Flash Gordon - to be honest I don't really remember much about the movie, but the song is one of those that is hard to get out of your head and another reason to celebrate Queen.

Happy reminiscing and hopefully I'll see you back here for the letter H.

80s Television - ALF | Sledgehammer | LA Law

This morning we heard on the news that Charlie Sheen had been rushed to hospital, the first words out of my dd's mouth were - will Two and a Half Men still be on tonight? It got me thinking about the first time my hubby came over to my house, we were all gathered in the family room and I saw his eyes roaming and suddenly realized he was looking for the television. We didn't have a television set in the family room (my parents still don't), but we do have one in the formal lounge.

In 1988 I emigrated to New Zealand where my parents and brother had been living for nine months and so began a new chapter in all of our lives. Having two living spaces made me feel like we were incredibly rich! It also made our tv watching very special because we made a night of it. Dad would light the fire in the front room and we'd either have fish and chips or a 'quick to make' meal like beans on toast and then it was television night.

Thursday night was the night we used to watch our television starting off with everyone's favorite alien - ALF. As anyone who watched ALF would know his real name was Gordon, but the Tanners called him ALF because it was an acronym for Alien Life Force (do you remember all of the 80s acronyms?). I absolutely loved this little fellow, although how he managed to resist eating the cat I have no idea!

After ALF came a program that I hadn't heard about until I moved to NZ and it was called Sledgehammer. Starring David Rasche my dad used to laugh himself silly during every episode and quickly adopted the saying 'Trust me, I know what I'm doing'.

Our Thursday night was rounded out by LA Law, because let's face it you didn't live through the 80s without watching LA Law. I was quite relieved to find in on television in NZ and happy that my parents watched it because I had started to watch it while living with my grandmother and enjoyed it.

I loved Arnie and Roxanne, Leland and Stuart, Benny and Abby. Unlike other people I wasn't so keen on Grace and Victor, but I still can't wait for this television series to become available on DVD - what's taking the studio so long to release it?

What were your favorite 80s television shows?

The A Team

When I was at the movies a few days ago I saw a preview of the A Team movie, it looks great, but will it be as good as I remember the A Team television series being? I pity the fool who never got to watch it, it was one of the shows that I was glued to.....and we didn’t watch much television in our house (in fact we went without tv for a few years, but that’s a whole new story).

It will be interesting to see how Liam Neeson (Hannibal), Bradley Cooper (Face), Sharlto Copley (Maddog) and Quinton Jackson (BA) do in comparison to the classic team of Peppard, Benedict, Schultz and Mr T.

You can buy the complete series in this limited edition set which has a picture of Mr T driving the A Team van which would make it a great gift idea. Personally after seeing the shorts for the new movie I really want to watch the old series again and it’s my birthday soon so I’m dropping a few hints!!