Looong TV Meme

[thisbluespirit]

I needed to post something (apart from fic, I mean a post post) - BT accidentally scared me off the internet in the middle of the week and it's not been quite the same since. In the meantime, I rewatched more Enemy at the Door and am trying to decide if I'm being more obsessive about that generally or Alfred Burke in particular, but that doesn't make an interesting post. (I've made one about EatD though. You can have that later, you lucky people. Sorry. And, actually, I lie - Alfred Burke is/was pretty interesting.)

Anyway, I was ignoring this but everybody's doing it and so... baa! I picked this up from sallymn (our asterisks matched quite frequently, which was handy).

Bold all of the following TV shows of which you've seen 3 or more episodes.
- Italicize a show if you're positive you've seen every episode.
- Asterisk if you have at least one full season on tape or DVD
- If you want, add up to 3 additional shows (keep the list in alphabetical order).

(I sort of want something in between three and all. There's quite a big difference in attitude in there sometimes.)


Presumably it's a list put together by somebody from the US, but I can't complain, because the list doesn't seem to admit that anyone but the US and the UK make TV, so the rest of the world should be the ones side-eying it, not me. I'll just correct MI:5 to Spooks! (Damn you, list maker! Spooks/MI:5, or MI:5/Spooks at a push, or Spooks. Honestly.) Although lots of these, I have never heard of at all, because I'm British and didn't watch all the US TV growing up.

21 Jump Street
24
Alias
American Gothic
America's Next Top Model
Angel*
Are You Afraid of the Dark
Are You Being Served?
Arrested Development
Ashes to Ashes
Babylon 5* (I have seen all the main TV series, but not the pilot or any of the extra bits.)
Babylon 5: Crusade*
Battlestar Galactica (the old one)
Battlestar Galactica (the new one)
Baywatch
Being Human - UK
Being Human - US
Beavis & Butthead
Beauty and the Beast
Beverly Hills 90210
Bewitched
Black Books
Blackadder
Blake's 7*
Bonanza
Bones
Bosom Buddies
Boston Legal
Boston Public
Boy Meets World
Breaking Bad
Brideshead Revisited
Buck Rogers in the 25th Century
Buffy the Vampire Slayer*
Bug Juice
Caitlin's Way
Carebears (I've definitely watched some of it, many years ago, but I don't remember it being much.)
Catweazle
Chappelle's Show
Charlie's Angels
Charmed
Cheers
Chicago Hope
Clarissa Explains It All
The Colbert Report
Cold Case
Columbo
Commander in Chief
Coupling
Cowboy Bebop
Criminal Minds
Crossing Jordan
CSI
CSI: Miami
CSI: NY
Curb Your Enthusiasm
Dallas (I may have seen more than three episodes of this growing up, but I wouldn't swear to it. Dynasty, maybe. Especially the ending, which was, I seem to remember, very funny.)
Damages
Dancing with the Stars
Danny Phantom
Dark Angel
Dark Skies
Davinci's Inquest
Dawson's Creek
Dead Like Me* (And every episode if you don't count the film.)
Deadwood
Degrassi: The Next Generation
Designing Women
Desperate Housewives
Dharma & Greg
Dinosaurs
Different Strokes
Dirty Jobs
Doctor Who (1963 - 1996)* (Anyone who claims to have seen all of this is either giving their age away online or lying. Would that it weren't so, but it is. Also this said 1963-1986, so, assuming that wasn't a horrible slight on the McCoy era, I've corrected it.)
Doctor Who (2005)* (I have never actually seen "Fear Her". Which is what I mean about needing something between 'three' and 'all'. And that wasn't deliberate, I just missed it at the time for some reason. I think I've caught any others I missed now. I think.)
Dragnet
Due South
Earth 2
Emergency!
Entourage
ER
Everwood
Everybody Loves Raymond
Extreme Makeover: Home Edition
Facts of Life
Family Guy
Family Ties
Farscape*
Father Ted
Fawlty Towers
Felicity
Firefly
Flash Forward
Forever Knight
Fraggle Rock (Why is Fraggle Rock here?! Whyyyy do people keep wanting to bring up Fraggle Rock?? Let us bury it somewhere and talk about less frightening things, thanks. Not that I'm still scared of it or anything. Aargh.)
Frasier
Freaks and Geeks
Friday Night Lights
Friends
Futurama
Game of Thrones
Get Smart
Ghostwriter
Gilligan's Island
Gilmore Girls
Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.
Greek
Green Wing
Grey's Anatomy
Growing Pains
Gummy Bears (I think)
Gunsmoke
Hannah Montana
Happy Days
Hardcastle & McCormick
Heroes*
Highlander
Highlander: The Raven
Hogan's Heroes
Hill Street Blues
Home Improvement
Homicide: Life on the Street
House
Hunter
I Claudius*
I Dream of Jeannie
I Love Lucy
Instant Star
Inuyasha
Invader Zim
Invasion
JAG
Jackass
Jeeves and Wooster*
Jem
Jericho
Joey
John Doe
Just Shoot Me
Justified
Keen Eddie
Knight Rider
LA Law
Land of the Lost
Laverne and Shirley
Law & Order
Law & Order: Criminal Intent
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
Lexx
Life on Mars (UK version)*
Life With Derek
Little House on the Prairie
Lizzie McGuire
Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman
Lost
Lost in Space
Love, American Style
MASH
MacGyver
Mad Men
Magnum PI
Malcolm in the Middle
Mama's Family
The Man from U.N.C.L.E.
Married... With Children
Melrose Place
Miami Vice
Millennium
Miracles
Mission: Impossible
Monk
Mork & Mindy
Monty Python's Flying Circus (I have definitely seen some Monty Python, but I couldn't swear to it being three whole episodes rather than compilations of clips. I may have done, though. There were definitely some repeats once. I was a bit too young and was mainly disappointed, really.)
Murphy Brown
My Life as a Dog
My Little Pony (I don't think we ever got this over here the first time. We'd have watched it - we had MLPs and my sister had the magazine, but we had no idea there was a cartoon.)
My Name is Earl
My So-Called Life
My Super Sweet 16
My Three Sons
My Two Dads
News Radio
NCIS
Night Court
Nip/Tuck
North Shore
Northern Exposure
Numb3rs
NYPD Blue
One Tree Hill
Oz
Paranormal Witness
Perry Mason
Phil of the Future
Pokemon
Popular
Power Rangers
Press Gang*
Primeval*
Prison Break
Profiler
Project Runway
Psych
QI
Quantum Leap
Queer As Folk (US)
Queer as Folk (UK)
Red Dwarf* (I had seen everything till the last series, which I missed.)
ReGenesis
Relic Hunter
Remington Steele
Rocco's Modern Life
Rescue Me
Road Rules
Robin of Sherwood
Robotech
ROME
Roseanne
Roswell
Salute Your Shorts
Sapphire and Steel*
Saved by the Bell
Scarecrow and Mrs King
Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?
Scrubs
SeaQuest
Seinfeld
Sex and the City
Silver Spoons
Six Feet Under
Skins
Sliders
Slings and Arrows
Smallville
So Weird
South Park
Spaced
Space 1999
Spongebob Squarepants
Spooks/MI:5*
Sports Night
Star Trek
Star Trek: The Next Generation
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Star Trek: Voyager
Star Trek: Enterprise
Stargate Atlantis
Stargate SG-1 (I've seen parts of definitely more than three episodes, but probably not enough to count.)
Starsky and Hutch
Superman (or, at least, if they mean the really old TV series that got repeated on UK TV one summer when I was a child, I have).
Supernatural
Surface
Survivor
Taxi
Teachers
Teen Titans
Tenth Kingdom
That 70's Show
That's So Raven
The 4400
The Addams Family
The Adventures of Pete and Pete
The Andy Griffith Show
The Apprentice
The A-Team
The Avengers (UK 1960s show)
The Beverly Hillbillies
The Bionic Woman
The Brady Bunch
The Closer
The Cosby Show
The Daily Show
The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd
The Dead Zone
The Dick Van Dyke Show
The Dresden Files
The Famous Jett Jackson
The Flintstones
The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
The Golden Girls
The Good Life / Good Neighbors*
The Goodies
The Honeymooners
The Invisible Man
The Jeffersons
The Jetsons
The Kindred
The L Word
The League of Gentlemen
The Love Boat
The Lucille Ball Show
The Magnificent 7
The Mary Tyler Moore Show
The Mighty Boosh
The Monkees (Possibly may have seen three episodes, but again, couldn't swear to it.)
The Munsters
The Muppet Show
The Mythbusters
The Nanny
The O.C.
The Office (UK)
The Office (US)
The Pretender
The Real World
The Sentinel
The Shield
The Simpsons
The Six Million Dollar Man
The Sopranos
The Suite Life of Zack and Cody
The Tribe
The Tudors
The White Queen (TWQ, why are you on this list??)
The X-Files
3rd Rock from the Sun
Third Watch
Three's Company
Thunderbirds are Go!
Thundercats
TJ Hooker
Top Gear
Torchwood
The Twilight Zone
Twin Peaks
Twitch City
Two and A Half Men
UFO* (Also why are you here? Why would you be here? Who made this list?)
Ugly Betty
Under the Umbrella Tree
Veronica Mars
The Vicar of Dibley
The Waltons
The West Wing*
Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?
White Collar
Whose Line is it Anyway? (US)
Whose Line is it Anyway? (UK)
Will and Grace
Wings
Wiseguy
Without a Trace
Wolf Lake
WKRP in Cincinnati
Xena: Warrior Princess
X-Men
X-Men: Evolution
You Can't Do That on Television

The alphabetisation is a bit off, isn't it? Presumably people have added some things that begin with 'the' in the correct fashion, but the main list has alphabetised things under 'the' (which it shouldn't, but either way, you should be consistent about it).

Comments

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

I've watched so few of those shows, it hardly seems worth the effort of doing the meme!

[thisbluespirit]

I was ignoring it, too, but it kept reappearing and I felt like a meme! I really don't even know what half of them are, though.

:-)

Oh, and, btw - I listened to the last Liz Shaw audio you sent me! Thank you! (I liked it, before you ask, although I think I'd say the first two were probably better - that one was fun, though. The other two both had something a bit beyond that, though.) I should probably have a go at finally listening to the last Eight and Mary Shelley that paranoidangel gave me last April (er, April 2012, I mean!) and then... the Sapphire and Steel one!!

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

Which Liz audio was that (I've lost track, I'm afraid!)?

I've heard of most of those TV shows - even the US ones - I just have watched many of them.

[thisbluespirit]

Sentinels of the New Dawn? The last of the three companion chronicles, anyway.

You are, as ever, more knowledgeable than I! ;-)

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

Ah - I actually really loved that one - but then if we all liked everything the same, where would we be?

Heh.

[thisbluespirit]

Oh, I enjoyed it, but it was more of a straight missing adventure, whereas the Cybermen one was more character-related and moving, and the one with the soldier used the format cleverly, which I really liked. So I'd expected more than a runaround with the third - but it was good fun all the same! (But, yes, it'd be a boring world if we all liked the same things, it's true. :-D)

And thank you, because I am pretty sure you gave me all three!!

[persiflage-1.livejournal.com]

Fair enough.

And yes, I did - I was determined to share the Liz love with you. There are two more to go...

[oonaseckar.livejournal.com]

I'm disturbed mostly by how many I've watched, and huge chunks of a lot. There goes about a quarter of my life. The feeling going through your list is mostly, 'You haven't watched that? or that? Or that? Surely you jest!' Although some I'm vaguely aware I've seen without being able to remember in the slightest. I seem to remember that by the last season of Dynasty they'd abandoned any attempt to keep a straight face.

Going to steal this!

[thisbluespirit]

I have a feeling my parents used to watch Dynasty for the entertainment value. I watched the ending with my Dad and he was delighted by the fact they even had someone abducted by aliens.

And, looking at the list, I did miss Thunderbirds. Although, again, I'm not sure I can swear to having watched as many as three episodes, because Gerry Anderson stuff seems to automatically drive me up the wall. I probably saw some of the A-Team, but again, not sure it would amount to even a whole episode.

But, basically, I'm old these days, and I'm British. That list doesn't have a hope of showing up the scary amount of TV I@ve actually watched in my life. :-)

[swordznsorcery.livejournal.com]

Ohmigosh, look at all the television! I have often thought that I had something of a misspent youth, and now I have the proof of it. I am greatly tempted to do this myself, although it would probably lead to me wondering how the hell I managed to survive a childhood that was apparently spent entirely in front of the television... I agree though - definitely needs something between three episodes and all the episodes. The present system seems irritatingly unrepresentative.

I'm amazed, though. "The A-Team"?! You've never watched "The A-Team"?! To me that's like never breathing.

I'm still tempted by your song lyrics meme too. You are a terrible distraction. ;)

[thisbluespirit]

I have watched the A-Team! But they don't have a category for "has seen enough separate bits it might add up to an episode or two but can't swear to it", either. It is kind of vaguely in my head as not my sort of thing, but entertaining. (I did have a figure free from a Wimpy - really! - that I was very fond of, but I don't even really know which character he was. He had movable joints, you see. I was impressed.)

You are a terrible distraction. ;)

I won't apologise, because that is the point of LJ, really. ;-p

[elisi]

BT accidentally scared me off the internet in the middle of the week and it's not been quite the same since
Oh dear. What did they do this time?

I have never actually seen "Fear Her".
You've not missed much.

[thisbluespirit]

Oh, BT only sent me an email saying that I had nearly used up my bandwidth for the month, but I didn't have the spoons to deal with it. When I came back to the internet a day or so later and looked at it properly, I was actually in no danger of going over in the remaining time (unless I'd set about some epic downloading or something). It wasn't really their fault; I was just being overly fragile.

Heh, everyone says Fear Her is rubbish, but, you know, I get a lot of pleasure out of Timelash and Time-Flight and even enjoy Underworld, so I'll see it one day and probably even like it... ;-D

[pitry.livejournal.com]

In this opportunity, then, let me play devil's advocate. I actually LIKE Fear Her. It's not a masterpiece by any means, nor is it anywhere near the best episodes of the show/season, and there are some horribly cheesy moments, but 1) it does hit most of the right emotional keys for me (except for the uber cheesy ending) and b) the Doctor and Rose's dynamic in that one is pretty awesome. Oh, and there's this really nice piece of music at some point there. I would say try watching it!

[thisbluespirit]

My not-watching it is entirely accidental and not deliberate, I promise. I missed a few episodes in S2 for reasons that I forget now, but I caught the others and not this one. BBC3 used to re-run New Who endlessly, so I meant to catch it sometime, and then I was ill, and now BBC3 don't re-run DW endlessly. One day I'll get the DVDs and then I'll see it. :-)

(And, :lol:, I should have known that you would love the unloved episode! ♥)

[pitry.livejournal.com]

Ach I know what you mean. It happens all the time, right? You MEAN to watch something, but by the time you get round to it, it's gone :(

(And HA. You sound like I like unpopular episodes. Are you suggesting Love & Monsters is anything less than beloved by everyone? Or Last of the Time Lords? FOOL! :P)

[thisbluespirit]

Yep!

:-D

Speaking as someone who even kind of likes Underworld, of course... ;-) And Last of the Time Lords did have its moments where the crack was just amazingly epic. I know other people who like Love & Monsters, but nooo, can't be doing with that one. I think most of us are a bit like this with DW, in the end. "That one's rubbish... but then, I like The Creature From the Pit/The Space Pirates/Time-Flight/Timelash/Underworld/every supposedly rubbish episode ever." *nods*

[pitry.livejournal.com]

The Creature from the Pit is a masterpiece! What kind of a twisted, twisted mind would call it rubbish?!

[thisbluespirit]

♥

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

I have seen a scary number of these shows, but only because I'm American and they were on my TV while I was growing up. We didn't have cable back then, and you watched what was on when you came home from school, and you also watched stuff just because one of your siblings was watching it. And some of it I've seen because it keeps getting repeated. I've probably seen every episode of "Friends," for instance, but not because I've tried to watch every episode -- it's just been constantly on for decades.

And yes, what is up with the alphabetization? Also, unless there's a show called "The Mythbusters" that I know nothing about, it's just "Mythbusters." (It's actually an awesome show, by the way -- they blow up things for science!)

[thisbluespirit]

We didn't have cable back then, and you watched what was on when you came home from school, and you also watched stuff just because one of your siblings was watching it. And some of it I've seen because it keeps getting repeated.

Yes, my TV watching has been a lot like that, but of course my "wallpaper" shows aren't these ones. Friends was constantly on over here, too, so yep.

The alphabetisation is just off, but then some people will never learn not to file things under 'the'... ;-)

[paranoidangel]

That is a bit of a crap system for highlighting TV shows - the bolded ones show up better than the italicised ones for the start. And of the ones I've not seen all of, I've either seen a bit (less than 3 episodes) or nearly all of. Which is a bit of a difference.

[john_amend_all]

I was thinking that if I did something like this, I'd put a bar against each show indicating roughly how much of it I'd watched. Something like this: ▓▓▓▓▓▓▒▒▒▒. And use tables to make them line up. And probably have a separate column for 'I own at least one season on DVD'. And use the 'DVD' character 📀 U+1F4C0 rather than an asterisk.

[paranoidangel]

A bar against it would be quite good. I think a square with letters and numbers in it followed by U+1F4CO would make the series names harder to read though.

[john_amend_all]

That bit will make more sense with the Symbola font installed.

[paranoidangel]

I'm not going to install a font just to see what your symbol looks like. The asterisk is going to be a better idea than assuming people have it installed.

[swordznsorcery.livejournal.com]

Yes. I like your thinking. The whole experiment is flawed from the outset, with that huge yawning gap between three episodes and all the episodes, and the presentation of the data is highly unsatisfactory. I like your version much better.

The idea itself is also flawed though, since they've let people add to the list willy-nilly. This not only means that everybody could conceivably have a different list, but the list itself has become quite unwieldy, and I imagine that a lot of people don't bother to read it properly, which doesn't do much for individual people presenting their own data. There should be a standardised list. What we have here is a bizarre mixture, with some very odd inclusions, and some equally odd omissions. It needs some proper organising!

[john_amend_all]

It's obviously much more interesting to design tools for doing the meme 'properly' than it is actually to do it 😄. I'm thinking some sort of app where it downloads a list of shows from a central wiki that also lists the number of episodes total. Then the user fills in how many episodes they've watched and whether they own the DVD, and it generates the HTML for the meme.

[swordznsorcery.livejournal.com]

Excellent! You're in charge of memes from now on. ;)

[thisbluespirit]

I think you're mistaking an LJ meme for a scientific survey here... ;-p

[thisbluespirit]

I've either seen a bit (less than 3 episodes) or nearly all of. Which is a bit of a difference.

*nods* Yep. Still, it was a meme, and I felt in want of a meme yesterday!

[pitry.livejournal.com]

I looked at the list.
I considered stealing.
I realised how many shows I would bold if I do that.

OH DEAR. This is where the first 29 years of my life went, then.

[thisbluespirit]

:lol: Well, it's nice to know, at least, I suppose... :-)

[clocketpatch]

That is a long list... *boogles*

But it does have Degrassi on it! So my country is allowed to exist in TV land. (Confession: I've... never actually watched Degrassi, or any home grown TV other than Mr. Dress-up, Polkadot Door, and Corner Gas)

ETA: And the Elephant Show! Since I'm certain I tormented you with the theme song to that at some point...

[pitry.livejournal.com]

It doesn't have original Degrassi though! That was totally one of my favourite shows when I was a teenager.

[thisbluespirit]

I do vaguely remember something being mentioned about The Elephant Show. I'm glad to hear that Canada also exists in TV-land, but it's a bit worrying that nobody else much does...

:-)

[llywela13.livejournal.com]

Oooh, interesting meme. I wanna try!

...runs off to own blog...

[thisbluespirit]

Everybody needs a meme every now and then. :-)