leave it to beaver (2 Viewers)

[jimmyjet]

i never liked lucy. but i agree with you - i am happy it was released, cuz it was popular with at least half the population.

you would have to search high and low to find a female who does not like it. nothing, and I MEAN NOTHING is a chick flick more than lucy !!!!!

i have fond memories of tons of shows. and even if i cant recall particulars, i tend to like everything that is reality-based, and the more fantasy-based shows not nearly as much.

i loved the wonder years, but could do without the older brother. luckily, he was not in it much. but barney was in andy all the time. no way to really watch that show without a lot of barney, most of the time.

i dont hear much about bachelor father. but i have fond memories of it, and what recall i do have, i think i would still like it. i am pretty sure i would still like donna reed.

the family shows and the westerns were the 2 mainstays when i was a kid. and i liked just about all of them.

 

[jimmyjet]

had taken a break from beaver, to watch some blu-ray movies.

just finished season 3.

the last episode, beaver's team, had many video issues.

did i get a bad disk, or was it just a poor transfer ?

 

[tonysam2]

I'm mostly the same. Sadly, I couldn't get into Father Knows Best anymore. We loved that when I was a kid, the whole family. But when I caught it on TV a few years back it just felt tedious. Now Ozzie and Harriet I love! The thread on here just got bumped, I hope with some news about the official release. I'd also like to see Patty Duke again, it's been years and the Shout! trailers make it look like it's aged good.

I disagree. FKB holds up very well. There were issues like homelessness that weren't mentioned much during the fifties. The show was not at all preachy, and in fact the title is intended as irony.

Ozzie and Harriet is very underrated. I consider it one of the funniest shows ever made.

 

[Joe Lugoff]

I disagree. FKB holds up very well. There were issues like homelessness that weren't mentioned much during the fifties. The show was not at all preachy, and in fact the title is intended as irony.

Ozzie and Harriet is very underrated. I consider it one of the funniest shows ever made.

I agree with what you said about FKB. It's not the goody-goody show people think it is. And the title is ironic. The radio show was originally called Father Knows Best?

However, your comment on Ozzie and Harriet made me go . I recently watched about twenty episodes on YouTube and never even cracked a smile, much less laughed. But don't mind me. There's no explaining these things.

 

[Gary OS]

I agree with what you said about FKB. It's not the goody-goody show people think it is. And the title is ironic. The radio show was originally called Father Knows Best?

At the risk of violating the "cease-fire" that Joe and I have right now (LOL), I'm going to ask a question that I'm being completely sincere about, even though it may sound like I'm trying to be smarmy or something. What show, from the time period we are discussing (50's and early to mid 60's), fits the description of being "goody-goody"? I'm just curious, because I'd think many people would have labeled FKB as one of those type of shows.

Again, this is a completely sincere question, not designed to start a dust up at all.


Gary "thanks" O.

 

[John Hermes]

I agree with what you said about FKB. It's not the goody-goody show people think it is. And the title is ironic. The radio show was originally called Father Knows Best?

However, your comment on Ozzie and Harriet made me go . I recently watched about twenty episodes on YouTube and never even cracked a smile, much less laughed. But don't mind me. There's no explaining these things.

I still can't believe you don't find O&H funny but, like you said, there's no explaining these things. Besides, we fans tend to cut you some slack after your wonderful post #1653 in the "B&W Era" thread.

 

[jimmyjet]

labels are not generally good descriptors, cuz most everyone has different connotations of them.

as far as "funny", i dont think most comedies are funny. they tend to be predictable.

what i find funny about beaver, and probably most of the other family shows of that era, is the amusing things that mimic real life.

when i watch the interplay between june and ward, it always makes me smile, cuz i find it not only humorous, but a lot of reality mixed in with it.

 

[Joe Lugoff]

Gary OS, I was referring to people who think (incorrectly) that "Father Knows Best" was a goody-goody show. These people think the same about "Leave It to Beaver," "Ozzie and Harriet" and "The Donna Reed Show." They can't seem to stand seeing families that aren't dysfunctional.

I don't think any of them were goody-goody myself. However, there is a show where the characters seem so unreal that I can't watch it, and that's "The Brady Bunch," but that's later than the time period you mentioned.

 

[jimmyjet]

i think what we are really discussing is "how real" the characters were ??

the old family shows had real characters, in my opinion.

but what some people may not understand is that these shows were popular, not because they depicted the typical american family, but because they depicted the values of american culture, and the sort of family that we at least attempted to be.

beaver is so synonymous with that idea, that it has come to be a common expression of how functional/dysfunctional your family was.

for example, the comment "i had a leave it to beaver childhood" means that you had a really good childhood.

 

[Gary OS]

i think what we are really discussing is "how real" the characters were ??

the old family shows had real characters, in my opinion.

but what some people may not understand is that these shows were popular, not because they depicted the typical american family, but because they depicted the values of american culture, and the sort of family that we at least attempted to be.

beaver is so synonymous with that idea, that it has come to be a common expression of how functional/dysfunctional your family was.

for example, the comment "i had a leave it to beaver childhood" means that you had a really good childhood.

I pretty much agree with everything you said. For me TV is entertainment, pure and simple. And that means it's something I'm going to make a choice about. It's not an essential for life (although for me it's close, lol), and it's not forced on me. Real life is different. I have to live in the midst of real people, with real dysfunction, all the time. I'm not talking about my personal family, but about society in general. I'm confronted with it every time I step out the front door of my house. People shouting at one another. Hating one another. Doing violence one to another. It's everywhere around the globe and even if I don't personally encounter bad things every day, I see it on the news or hear about it from friends, neighbors or co-workers regularly.

I wrote all that to say that when it comes to me taking a break from the "real world" and sitting back in my easy chair to be "entertained" for a bit, I don't want to see or hear dysfunctional families arguing all the time (ala "All in the Family"). I don't need TV to remind me how bad things are in the real world (ala so many shows on today, imho). I guess the simplest way to explain it is like this: when it comes to TV shows, I prefer to watch the ideal rather than the real (if the real means dysfunction and everything associated with it). That's why the 50's is my ideal TV decade. I think the general idea behind TV in those days was to portray a more positive, uplifting ideal rather than an in-the-gutter, negative real. But that's just my opinion. To each his own.


Gary "again, that's only my two cents and I'm not trying to say everyone should feel like I do" O.

 

[Joe Lugoff]

I basically agree, but I wonder if some people don't like the families portrayed in shows like "Beaver" and "Father Knows Best" because it makes them see what they missed out on and that makes them feel bad -- and they prefer "All in the Family" or something like "Maude" because it makes them feel good to be able to say, "My family was messed up, but we weren't as bad as them!"

Actually, all I ask of a show is that it's well-written. I like both kinds of shows, when they're well done.

"I think the general idea behind TV in those days was to portray a more positive, uplifting ideal ..."

And yet, the most popular show of that era was "I Love Lucy." Lucy was a liar and a schemer and still somehow became the most beloved TV character of all time. Then there was "The Honeymooners," showing the very depressing life of a loser who yelled at and threatened to hit his wife (although they always made up at the end.) And Westerns were very big in those days, the message of which was usually that you solve every problem with a gun. But generally I agree that things were much more positive and uplifting in the 1950s and early 1960s, especially compared to the dreary times we're living in now.

 

[jimmyjet]

hi joe,

yea, i dont doubt that some people like watching all in the family for that very reason. in fact, i stated this awhile back.

i most certainly believe that people were able to hide their prejudices through that show.

"i aint as bad as archie bunker sort of thinking".

my favorite western was bonanza.

but i would not characterize that particular show as solving everything with a gun. in fact, i think of it almost the opposite. the gun was only used when no other options were available.

 

[jimmyjet]

regarding reality versus entertainment - what i was referring to with "real characters" had more to do with whether they seemed like real people, or whether they were more like caricatures.

while there is tremendous dysfunction in families today, i do not see all in the family to be real characters. i would describe them more as parodies.

in the past, i have seen family shows that had the kids shooting off jokes and wisecracks that no kid of that age would be smart enough to do. hence, not real characters.

a more current show that i liked was the wonder years. i thought the brother was a bit of a parody, but kevin, winnie, mom, dad, etc. were all real people. and i also think it gave one an uplifting feeling, like the 50s and 60s family shows tended to do.

 

[TravisR]

I basically agree, but I wonder if some people don't like the families portrayed in shows like "Beaver" and "Father Knows Best" because it makes them see what they missed out on and that makes them feel bad...

I think for a show that is known as being a picturesque look at life in the 1950's, Beaver got into many relatively tough situations. He had a loving family but he was always getting into some crazy stuff- getting duped into using a stolen row boat, ruining Ward's signed Yankees baseball, inadvertently wearing a girl's sweater, getting stuck in the principal's office overnight, spending a fortune to call Don Drysdale, getting caught in a soup billboard(!). Obviously, there's no story if Beaver doesn't have something happen to him but I'm glad I didn't have Beaver's adventures when I was a kid.

 

[Joe Lugoff]

There are people, poor souls, who don't think a kid is being realistically portrayed unless he's shown using drugs or getting a girl pregnant. Since "Leave It to Beaver" and "Father Knows Best" didn't deal with those problems, some people think they were unrealsitic. (However, "Beaver" did deal with Beaver and Larry trying smoking.)

The big problem with Beaver was that he seemed too stupid to be real because he absolutely never learned his lesson. He let jerks like Eddie, Whitey, Gilbert, Larry, etc. etc. etc. take advantage of him over and over and over. Either he was very dumb or the biggest wimp of all time.

 

[JohnMor]

I think for a show that is known as being a picturesque look at life in the 1950's, Beaver got into many relatively tough situations. He had a loving family but he was always getting into some crazy stuff- getting duped into using a stolen row boat, ruining Ward's signed Yankees baseball, inadvertently wearing a girl's sweater, getting stuck in the principal's office overnight, spending a fortune to call Don Drysdale, getting caught in a soup billboard(!). Obviously, there's no story if Beaver doesn't have something happen to him but I'm glad I didn't have Beaver's adventures when I was a kid.

I remember another adventure that I bet a lot of kids of the day actually had: the mail-order record club that kept sending the monthly selection and billing him for it (because he never bothered to send back the postcard every month). I bet there were quite a few parents who ended up paying off unexpected Columbia House Record Club bills back in the day.

 

[jimmyjet]

There are people, poor souls, who don't think a kid is being realistically portrayed unless he's shown using drugs or getting a girl pregnant. Since "Leave It to Beaver" and "Father Knows Best" didn't deal with those problems, some people think they were unrealsitic. (However, "Beaver" did deal with Beaver and Larry trying smoking.)

The big problem with Beaver was that he seemed too stupid to be real because he absolutely never learned his lesson. He let jerks like Eddie, Whitey, Gilbert, Larry, etc. etc. etc. take advantage of him over and over and over. Either he was very dumb or the biggest wimp of all time.

this is a common complaint i have heard about beaver, at least by some on this forum.

and i agree that a real beaver would never have let larry talk him into doing things, and then allow larry to weasel out of it, and go home cuz it was dinner time, or some such excuse.

but the point of the show was not to depict the life and growth of beaver.

but rather to depict individual situations that a kid might get into, the decisions made, and the consequences that were likely to follow. and in this sense, beaver is a real person.

 

[jimmyjet]

awhile back, someone mentioned that the kids never finished their milk.

after that, there were several times where they did not.

but in beaver and kenneth, beaver finished the glass !!

they probably hate milk today !!!!!

 

[jimmyjet]

just watched "and when the sky was opened" - season 1 of the twilight zone.

miss landers was in it.

i think that might have been before she was in beaver, since she did not make it on beaver until the second year.

 

[Joe Lugoff]

The second year of Beaver was 1958-59. The Twilight Zone's first season was 1959-60.