"Alice" power rankings

Last week, we unveiled our exclusive power rankings of the series Battlestar Galactica. There is but one other TV program we covered this season that has the scope, the ambition, the sheer majesty of that show and thus deserves its own power rankings. That's right, it's time to revisit Alice.

When we talked about the long-running sitcom early in this latest ninth season, I did roll out a ranking of the Mel's Diner regulars, but this involves everyone on the show. Remember how this works: I look at who would win if they faced each other today at a neutral site in Minot, North Dakota. Here goes:

1) Mel Sharples: The man, the hat, the spatula--Mel is the most interesting character on screen at any given time, and Vic Tayback enlivens even the most mundane material. Mel is the soul of the show.

2) Henry Beesmeyer: If Mel is the soul of Alice, then Henry is...uh, I don't know, the trick left knee? Somehow I mean that as a compliment. Any episode is richer if it has the mild-mannered but wisecracking phone lineman.

3) Alice Hyatt: I mean, it IS her show. For better or worse, that's her belting the theme song.

4) Florence Jean Castleberry: If Mel is the soul of the series and Henry is the wonky left knee, then Flo is the...grits. OK, I've taken this as far as it can go.

5) Vera Gorman: Sure, she is a bit of a dingy broad, but she was part of the diner before Alice arrived at the show's inception and she stayed for the whole run. She provides an essential foil for Mel.

6) Tommy Hyatt: The attempt to give him a guitar and turn him into a teen idol didn't go so well, but for a while he was one of the more tolerable kids on TV, and he stuck it out for all 9 seasons, too.

7) Jolene Hunnicut: Believe it or not, she is in more episodes than any waitress besides Alice and Vera. Jolene may not stand out to most fans of the series, but she was there. She brought stability after the departures of Flo and Belle.

8) Earl Hicks: Dave Madden is so good that you assume this character was in more than a mere several dozen episodes.

9) Belle Dupree: Diane Ladd gave it her all, but for reasons that aren't 100% clear, things didn't work out for her. She had the thankless task of following Flo, though, and Belle didn't bring down the whole operation, so she gets some credit for that.

10) Sam Butler: OK, OK, I admit it! Alice's "connected" alter ego is one of those gimmicks that's so bad it's worse, but I have a strange fascination with it. It took all the restraint I could muster to avoid recommending we spotlight a Sam episode on the podcast.

In all seriousness, Alice playing a gangster in drag might have been amusing once, but bringing that back killed the precious credibility the series had built up.

But still..

5 Shows We Could See on Streaming for Hispanic Heritage Month (but don't get your hopes up)

September was another disappointing slate for 70s and 80s TV fans except for the random obscurities Crackle keeps adding, but surprises can happen, so here are some era shows we could see to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month (September 15-October 15). Maybe we'll see something off this list in October.

*Chico and the Man: Is this one of the biggest shows to never be streamed (not counting the old AOL In2TV website)? 4 seasons, nearly 90 episodes, and the sitcom declined after Freddie Prinze's death, but it was a big hit at the beginning of its run. Yet it rarely gets any attention, with little rerun exposure and one paltry sampler release on DVD. HBO Max can really use an injection of some old-school sitcoms.

*A.K.A. Pablo: There's a good reason this sitcom was left out of the big Amazon/Norman Lear streaming announcement earlier this summer. This Paul Rodriguez vehicle produced through Lear's Embassy company flopped in its 6-episode run on ABC in 1984. Yet the cast also includes Joe Santos, Hector Elizondo, and Katy Jurado. Maybe Crackle will dig this out of the vaults.

*A.E.S. Hudson Street: In a similar vein, this Sony show from Barney Miller's Danny Arnold lasted a mere 5 episodes on ABC in 1978. It stars Gregory Sierra as a doctor at an Ambulance Emergency Service hospital in NYC.

*Villa Alegre: There is not a lot of interest in vintage children's programming except maybe iconic shows from the Baby Boomer era like Howdy Doody. And if that programming aired on public television, fugeddaboutit. Sure, you can find reruns of Sesame Street and Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, but I don't think the original Electric Company is available anywhere (some individual episodes are for sale on Amazon and iTunes), and that one has Rita Moreno and Morgan Freeman!

How about Villa Alegre ("Happy Village"), a half-hour 1973-1977 program featuring Spanish and English? 

You don't hear too much about it these days, but when you do, you see fond memories of it. I'm not sure who owns rights to it or if the original material exists in full, but I'd love to see PBS, which is happy to shill some of its library for pledges, dig into the vaults and offer more variety than just the Ken Burns archives.

*Paul Sand in Friends and Lovers: Maybe not the most incisive depiction of Latino culture given that Sand plays musician Robert Dreyfuss, but did you know the actor was born Paul Sanchez? Well, now you do.

The series only lasted a half-season and has to be considered a failure, but it's from MTM Productions and created by James l. Brooks and Allan Burns. Penny Marshall, Jack Gilford, and Steve Landesberg joined Sand in the sitcom. Unfortunately, this is controlled by Disney, which shows little if any interest in putting old Fox-owned sitcoms on Hulu, but maybe someday it will get out there.

Top Ten #133

(Note: this post should have run yesterday, but it didn't. Please read it in the spirit of it being yesterday. After all, we all enjoy revisiting the 1970s and 1980s, so why not...one day ago? We'll be back on track next week. Thanks!)

1) Battlestar Galactica: Watching the ill-fated follow-up makes me appreciate the show even more. I liked Battlestar Galactica  more than I ever thought I would; I dislike Battlestar Galactica 1980 more than I ever thought I could.

2) Masters of the Universe: He-Man and his pals are among the nominees for the 2021 Toy Hall of Fame class along with luminaries such as the Cabbage Patch Kids. If "riots caused" is a key qualification, then the Cabbage Patchers are no-brainers!

3) The NFL returns: Big ratings in week one for pro football, but I still miss this:

4) Paul Williams: Happy birthday to BOTNS fave Paul Williams, AKA Alison Troy, AKA one of the people who makes sure we can't play his songs on the podcast without getting our butts sued!

5) The Emmys: Yep, they're having them.

On this date in 1982, the L.A. Dodgers helped kick off that year's show:

6) Columbo: Cozi-TV celebrates the series' 50th anniversary this weekend with a marathon. Yes, you'll roll your eyes if they run "Just one more thing," before each episode, but admit it: You'll be disappointed if they don't.

7) Talk Like a Pirate Day: Does this day make anyone else think of watching the Pittsburgh Pirates on hot summer nights in the 1980s? Just me?

8) The Mary Tyler Moore Show: It premiered this night in 1970. Sky point to Ed Asner!

9) Christopher Knight: Me-TV ran a piece on one of the most important Very Special Episodes of the era: Peter's courageous struggle with puberty:

10) R.I.P. Leta Powell Drake: You may not know her offhand, but her interviews provide plenty of fodder for our YT playlists. I mean, there's even one for Tucker's Witch!

Happy Batman Day!

 According to DC Comics, today is Batman day, and the publishing company and its corporate overlords are celebrating with news, events, comics, and of course merch.

I may have said on the podcast that "my Batman" growing up was not the Adam West one, but the Jim Aparo Batman of the comics and the Olan Soule Super Friends Batman of TV. But today I hoist a Batsoda (seriously, why don't I have one of those in my hand right now?) for all the Batmans out there!

Thank you!

For the first time in several months, there is no new podcast this week, but we will have more soon (Battys, anyone?) For now, if you have missed any of this season's episodes--or any, for that matter--may we suggest you check out our archive? If you're seeing this on our homepage, you can just scroll up and get quick access to all of our previous episodes.

Thanks to all of you for listening and for supporting the podcast in this ninth season. We have special things planned for the future, so stay with us, and keep visiting us on the web for more stuff! We will still be active here between seasons!

Rick's exclusive Battlestar Galactica power rankings

 Everyone loves 'em, everyone does 'em, and now it's time for me to join in the fun with my exclusive top 10 of the original Battlestar Galactica! Keep in mind the way I do these is if two characters from BSG were to fight each other on a neutral planet right now, who would win?

1) Commander Adama: The majestic leader of the ragtag fleet (and sometimes a ragtag show), played with mastery and command by Lorne Greene, deserves the top spot even if he gets a little obsessed with that Kobol stuff early on and it clouds his judgment.

2) Captain Apollo: Well, where else can you rate the guy who is, according to the series, best at piloting, best at warrior-ing, best at surrogate fathering, best at actual fathering, best at diplomacy-ing, and even best at triad? I think the only thing he can't do is gamble, and that could be seen as a virtue.

3) Colonel Tigh: Maybe we are putting Tigh too High, but it's not his fault the series often reduced him to walking around the bridge looking constipated. Given the chance, Tigh could have stepped in and led the ragtag fleet all over the cosmos.

4) Colonel Starbuck: Forever second banana to Apollo, but he doesn't seem to mind. Within the show's universe, he is one pretty cool guy in addition to being the second-bestest pilot, triad player, etc. By the season's end, he is still impetuous but has some maturity to go along with his warrior spirit. Plus he says feldercarb a lot.

5) Boomer: No explanation should be needed here, really. As long as we're talking about triad, what's up with the thing where Starbuck and Apollo always team up against Boomer and some scrub who barely gets camera time, let alone dialogue, and then Boomer walks off after the game with the other team?

6) Commander Cain: Lloyd Bridges guests as Cain in two episodes (or one two-parter) and is the single best guest star the original series has to offer. The character is relatively complex and has some interesting personal dynamics with Adama. I wish there were more of Cain in the show's short run.

7) Sheba: I would love to put Athena in here, but the show treated her like an also-ran and then just stopped mentioning her. Sheba wasn't quite a top-echelon character as they tried to push her, but given time, she might have become that.

8) Count Iblis: Speaking of Sheba, she was drawn in by the enigmatic Iblis, played with full, uh, enigmacity by Patrick MacNee. This character is intriguing and ultimately a better foil for the main cast than the regular villains on the shows.

9) Chameleon: Hey, it's Fred Astaire! The details of the storyline are a little hazy, but it's a fun episode and cool to see a true legend on the series.

10) Jolly: I just don't have the heart to exclude him.

Not ranked: Cassiopeia, despite the efforts of the show to elevate her; Omega, who somehow became almost a main player on the ship by the end; Baltar, who certainly gave it his all; the Cylons, who just didn't stand out enough as individuals; Serina, who just didn't last long enough; Boxey because--well, let's just leave it at that; Muffit II.

Battlestar Galactica: The LP!

Check out this recent addition to the Battle of the Network Shows collection, a glorious original soundtrack album to the Battlestar Galactica series:

Owning this doesn't just make me want to fire up my Viper and go buy a hi-fi, it makes me want to BE Stu Phillips leading the L.A. Philharmonic in this glorious music. 

I mean, looking at this album, you have to think the show is awesome and "a big deal," right?

Does the ragtag fleet have an "arts ship"? They have a prison barge, I think a trash barge, and they have concerts, but do they have one dedicated ship for the fine arts?