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| Nostalgia isn't what it used to be. |
ABC
September 23, 1975
Sitcom
DVD
B-
This is another pilot that wasn't the first episode to air. But they added a bit of narration at the beginning to present it as a flashback. It generally works, although as I recall the menacing juvenile deliquency would be toned down as the show went on. (Here, Epstein being voted Most Likely to Take a Life is plausible, and Horshack actually comes to class with a porn magazine!) Some things to note that will be contradicted or at least modified later: Woodman is the principal rather than the vice-principal, Julie likes the Sweathogs, and Gabe is presumably 26, since he refers to going to school in 1965 and tells Woodman he's no longer 16. I like the references to the economy, rooting us in a specific time and place.
Don Stark is a student extra for the first of two times, while his classmate Mike Agresta would be an Office Worker five years later on the Bosom Buddies pilot. And Leslie Ackerman, who plays Vinnie's sort of girlfriend Silvia would be back, but she makes less of an impression than Debralee Scott. This is the first episode written by series co-creator Peter Meyerson, who'd written for That Girl and The Bob Newhart Show. It's one of only three WBK episodes directed by producer James Komack.
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