Tag Archive for: television

Saved by the Bell

30 years ago today the television show Saved by the Bell aired its first episode 1. This will come to no surprise from people that know me but I’m kind of obsessed with Saved by the Bell.

I was born in 1983, so I was six when the show first aired. A show revolving around High School kids doesn’t seem like a show a six year old would be interested in, but I had two older sisters that also watched the show. That being said, I think I did most of my SBTB watching on weekday mornings and afternoons. In fact, I didn’t watch SBTB in its normal time slot, on Saturday mornings, until the last season or two. Superstations TBS and WGN used to air back to back episodes before and after school. Local station, KPLR channel 11, also aired back to back episodes in the afternoon, so I could potentially watch six episodes in a single day. I was in heaven.

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  1. This does not include the original show Saved by the Bell was spun off from, Good Morning Miss Bliss, which aired in July of 1987

The other day I was browsing YouTube and a suggested video that came up dubbed itself a lot episode of Saved by the Bell. What? An episode of SBTB that I have not seen? How could this be? So, I watched it. All twenty minutes of it. It’s not really an episode. It’s a promo for the NBC Saturday morning lineup and it features Zack, Kelly, Lisa, Slater, Screech and Jessie. There is no Mr. Belding, and the whole premise is really weird.

Because it’s a promo for Saturday morning, there are a lot of clips of cartoons. You have Alf (the puppet) interacting with the SBTB kids and talking about his cartoon. There’s John Candy introducing Camp Candy, and appearances by Marsha Warfield and Sherman Hemsley. It was really weird. If you like SBTB or retro TV stuff in general, give it a watch below.

white rabbit project
Netflix released a trailer for their new show White Rabbit Project today. If you were a fan of Mythbusters, you’ll probably want to check it out. It stars the former Mythbusters build team, Kari Byron, Tory Belleci, and Grant Imahara as they go down the “rabbit hole to investigate weird and wonderful events from pop culture, science, and history.”

I was a huge fan of Mythbusters and was sad when they decided to part ways with the build team in the final season. I’m happy to see the gang back together. You can stream all episodes starting December 9th. Check out the trailer below.

This past weekend SNL took on the popular podcast Serial with a brilliant digital short. Cecily Strong does a great impression of host Sarah Koenig. The spoof investigates the story of Kris Kringle, an elf who allegedly leaves presents in people’s homes. Watch it below.

go bayside

Anyone who knows me knows I’m a huge Saved by the Bell fan. I could go toe-to-toe with anyone on SBTB trivia (impressive, I know), that’s why it was a big shock that there was a podcast about Saved by the Bell that I didn’t know about. Imagine that, two of my favorite things joined together, podcasts and SBTB. The result is the awesome Go Bayside.

If you’re not familiar with the podcast, it was started by comedian April Richardson and each episode is an in-depth discussion on an episode of SBTB (done in order of air date). About 2 years ago I had an idea to do a SBTB podcast but 1. I don’t have the time or know-how to do a podcast and 2. I would be hard-pressed to find someone that loves SBTB as much as me.

Anyway, the podcast, which is nearing the end of its run, features guest appearances by other comedians and actors, such as Chris Hardwick, Paul F. Tompkins, and Entourage’s Jerry Ferrara (Turtle), among others. Some of the guests are fans of the show and others never really watched it. Ferrara may even give me a run at super fan status. The discussions are hilarious and really shed light on how ridiculous the show actually was. If you ever watched the show and love podcasts, you should definitely check it out. It may bring back some good memories of the Saturday mornings and weekday afternoons that you spent with Zack and the gang.