# FOX Cracks Open the Vault to Celebrate Network's 25th Anniversary



## cj9788 (May 14, 2003)

In celebration of its 25TH Anniversary, FOX is giving viewers a chance to look back at a show that defined the network and created one of television's most iconic characters: "Al Bundy." On Sunday, April 22, the premiere episode of "Married&#8230;With Children" (7:00-7:30 PM ET/PT) followed by an encore of THE SIMPSONS' 500th episode (7:30-8:00 PM ET/PT) will kick off an historic evening on FOX.

"Married&#8230;With Children" premiered April 5, 1987 on FOX, with three half-hour broadcasts (7:00-7:30 PM, 8:00-8:30 PM and 9:00-9:30 PM) of the show's "Pilot" episode. In the pilot, Al Bundy (Ed O'Neill) gets front row seats to a basketball game, but Peggy (Katey Sagal) makes him stay home and meet their new neighbors, Marcy (Amanda Bearse) and Steve Rhoades (David Garrison).

THE SIMPSONS officially launched as a full-fledged series on January 14, 1990, but Springfield's most famous family had appeared on FOX for several years in a number of animated "shorts" as part of "The Tracey Ullman Show." To celebrate THE SIMPSONS' continuing impact on popular culture, FOX will encore the series' 500th episode, "At Long Last Leave," in which the Simpsons are evicted from Springfield and join an off-the-grid community outside of town.

Immediately following these rebroadcasts, FOX's 25TH ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL (8:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) will take an entertaining look back at the groundbreaking and irreverent shows that have come to define the network. The star-studded special will pay tribute to FOX's most memorable moments with appearances by FOX talent, highlights from iconic series and specials and reunions with cast members from some of the network's fan-favorite series, including "Married With Children," "In Living Color" and "That '70s Show," among other surprises.

For more information on FOX, please visit www.fox.com


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## Earl Bonovich (Nov 15, 2005)

I wonder if they are going to bring back some of their biggest screwups...

** cough ** Firefly ** cough **


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## trainman (Jan 9, 2008)

Fox _really_ started on October 9, 1986, with "The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers" -- April 5, 1987, was their first night of _prime-time_ programming.


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## Red Orc (Oct 11, 2011)

Earl Bonovich said:


> I wonder if they are going to bring back some of their biggest screwups...
> 
> ** cough ** Firefly ** cough **


 I liked firefly


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## lparsons21 (Mar 4, 2006)

Red Orc said:


> I liked firefly


So did a lot of people. Unfortunately not the 12-18 year old demographic Fox was looking for in those days.


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## Henry (Nov 15, 2007)

:hurah: _*Firefly*_ :hurah:


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## Earl Bonovich (Nov 15, 2005)

Red Orc said:


> I liked firefly


I did as well, what I meant by screwup... was that they canceled it.


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## Henry (Nov 15, 2007)

Earl Bonovich said:


> *I did as well*, what I meant by screwup... was that they canceled it.


I took it that way, _Earl. So_ what are they doing now when they don't even mention _Firefly_ as part of their 25th? And what about 24?

Sounds like another screwup in the making.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

The MWC pilot episode runs all the time. It was just on VH1 Classics a few days ago.

If they want to do something special, run some of the other stuff like Herman's Head, The New Adventures of Beans Baxter, 21 Jump Street, Parker Lewis Can't Lose or Duet.


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## Jimmy 440 (Nov 17, 2007)

Wasn't their some sort of "lost episode" of MWC too ? I have never seen it.


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## Wisegoat (Aug 17, 2006)

SayWhat? said:


> The MWC pilot episode runs all the time. It was just on VH1 Classics a few days ago.
> 
> If they want to do something special, run some of the other stuff like Herman's Head, The New Adventures of Beans Baxter, 21 Jump Street, Parker Lewis Can't Lose or Duet.


Adventures of Briscoe County, Jr. I can never get enough of Bruce Campbell!


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## kevinturcotte (Dec 19, 2006)

Jimmy 440 said:


> Wasn't their some sort of "lost episode" of MWC too ? I have never seen it.


"I'll See You in Court" It never aired on Fox, and finally aired on TBS or something that in 2002. Basically, Peggy drags Al to a hotel that "Charges by the hour"  They find a tape there, and it's from a prior visit of Steve and Marcy-the hotel is recording the guests. All 4 sue the hotel. Steve and Marcy won $10,000, and Peggy and Al won nothing.
They pulled it because of Terry Rakolta and her fit over the "Her Cups Runnith Over" episode. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I%27ll_See_You_in_Court


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

That's been shown quite a bit recently too.

I'd swear there was a different pilot though, with a different cast. I'm sure I've seen it, but only once or twice. There was another family in an episode called "Peas In A Pod" about a TV company doing a ripoff of the Bundys based on Kelly's description of the family, but that's not what I'm thinking of.



kevinturcotte said:


> They pulled it because of Terry Rakolta and her fit over the "Her Cups Runnith Over" episode.


Yeah, poor ole' Terry had a fit over Devin DeVasquez:


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## kevinturcotte (Dec 19, 2006)

SayWhat? said:


> That's been shown quite a bit recently too.
> 
> I'd swear there was a different pilot though, with a different cast. I'm sure I've seen it, but only once or twice. There was another family in an episode called "Peas In A Pod" about a TV company doing a ripoff of the Bundys based on Kelly's description of the family, but that's not what I'm thinking of.
> 
> Yeah, poor ole' Terry had a fit over Devin DeVasquez:


If it wasn't for her, it probably would have been cancelled long before it was, so I'm grateful for her lol So were the producers-they used to send her a basket of stuff, or something, every Christmas lol


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## phrelin (Jan 18, 2007)

Maybe they could demonstrate their current "where's my show" programming game and announce on Saturday they're moving the 25th Anniversary stuff to Wednesday while "American Idol" will be moved to Thursday and....

Yeah, I'm irked at Fox.


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## mreposter (Jul 29, 2006)

SayWhat? said:


> ...run some of the other stuff like Herman's Head, The New Adventures of Beans Baxter, 21 Jump Street, Parker Lewis Can't Lose or Duet.


Ah, the classics 

I loved Beans Baxter way back in '87.
21 Jump Street was pretty cool back then too - I even watched the short-lived spin-off "Booker" with that amazing thespian Richard Grieco.


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## sum_random_dork (Aug 21, 2008)

Many people in their 30's remember FOX for 90210, for me that's what truly made me watch FOX on a regular basis. Before the age of DVRs if you didn't watch 90210 you wouldn't have anything to talk about the next day in school. As I also recall, wasn't there a spin-off from "Down and Out in Beverly Hills" that started on FOX primetime???


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## spartanstew (Nov 16, 2005)

Henry said:


> So[/I] what are they doing now when they don't even mention _Firefly_ as part of their 25th?


They're treating it like every other show that didn't last a full season - just like they should.


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## phrelin (Jan 18, 2007)

Ok, now that I've determined that "X-Files" (1993-2002) stars Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny plus "Ally McBeal" (1997-2002) star Calista Flockhart "will be among the celebrity participants for FOX's upcoming 25th Anniversary Special, to air on April 22" I guess I'll record and watch it.

But what I'd give to see segments of "Ally McBeal" with Vonda Shepard and Barry White singing and maybe even Josh Groban and Robert Downey Jr.. One would be hard pressed to find a Series Cast list that is as impressive. The show won four Emmy's and three Golden Globes in its five seasons.

In the 1998-99 season Nielsen Ratings "X-Files" ranked #12 with an average 16.39 million viewers and "Ally McBeal" ranked #20 with an average of 13.8 million viewers.

But, of course, it was "The Simpsons" that in 1990 became the first series from a fourth network to enter the top 30 since the demise of the DuMont Network in 1956.

And while I loved the "Firefly," it averaged 4.48 million viewers and ranked 125th. Today, of course that would be a hit on Fox which just renewed "Raising Hope" which pulled 3.95 million viewers last night.


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## SayWhat? (Jun 7, 2009)

phrelin said:


> But what I'd give to see segments of "Ally McBeal" with Vonda Shepard and Barry White singing and maybe even Josh Groban and Robert Downey Jr.


Wasn't too long ago that Reelz Channel ran the whole series. Within the last year or so.


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## The Merg (Jun 24, 2007)

Earl Bonovich said:


> I did as well, what I meant by screwup... was that they canceled it.


And the fact that they aired the episdoes out of order and not all of them at that... 

- Merg


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