Bizarre episodes of sitcoms

As a child, I was always struck by the episode of Gilligan's Island when the castaways actually left their island, only to be taken to another island by a mad scientist experimenting in switching bodies and brains. Outlandish even for the series, the episode still sticks in my mind.

Mary Hartman having a breakdown on the David Susskind show.

The attempted rape of Edith Bunker.

Mel having access to the technology (in Phoenix, AZ in the early 1980s) to replace Alice with a waitressing robot.

I don't think it happens anymore but back in the 80s sitcoms would throw in episodes dealing with serious subject matter. It was always awkward, not funny, and not well acted. Bizarre and horrible.

A, My Name Is Alex

Punky Brewster and her friends get turned into heads in a wall along with Vincent Schiavelli.

Two from Roseanne's second season when it was still good (too many bizarre episodes from the show's last two seasons to count). The first was Somebody Stole My Gal, where Bert, an emotionally needy architect at Dan's new job site, adopts the Conners as a surrogate family. Bert was played by Kevin Dunn, who plays Chief of Staff Ben Cafferty on Veep. I love his portrayal of Cafferty, but he's so annoying as Bert on Roseanne. Luckily he was only on that one episode.

The other was Sweet Dreams, where Roseanne falls asleep and dreams she killed Dan and the kids and is on trial for it. It's a dream episode, so it's supposed to be bizarre, but it just doesn't fit in with the quality of the other shows, and neither did the episode about Bert.

[quote]I don't think it happens anymore but back in the 80s sitcoms would throw in episodes dealing with serious subject matter. It was always awkward, not funny, and not well acted. Bizarre and horrible.

Now they just do out and out ads and political propaganda.

The episode of [italic]Diff'rent Strokes[/italic] where Arnold and Sam become ghostbusters and meet Ray Bolger.

When Wilbur Post sent Mr. Ed to live with Mae West.

Roseambo, where she dispatched terrorists on a train by shooting a tampon in their eyes.

Venus teaches science.

Florence and Robert play Carol's and Mike's parents.

An episode of Growing Pains in which Ben dreamt his life was a television show.

Also, wasn't there an episode of The Jeffersons where Louise was mistaken for a call girl?

I just remembered another one: the Kate & Allie ESP where Allie was homeless for a day.

LaVerne de Fazio on Death Row singing a gospel tune with the condemned inmates.

Episode*

JM J Bullock being raped in the back of a van by two husky women.

So bizarre and unintentionally offensive and over-the-top that they scrubbed the episode from syndication. It became almost lore until a few years ago when someone began posting segments online and we were forced to face the truth:

It happened.

I have a special appreciation for when people behind the scenes don't realize how far they have taken things.

Fonzie jumping the shark became part of the pop culture vernacular for such an occurrence.

Lucy Ricardo traveling to Scotland

Seinfeld visiting India in reverse

Blair Warner's mother having an abortion

In hindsight, the episode of [italic]Silver Spoons[/italic] where Bruce Jenner appeared, if you recall that two years earlier in another episode Derek forced Ricky to dress as a girl when he couldn't get a real one.

When Mr. Carlson molested Dudley.

That awful spinoff attempt of GG with Rita Moreno & the pops from sixteen candles

I'm so excited! I'm so excited! I'm so... SCARED!

[quote]When Mr. Carlson molested Dudley.

[italic]Webster[/italic] upped the ante on the creepiness factor when one of his female classmates got molested as he was right outside the hall waiting for the car to take them home. There they didn't even show the perp. Vicki the Robot from [italic]Small Wonder[/italic], which by right should own this thread, was a guest star and so was Miriam Flynn.

But nothing could top when [italic]Mr. Belvedere[/italic] had Wesley get molested by his camp counselor. One bad touch and suddenly he's scarred for life. But here, keep in mind that in an earlier episode they had him dancing in his underwear like Tammy Cruise in [italic]Risky Business[/italic], so they're ones to talk.

That time R25 did a guest turn on Phyllis

[italic]The Facts of Life[/italic] girls get stoned with Helen Hunt. On that CBS show she was on with Jo's boyfriend Eddie and Pete from [italic]Pete's Dragon[/italic], they also did a pot-themed episode right before they were cancelled.

When Alice blithely lets her son Tommy go on a camping trip with a gay man. That gay man was Tommy's school teacher. It had "very special episode" written all over it. It was just a poorly thought out episode.

Bizarre in a good way: the Frank Grimes episode on The Simpsons. It was almost a definitive commentary on the show itself; it turned everything upside down. And, despite a few random good episodes after that, the show seemed to hit a dead end.

The Jesse James episode of the Brady Bunch. The whole family getting murdered on the train while Bobby screams helplessly traumatized me for life.

So, r30, you come to the DL as a safe space?

Blair's mother didn't have an abortion, R20. She birthed Bailey. That episode was the single most ridiculous episode of TV ever, R30-who the hell would have considered Jesse James a hero?

IIRC Bobby's affinity for Jesse James was based on a TV movie with all the violence cut out.

Once Bobby got over his fascination with Jesse James, he moved on to Charles Manson.

The episode of "I Love Lucy" where Lucy dresses up as Superman for Little Ricky's birthday party.

"Waaaaaah...I'm here to fight for truth, justice and to be in the show at Club Babalu!"

In all seriousness, R34, Bruce Lansbury is Angela Lansbury's brother and Deirdre Lansbury's uncle, and he was a bigwig at Paramount Television at the time (big enough for the credits), so he is two degrees removed from Ol' Chucko.

In an early episode of The Jeffersons, Florence, the maid needs to find a place to live because her building is being torn down. She's so agitated by it that she tells Louise that she's going to kill herself (she basically spends all her money by taking a taxi from Harlem and making it stop at the Waldorf Astoria so she can use a fancy bathroom). Her words are something like, "Tonight, I'm going to take a handful of pills and wake up in the arms of Jesus."

Obviously Louise talks her out of doing it by offering her a chance to be a live-in maid. But it was such a strange comment coming from Florence. Suicide doesn't play well on sitcoms.

That episode of The Flintstones when Betty says, "Look Wilma! There's an X through the guard! *gasp*"

The I Love Lucy where Ethel almost gets raped.

Another I Love Lucy episode was the "blackeye" episode. Ricky tosses a book to Lucy and it hits her and she gets a black eye. Ethel and Fred don't believe their story until they go through the same book tossing routine. Maybe it was funny in 1950s, but it was a bit icky.

[QUOTE] (Facts of Life) Tootie is almost lured into prostitution by a New York City pimp.

I found this more plausible than someone going apeshit over not being able to attend a Jermaine Jackson concert.

What if it was a Jermajesty concert?

I found the Maude episode where her mother visits quite out of place.

The MTM episode where Mary becomes addicted to sleeping pills is very strange and sticks out like a square peg in a round hole compared to most of the other episodes. The show never did PSA episodes and, besides one or two Nixon jokes, hardly ever incorporated current events into the stories. It felt really out of place.

People mention the "A, My Name is Alex" episode of "Family Ties", but there were two other episodes which attempted to tell a Very Special story. The first featured Tom Hanks as the family's favorite uncle -- goofy and lovable but hiding the fact that he was an alcoholic. The second - and I *think* I remember this one but I could be wrong - featured another uncle who kept putting the moves on Mallory until she told her parents. At the end, it turned out the uncle had just divorced and was feeling "lonely" which was why he attempted to seduce his niece. Or something.

That was Steven Keaton's coworker at PBS

MASH had a lot of bizarre episodes but the one that sticks out in my mind is the one where fat little Nurse Kelly rails against Hawkeye for not seeing her as a sex object. It was the only show that featured Nurse Kelly prominently and it was weird. Plus the actress (was she really an actress at all?) who played her was absolutely terrible, like a kid acting in a school play.

The Brady Bunch episode where Bobby dreams that martians come to visit him.

I would say the entire final season of Roseanne qualifies. It went against everything the show was about. Unwatchable.

A two part episode of Chico And The Man after Freddie Prinze died and they waited weeks before acknowledging it. The Man gets pissed because the new young Chico wants to live in the old dead Chico's van and Ed does a monologue about people you love leaving and never coming back.

R49 wins. Horrible, horrible season. Except for the series finale.

I remember as a kid thinking the episode of 'Family Ties' where Steven has an affair with Judith Light was icky. Sitcom dads shouldn't cheat on their wives even if it is with the irresistible Karen Wolek.

[quote]It was the only show that featured Nurse Kelly prominently and it was weird. Plus the actress (was she really an actress at all?) who played her was absolutely terrible, like a kid acting in a school play.

That actress reached her true potential playing a corpse in Clue.

Ah yes, R45. I learned that one is an alcoholic if one drinks vanilla from that episode. I was so naive I was worried that I had a drinking problem at 7 because I was always thirsty.

Wasn't the Jesse James episode of Brady Bunch a response to the film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?

When Johnny Carson guested on MTM but we never saw him, just heard him, due to a blackout.

The Sandford and Son thread reminded me of the episode where Fed accidentally knocks over Lamonts glass collection causing a riff between them. A glass collection which we'd never seen before then, in the middle of the living room.

How about the episode of Three's Company where the Ropers think that Chrissy is pregnant. What was bizarre about the episode was that Joyce DeWitt inexplicably didn't appear. Instead Ann Schedeen, who played Jack's sometimes gf, was living with Jack and Chrissy and got all the Janet lines. It was explained that Janet was away visiting her family. Does anyone know the story behind Joyce not appearing in that episode? Contract dispute? Illness?

Joyce was having a nest of weeping anal warts treated that week

Joyce Dewitt was busy on Broadway for that filming. At least according to her.

I thought her Leggs commercials took up most of her time R60?

She was suffering complications from botched permanent eyeliner surgery.

Broadway? The only activity she'd have been doing on Broadway is panhandling.

There was a bizarre episode of Mork and Mindy with Raquel Welch playing an alien who kidnapped Mork as a sex slave and locked Mindy up in a giant bird cage.

When I was first hired as an Air Traffic Controller in 1988, we were shown an episode of "Kate And Allie" that had been especially produced for the Department of the Treasury to promote Savings Bonds. It was so bizarre watching it!

I think lots of other episodes of shows have been made for other branches of the government to promote various things.

The male strippers on "The Facts of Life." I know that was the craze to feature on shows back then, but the whole thing was so tonally off and bizarre. Yeah, the guys were hot in their 80s way but it was just weird.

"Archie Gets Branded"- a swastika is painted on his door and by the end of the episode, a guy is blown up in a car outside his house, No applause as the show fades to black.

The episode of AITF where Edith accidentally steals something and thinks that makes her a "klepper."

The "Seven Little Indians" murder mystery episode of Facts of Life. One of my favorites.

How is G Sick and Tired bizarre?

The strangest episode of GG is when Rose moves to the beach after a near-death experience.

Wow, what, R65?? I wouldn't have believed it if you hadn't provided the link. Somehow, when I think of secret government activities, commissioning Very Special Sitcom Episodes is not what I would expect.

The last season of Roseanne, yes, and then the very last episode of Roseanne was probably the most bizarre sitcom episode ever created. I was confused and didn't like it at first, but after seeing repeats several times, and looking back on it, I've changed my mind. It's interesting, not formulaic, thoughtful, and smart...and it explains why the last two, especially the very last season were so weird.

[quote]There was a bizarre episode of Mork and Mindy with Raquel Welch playing an alien who kidnapped Mork as a sex slave and locked Mindy up in a giant bird cage.

In the movie about Mork and Mindy, it was shown as yet another mess foisted by the network to boost ratings.

At the end of Roseanne, it's revealed that the entire series was a figment of her imagination. "St. Elsewhere" did it first and better; the entire series took place in the mind of an autistic child. As for Roseanne, well, I could buy the fact that Dan died of a heart attack and Jackie was gay. But David marrying Becky instead of Darlene, and Darlene ending up with Mark? I thought that was unbelieveable and just plain stupid.

cling peaches... in heavy syrup!

The episode of WKRP that addressed the people getting trampled at The Who concert.

Laverne's fiance (a pre Cheers balding Ted Danson) dies fighting a fire. Her coping with death is a laugh a minute riot.

Beverly Hills 90210- Tori Spelling's Character, Donna Martin, becomes a high fashion model in Paris.

Since you mention Mr Belvedere, R25... I've never actually seen this episode, but judging by the clip it looks rather special:

"Married With Children" had a bunch of them, so many that they really weren't "bizarre" after a while-- you just came to accept some of the weirdness. Like the one where the aliens kept stealing Al's dirty socks to use as rocket fuel.

Maude having an abortion. Who knew she was still fertile? Who knew she was a woman?

R79 yes, and Amanda Bearse became more and more butch.

[quote]"St. Elsewhere" did it first and better; the entire series took place in the mind of an autistic child.

The Tommy Westphall dream theory is only implied in the episode, not directly stated. Fans still debate it although over the years more fans than not have come to accept it.

The weirdest part of that theory is the "Tommy Westphall Universe Hypothesis." From Wikipedia:

"The Tommy Westphall universe hypothesis, an idea discussed among some television fans, makes the claim that not only does St. Elsewhere take place within Tommy's mind, but so do numerous other television series which are directly and indirectly connected to St. Elsewhere through fictional crossovers and spin-offs, resulting in a large fictional universe taking place entirely within Tommy's mind.[3][4][5][6][7] In 2002 writer Dwayne McDuffie wrote Six Degrees of St. Elsewhere for the Slush Factory website.[8] In a 2003 article published on BBC News Online, St. Elsewhere writer Tom Fontana was quoted as saying, 'Someone did the math once... and something like 90 percent of all [American] television took place in Tommy Westphall's mind. God love him.'[9]

"An example of crossover

"The St. Elsewhere characters of Dr. Roxanne Turner (Alfre Woodard) and Dr. Victor Ehrlich (Ed Begley, Jr.) appeared on Homicide: Life on the Street.[10][11] Fontana was the executive producer and showrunner for Homicide for its entire seven years.

"Proponents of the Tommy Westphall Universe argue that because of this fictional crossover, the two series exist within the same fictional universe, and within Tommy Westphall's mind because of the final episode of St. Elsewhere; by extension this hypothesis can be extended to series ranging from the science fiction program The X-Files to the entire Law & Order franchise (due to various crossovers with characters from the Homicide series, in particular Det. John Munch)."

Arnold Ziffel, pig on Green Acres, tests his civil rights ('67/'68).

Quite funny and bizarre at the same time.

R78 pretty sure I'm going to hell for laughing at that YouTube clip for like the last 21 minutes.

There was an episode of I Love Lucy where Lucy, Fred and Ethel are redecorating Fred and Ethel's apartment. Lucy cuts into an old feather filled chair to recover it with new fabric. Fred gets hot and turns on the fan and the fan blows all the feathers around the freshly painted room. But somehow Lucy got blamed for the entire mess and the Ricardos gave the Mertzes their old furniture. The entire thing made zero sense, and Lucy couldn't get her new fur stole because they had to buy new furniture.

"Maude having an abortion."

Although she looked a good fifteen years older, Maude was only in her early forties. Women in their forties can certainly become pregnant. But in her case it was so strange, because she looked SO old.

A natural pregnancy in the mid 70s for a 43yo was about as rare as a Yeti sighting

Gilligan had a dream where he was Jack I believe to the Skipper's Giant and tries to steal some valuable oranges. It was bizarre watching the obvious kid stunt double running between skippers legs in fast motion. I remember thinking: How did they make Gilligan so small and why is floppy white so big that you can't see his face! I would check the tv guide daily to see to it the episode was airing.

Speaking of weird "I Love Lucy" episodes, CBS is once again airing the colorized Christmas episode tonight. (Already aired in some time zones.) It was considered so bizarre and atypical that it's the only episode that was never included in the syndication package and was never seen after its first airing until a few years ago when CBS revived it and colorized it.

The last episode of MTM was generally great, but I'm not sure why Lou included "Sue Ann" in his "I treasure you people" speech. He spent four seasons trying to deflect her obnoxious sexual advances. I read the original script didn't include Sue Ann in that final scene and they filmed the first take without her, but Jay Sandrich (I think) said "let's get Betty in this." Also, it made no sense to shoehorn Georgette into that scene. She was always beyond annoying and she was the weakest part of the series.

Tom Shales did a review for that I Love Lucy Christmas show. I can't remember about the review, except that Shales said it was more sad than funny. He said all the characters say to the viewer "Merry Christmas!"...and all the actors are dead and had been for some time. It does seem pretty sad.

[quote] I found this more plausible than someone going apeshit over not being able to attend a Jermaine Jackson concert.

Considering the timeline and how many episodes before that had Tootie talking about Michael Jackson, I'm convinced it was written for Michael and that Jermaine did it because Michael was busy with [italic]Thriller[/italic].

r73 is right. The only thing more unreal about the gorgeous Glenn Quinn marrying plain Lecy Gorensen was him ending up with Sara Gilbert.

I agree R1. Why didn't they just stay in that nicely appointed castle, too? There was electricity!

R73 is wrong-The ENTIRE series was not a dream. Just the last season (or at least the events after Dan's heart attack).

Ummm, R78, this thread is for BIZARRE episodes. Not VERY SPECIAL episodes. Perhaps you're "very special" yourself?

What about the growing pains episode when li'l Ben turned rough trade to feed his cough syrup habit?

Was that one pulled from syndication as well?

The was a really strange episode of King of Queen when Doug took Carrie's oxygen mask when their airplane had some trouble. Carrie got all mad that he didn't think of her first but it was all pretty bleak. And not jokey.

Small Wonders, with Vicki the Robot taking speed.

The All in the Family episode where Jean Stapleton played Edith's double Judith was just strange and really went against the show's grain of being, for the most part, reality-based. The show got close to jumping the shark in season 6 with the introduction of Teresa and turning Edith into an all-knowing saint, but the doppelganger episode is a true jump the shark moment.

Barbara Rush as Nora Clavicle, a spoof of Gloria Steinem and the feminist movement on Batman. Truly bizarre for what was already a bizarre show.

[quote]Bizarre in a good way: the Frank Grimes episode on The Simpsons. It was almost a definitive commentary on the show itself; it turned everything upside down. And, despite a few random good episodes after that, the show seemed to hit a dead end.

Bizarre in a bad way: Homer getting raped by a panda. At least when Norman Lear's shows subjected Edith Bunker and Natalie Green to traumatic attempted sexual assault, they didn't treat the act itself as a joke and they gave them a chance to get away.

And it just got worse after that, not just in its heavy-handed attempts to compete with [italic]South Park[/italic] and [italic]Family Guy[/italic] and falling on its face, but in its unmotivated sentimentality built around poorly constructed resolutions of improbable plots.

R87 doesn't know any old-school Catholics.

"The ENTIRE series was not a dream. Just the last season (or at least the events after Dan's heart attack)."

So Jackie turned gay in the last season, after Dan's heart attack? Becky and Darlene ended up switching brothers in the last season, after Dan's heart attack? I think the general impression is that after Dan's death she rewrote her life story as a form of therapy and that the whole series was her fantasy and in her fantasy Jackie liked men and Darlene was with David and Becky with Mark.

The Growing Pains episode when Mike and friends are at a party or something where people are doing DUN DUN DUN... cocaine! What was bizarre was Kirk Cameron's little self-righteous plea at the end for the kiddies to just say no to drugs. Oh, and gay sex.

R95, R104 is correct. Roseanne begins writing after Dan's heart attack, but the idea is what's depicted in the show overall is her rewriting her life story.

I hated the last couple seasons, but I really liked the last episode (except the Mark/Becky, David/Darlene switch, that made no sense). The very end when Roseanne walks into her dingy livingroom and just collapses from the weight of her life was really compelling.

Well...that's really stupid.

Roseanne made a sitcom that looks as an EKG like a perfect bell curve

Not quite, the first 2 seasons are much much better than the last 2.

You are a ball buster, R109!

But, I suppose you are right...

I definitely place the heart of 1-2 over the Elvis in Vegas indulgence of 8-9

Bizarre but brilliant because it's so outrageous and so, so funny is the final episode Bob Newhart's second TV series where he wakes up in bed with Suzanne Pleshette and realizes he's still in his first TV series and the entire second series was just a dream of his first series character.

They handled gay issues in such a bizarre way on Sanford and Son. In one episode, Fred thinks Lamont is having an affair with Rollo, and Lamont thinks Fred is having an affair with Bubba.

In another, Fred, Lamont, and Rollo get arrested while auditioning for a gay porn film. (They thought it was a legit movie.) The word gay wasn't used but there were no women present in the scene and the director was a flaming queen.

Below Aunt Esther bails them out of jail after the porn arrest:

Rollo was fucking hot!!

I recall that actor playing a brother in law to Rerun on What's Happening when they bet the vacation money on a football game

Christ how old r u fucking ppl? These r my granparents shows. If one a them even wanted to talk abt these shows Id b like ttyl.

R115, we are old enough to know how to spell words correctly.

I am very proud to say:

I'M...

50!!!!!!!!

Gorgeous

I seem to recall a Gilligan's Island episode that was, well, disturbing. A hunter had arrived on the island and had decided that Gilligan was to be his prey so Gilligan was set loose to run and hide on the island and the hunter had a deadline to hunt Gilligan down and kill him while the other castaways kept trying to hide him and keep him safe. The deal, of course, was that if Gilligan was able to stay alive for whatever period of time, the hunter would take the castaways back to Hawaii with him on his plane. I don't remember how it ended, except that the hunter, of course, double-crossed the castaways. It was rarely but occasionally shown.

Does anybody else remember that episode or did I dream it?

Hey R110, I would have let it go if you hadn't said a "perfect" bell curve.

The Cosby episode where Claire and the kids were all on vacation and the college student babysitter showed up by accident to find Cliff home alone. He decided to make the two of them dinner, he served her a drink for an appetizer. I don't remember what happened next.

The episode was removed from syndication.

R119, Gilligan lives, but the hunter leaves and goes insane.

The final 2 years of Seinfeld.

I thought it was bizarre that I was dropped from FRIENDS.

There was an episode of "One Day at A Time" that was one long monologue by Ann (Bonnie). I think none of the other cast appeared.

A lot of Roseanne episodes have been mentioned. But the one I'm thinking of happened sometime after Lecy Goranson came back to replace Sarah Chalke. They would occasionally have fun and have Chalke pop up for no reason, like in the Halloween episode. But there was one where both actresses played Becky in different scenes of the same show, and there was no mention of it, not even any jokes.

How about the Family Guy episode where Brian and Stewie get stuck in the bank vault and ings go to shit. Like the shit Stweie mad Brian eat of his diaper just to fuck with him.

I think the monologue episode of ODAT included those immortal words"Hold me David,I'm scared."

R115 has never heard of syndication. The two Sanford and Son episodes I mentioned I saw just recently on TV One.

There was a Simpsons episode from one of the first few seasons that I think it is now considered classic. It's the "Bart, Daredevil" episode. Bart gets a skateboard(?) and starts riding over ramps like Evil Kenevil. (Evil even had a cameo in the hospital). Bart gets over-excited and decides he wants to jump the Grand Canyon, and makes plans to do just that. Homer is terrified and tries to stop Bart at the end. He convinces Bart to not to thru with it, but ends up stepping on the board by accident and he, himself rides over the Canyon. Homer ALMOST makes it, but.....

The original ending was thought to be so violent and grisly that Fox edited it and it was never shown again. I have it someplace on VHS.

r65, Cheers did an episode to promote savings bonds as well. Hollywood is a brand if the government.

*branch ^^

Very 80s/Reagan

How about the episode of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills when Taylor zips herself into the suitcase. Anyone? Anyone?

I remember an Episode of Ellen where Ellen had a date with a man. I thought that was bizarre.

There was a Happy Days episode from the first season when Richie had an older brother. He was never seen or heard from again.

Not a sitcom, but the "Three Sisters" episode of Knots Landing with Valene and the other gals of Seaview Circle staying at a haunted house. Valene, possessed by the ghost children there, nearly wound up jumping to her death. Poor Val!

There was an episode of Cheers where Diane gets stuck in a hole under the bar.

"There was an episode of "One Day at A Time" that was one long monologue by Ann (Bonnie). I think none of the other cast appeared."

There were other people in the episode. Ann starts feeling old and she sees a doctor (a plastic surgeon) who tells her she's fine the way she is. She thinks he's interested in her and invites him to her party (a birthday party, I think). He was up with his date in tow; a girl Julie's age. Crushed, she retreats into the bedroom and goes into a long monologue about aging and whatnot. But at the end of the episode she's recovered and goes back to the party and dances with abandon.

A "Lucy Show" episode where Kim (Lucie Arnaz) enters a Lucille Ball lookalike contest and loses. Lucy played "Herself" and Lucy Carmichael in the final scene.

Here's the infamous "Ann's Crisis" ep monologue, R139.

I love how throughout the episode, Ann keeps talking about turning 36 as "middle age."

And the gleam in Bonnie's eyes in the monologue..... "I SMELL AN EMMY NOMINATION!"

The Munsters. It was one of the later episodes. Grandpa makes some potion that is supposed to get rid of Herman's bad cold. Herman drinks it, his cold is gone, but it also turns him into a woman. For the next 15 minutes, it's Fred Gwynne as Herman Munster in drag. Grandpa then makes an antidote potion, Herman drinks it, and is suddenly: a real man. (Fred Gwynne as himself looking very handsome). Lily sees him, screams, then almost passes out because he's so ugly! She can't bear to be in the same room with him. Finally, Grandpa concocts the right potion and Herman is back to "normal". It was one of the funniest and most bizarre episodes of any sitcom I had ever seen.

That sounds like your average run of the mill episode of "The Munsters"!

The "Punky Brewster" episode where Cherie gets locked inside of a refrigerator after playing hide-and-go-seek, and the kids have to perform CPR to save her....

made me terrified of ever getting locked inside of a refrigerator as a kid!

The "Punky Brewster" episode where Punky is terrified of a serial killer, who is loose in Chicago, coming to kill her or kill Henry.. So she boobytraps her room.

In retrospect, "Punky Brewster" was a very bizarre, and pretty dark show for kids.

R119 you remember that Gilligan episode because old school DL favorite Rory Calhoun played the hunter!

The episode of Designing Women where Mary Jo sees the face of Jesus in a snow shovel.

OK, last one about "Punky Brewster.."

When Punky's fat cousin Louise comes to visit and everyone is so appalled that she is so obese, everyone makes fat jokes about the poor girl (including herself) and they try force her to lose weight.. can you imagine the outcry if that aired on a kid's show nowadays?!

I remember watching a Lassie episode in the Timmy years where a huge production was made of Timmy getting his first onscreen spanking. Mom was peeping in the window and Lassie was whining. My mom said it was a reaction by the studio to public scorn over Timmy's sugary sweetness. Not in those words, i was a kid.

My favorite episode, R149

I love "Bob's Burgers" but last year they had this weird and very stupid episode about getting a new couch then wanting the nasty old couch back. It was so poorly written.

And, on "The Golden Girls" there's the very stupid/illogical episode where Rose thinks Bob Hope is her father. I think that was after she thought Don Ameche was her father.

There's that mistaken identity episode of Three's Company where Mr. Roper notices Jack leeringly looking at Chrissie. So Mr. Roper thinks Jack is really straight pretending to be gay. So Jack has to convince Mr. Roper that he really is gay, even though he's really straight.

I thought it was really bizarre because they kept repeating the same episode every week.

[quote]There was an episode of Cheers where Diane gets stuck in a hole under the bar.

She was pregnant in that one. Kate and Allie ran out of ideas to hide Susan St James pregnancy, so they just made Allie pregnant too.

Or you could do what the Dick Van Dyke show did when Millie was pregnant, just ignore it.

Wasn't there an episode of Perfect Strangers where the two found out they weren't really related to each other.

Just like Stephanie on All In The Family, she's not a blood relative of Edith at all.

Like The Brady Bunch Jesse James ep mentioned upthread, Happy Days had one where Fonz fell asleep watching a horror film and had a nightmare that his cool was stolen by a mad scientist played by hunky Dick Gautier.

No, R151. The Bob Hope episode was before the Don Ameche episode. And Don Ameche actually was her father, she didn't "think" he was.

My favorite "bizarre episode" of a series is the Halloween episode of "Facts of Life" where everyone thinks Mrs. Garrett is possessed by a dead murderer and is now killing people and turning them into bratwurst.

There's an episode of Phyllis where Cloris Leachman goes out of her way to help a man she assumes is gay who can't find a meeting space for his 'group.' Turns out he's not gay at all; he's a Nazi sympathizer and meeting up with his fellow pro-Nazis what the meeting was really about.

Season 2, episode 4. - The Great Debate

I am Cait

Does anyone else remember the Brady Bunch episode where Bobby and Cindy go skinnydipping at their neighbor's house? I believe the scene in question, where Alice sees that they're naked under their robes, was pulled from syndication.

Remember when Alice told Bobby to go skinny dipping but she's have to "inspect" Cindy's suit closer

It's not a sitcom, but a comedy show nonetheless:

the episode of "Whose Line is It , Anyway?" with Richard Simmons.

A very recent episode of Modern Family where a goat explodes or dies in a grease fire, or some such. DISGUSTING. Now if it had been that fat fuck Eric Stonestreet INSTEAD - well, that would have made for great TV.

It runs into a wall. You're really not funny.

What do you mean Stephanie wasn't a blood relative to the. Bunkers? Isn't she the daughter of Edith's no-good deadbeat cousin?

Many I Love Lucy episode can be considered bizarre, but I think the one where she pretends to be a sculpted head is particularly bizarre. When I was a kid it scared the crap out of me for some reason.

I think an even more bizarre episode of "Maude" was when she was diagnosed with manic depression. She got the idea in her head that Henry Fonda should become president, and went to ridiculous (unbelievable) lengths to get him to run. When she realizes he's not interested in running for president, she goes into a major funk.

Like the Kimberley Drummond eating disorder episode of " Diffr'ent Strokes," Maude became mentally ill out of the blue. I don't think her "illness" was ever mentioned before or after that "special" two-part episode.

That Golden Girls episode where they all thought Lazlo was hot. I've never seen anything more bizarre.

[quote]There was a Simpsons episode from one of the first few seasons that I think it is now considered classic. It's the "Bart, Daredevil" episode. Bart gets a skateboard(?) and starts riding over ramps like Evil Kenevil. (Evil even had a cameo in the hospital). Bart gets over-excited and decides he wants to jump the Grand Canyon, and makes plans to do just that. Homer is terrified and tries to stop Bart at the end. He convinces Bart to not to thru with it, but ends up stepping on the board by accident and he, himself rides over the Canyon. Homer ALMOST makes it, but.....

[quote]The original ending was thought to be so violent and grisly that Fox edited it and it was never shown again. I have it someplace on VHS.

It not only wasn't edited out, it was featured in a few different clip shows later on in the show's run. It's one of the most famous gags they've ever done. I just watched it again on FXX this past weekend. It is, indeed, pretty grisly, but Jesus Christ is it funny.

The episode of Alice where Vera thinks George Burns really is God.

The scene from Bart the Daredevil:

[quote]But David marrying Becky instead of Darlene, and Darlene ending up with Mark? I thought that was unbelieveable and just plain stupid.

Actually, that's the only thing that didn't bother me about the finale. It makes perfect sense.

Christ how old r u fucking ppl? These r my granparents shows. If one a them even wanted to talk abt these shows Id b like ttyl.

Syndication. You stupid twat.

Forgive me if this has already been posted BUT does anyone remember the episode of "Facts of Life" where Jo died in a motorcycle accident on her first day at the school. But they brought her character back as if it never happened?

Oh. man. Sorry I fucked up the formatting there^^^

The Puerto Rican.day episode of Seinfeld that is never.shown in syndication.

The (I think final) episode of "Father Knows Best" where Robert Young is a cowboy in a Western. I don't think any of the regular cast appears.

You're not imagining things,R159. The episode probably exists intact in the DVD set.

R170, that reminds me of a Super Dave sketch from the show called, well, Bizarre!

[quote]does anyone remember the episode of "Facts of Life" where Jo died in a motorcycle accident on her first day at the school. But they brought her character back as if it never happened?

Weird. All I can find about this is a rumor about that 2001 reunion movie where the rest of the cast gets together for Jo's funeral after a motorcycle accident.

R168, wasn't there more footage added to the clip for the Simpson's clip show?

Remember when an alien named Mork just showed up on Happy Days for no reason? Yeah.

[quote]What do you mean Stephanie wasn't a blood relative to the. Bunkers? Isn't she the daughter of Edith's no-good deadbeat cousin?

No, I forget the exact linage but Edith explains Stephanie's father is married to her STEP-cousin. So not only isn't Edith not related to Stephanie she's only related to Floyd by marriage.

The cut scene from the Brady Bunch

Really R177? That's crazy I swear I remember this. They were in their uniforms--so this was after they got rid of the Sixteen Candles crew--and Tootie and Natalie or Natalie and Blair were trying to convince Jo not to go riding that night. I think it was the first time the character was introduced. And I distinctly remember the gang standing in silence--like in most 80s sitcoms--when they were told about the accident and then there was the typical no applause credit roll.

FUCK this is driving me crazy!

So what this thread boils down to is that sitcoms by their very nature are bizarre that "normal" episodes are the exception.

For the reunion movie, Nancy McKeon asked that Jo be killed in a motorcycle wreck in a time before the film was set so she would not have to come back.

Instead, the script has Jo busy being a cop so her biker daughter comes to the reunion alone.

R149 "Lassie" was not a sitcom.

thanks to whomever posted the Punky Brewster clips... brings back memories! and yes, by today's standards, it was a weird show!

Does anyone remember Sticks on Happy Days? That was just bizarre.

NWell, maybe not intentionally, R185...

An episode from the last season of "The Bob Newhart Show" that wasn't exactly bizarre but felt like it had been lifted from another series.

While Bob is away on a book promotion tour, Emily and Howard befriend an elderly neighbor, played by Mildred Natwick, in their building who insists on living as if it still the 1920s.

The episode had a sentimental "aaww" tone that the rest of the series just didn't have.

R187 What's even more bizarre is that the actor who played "Sticks" became porn star Jack Baker.

Not a sitcom but Star Trek TOS when Kirk trades bodies with a woman.

R168 I could be mistaken, but I think they originally edited out the second clip for syndication when the back of the ambulance opens causing Homer to fall out and back down into the Canyon. Maybe they later put it back in after it had developed such a large cult following.

It's bizarre that OP reposted a thread topic -- word for word! -- from 2009.

[quote]Forgive me if this has already been posted BUT does anyone remember the episode of "Facts of Life" where Jo died in a motorcycle accident on her first day at the school. But they brought her character back as if it never happened?

Jo died in a motorcycle accident in Beverly Ann's "It's a Wonderful Life" dream sequence in the last season.

The most bizarre thing I find about The Facts of Life is that it managed to stay on the air for almost 10 years!!

r192

It's even more bizarre you searched to find it. Really, don't you have ANY life?

Sadly, many of us on here don't. THANK HEAVENS FOR DATA LOUNGE!!!

[quote] [R168] I could be mistaken, but I think they originally edited out the second clip for syndication when the back of the ambulance opens causing Homer to fall out and back down into the Canyon. Maybe they later put it back in after it had developed such a large cult following.

That's odd. I remember watching the original airing of said episode then subsequent repeats, and I don't recall this scene ever being cut. I would have remembered if the ambulance crash was cut in syndication because that was one of my favorite gags of the earlier seasons.

Speaking of the Simpsons, every post 2000 Simpsons is bizarre and stupid. In my world, the Simpsons ended at season 10 (and All in the Family ended when Gloria and Meathead moved to California).

The Family Guy when Brian dies is totally manipulative and way out of character for the show.

"Many I Love Lucy episode can be considered bizarre, but I think the one where she pretends to be a sculpted head is particularly bizarre. When I was a kid it scared the crap out of me for some reason."

It wasn't really a bizarre episode. Lucy was always pretending to be something: a ball player, Superman, an alien creature, Harpo Marx. Lucy WAS bizarre.

The end of Bob Newhart was spoofing the dream that Bobby Ewing had in Dallas

The Brideless Groom episode on The Three Stooges. My favorite.

[quote]The Brady Bunch episode where Bobby dreams that martians come to visit him.

Not surprisingly, the only cast member missing from R48's photo is Robert reed/

Speaking of the Bob Newhart Show, there was that episode that had the Grim Reaper appearing briefly in one of the elevators at Bob's office. It got a long laugh from the men in the audience. It was supposedly groundbreaking and TV Guide called it a "great sight gag" and featured it on the page in a "Close Up." But I thought it was unfunny and just weird.

There is a bizarre "Gilligan's Island" where a bounty hunter arrives and tries to hunt down and KILL Gilligan for 24 hours! It is in terrible taste and quite menacing for a Sherwood Schwartz sit-com!

On Northern Exposure, there was a long dream / daydream sequence where the whole cast is reimagined in New York. I think Dr. Fleischman dreamed it. The blonde waitress, Shelly, was a happy hooker, and Maggie was a glamorous seductress. So weird.

There were other odd episodes, like the one with Peter Bogdonavich. He had a cameo as himself. He'd been corresponding by fax with Ed the film buff. He just shows up in the woods one day and he and Ed go to dinner at Maurice's (the guy who hates gays and calls them sodomites). That one was a bizarre but great episode.

R204 That same episode was mentioned about halfway down the thread. It starred Rory Calhoun. A few people commented on it.

The DESIGNING WOMEN episode where Suzanne Super Glue-d her mouth shut. It was obvious that tptb were punishing her for spilling the beans on a Baba Wawa special about their treatment of her. But she and the episode were just as funny as ever.

I do believe we have a winner....

Did you make that lame clip, R208? I only ask because it's already been posted and either you're too lazy to read or you have some stake in the hits on a video that's only marginally funny at best.

Agreed, R209. When I clicked on it this time I remembered it from when it was posted last year. Pretty sure someone's trying to get some clicks out of it.

[quote]Does anyone remember Sticks on Happy Days? That was just bizarre.

I think he is remembered more for his porn career than Happy Days.

I would nominate the "Maude's Dilemma" double episode of Maude in Season 1. They were both written by Susan Harris and what is bizarre is that Harris's writing here is surprisingly unfunny.

R212, You dismissed me!

The episode of The Cosby Show where all the men get pregnant and give birth to their favorite things. Really fucking bizarre.

There was a strange episode of the Nanny with a hair salon owner and some goofy awkward girl that I think was a spin off attempt. Really, really weird and random.

Moonlighting had a lot of bizarre episodes. Many of them were bizarre but great: the dual dream sequence where both David and Maddie dream about an unsolved murder from the 50s (Cybill singes"Blue Moon" and Orson Wells introduced the episode), "Atomic Shakespeare" and the one featuring "Big Man on Mulberry Street." Unfortunately in the last 2 seasons there were also a few bad-bizarre episodes.

Another crazy one that worked well: :The Straight Poop. Rona Barret does an expose on just what the hell is going on with the show and the leads.

r213

This is what Maude said to her unborn baby.

[quote]can you imagine the outcry if that aired on a kid's show nowadays?!

That barely scratches the surface of the weirdness that happened on [italic]Punky Brewster[/italic]. They turned themselves into dupes of the drug war with that Just Say No business and took it even further than [italic]Diff'rent Strokes[/italic] did, but right after the two-part "The Perils of Punky" which couldn't possibly have been created without some kind of chemical enhancement. And when they went into first-run syndication rather than lose any more viewers to [italic]60 Minutes[/italic] and [italic]Disney[/italic], they made Henry into a pill-popper.

I always enjoyed when socialite Margaux would visit the rest home where punky was being held captive

R215 that was what the industry calls a "backdoor pilot." Like the Rita Moreno episode of Empty Nest.

Punky also had an episode about the Challenger explosion. The title: Accidents Happen. I'm not kidding.

And they even had Buzz Aldrin to convince Punky not to give up her dream of becoming an astronaut, one Homer Simpson would get to live out eight years later once again with Mr. Aldrin as a guest star.

Buzz has to feed the K2 habit somehow...

The episode of [italic]Gimme A Break![/italic] where Nell and her diet group get stuck in an elevator trying to save the founder of their diet group, who gained back all the weight he lost, from killing himself by jumping off the top floor of a hotel.

This is reaching back a bit, but on that Davey and Goliath preachy stop-animation show had an episode where Davey meets a new kid who was deaf. Davey took the new kid's aloofness as being stuck-up and dumb. I recall gasping aloud when, after trying to explain his situation and pointing to his ear, the new kid is mocked by Davey with: 'Ya, you bet you oughta shoot yourself for being so dumb!" I wonder if this episode will be back in syndication now. :(

On the Brady Bunch where Greg and Marcia run for class president against each other though they're in different classes

Greg is groovy!

OMG, r181. That scene is horrifying!

The later years of [italic]The Jeffersons[/italic] had some unusual ones to say the least, but none was more bizarre than Louise meeting Sammy Davis, Jr. in 1983 and believing it to be for the first time, completely forgetting she met him when they lived next door to the Bunkers. Two years later, right before they were cancelled, she becomes obsessed with meeting Engelbert Humperdinck in Atlantic City, brushing off both Helen Reddy and Charo in the process and not even recognizing him when she actually does see him.

The only way I can buy any of this is if she were in the early stages of a rare and undiagnosed form of dementia.

[quote]OMG, [R181]. That scene is horrifying!

You think that was bad? [italic]The Partridge Familly[/italic] had Danny got drafted (!); he had to strip down for the inspection like all the other draftees, and they paraded him around in white briefs while all the grown men surrounding him were in boxers. And they had the nerve to complain about David Cassidy showing off his pubes; well, at least he actually had them!

Fun with audio editing.

Got = get

When Endorra made Darrin's ears grow. It's not like anyone would notice the difference in real life.

"Moonlighting" wasn't really a sitcom, but it could get pretty bizarre. Was it the finale episode where pregnant Maddie goes into labor and Bruce Willis plays her and David's unborn baby in heaven (complete with a bow in his hair, what there is of it). Maddie has a miscarriage the baby soul in heaven doesn't get to have them as parents after all. Someone tells him (an angel) that he'll be eventually be born in a baby with different parents but baby Willis whines "but I want THEM!" It was so weird and unfunny.

"The Partridge Familly had Danny got drafted (!); he had to strip down for the inspection like all the other draftees, and they paraded him around in white briefs while all the grown men surrounding him were in boxers. And they had the nerve to complain about David Cassidy showing off his pubes; well, at least he actually had them!"

Actually, that was a pretty funny episode. Danny does get drafted. Shirley tried to inform the army that he's only a little kid, but nobody listens to her. So she decides to let him go and get his draft physical. Eventually it's found out that he's nine or ten years old and everything gets all worked out. I think the episode was playing on how incompetent the army, which isn't bizarre at all.

R234: That sounds just dreadful.

[italic]Married with Children[/italic] was going to make Peggy pregnant when Katey Sagal got pregnant, but then she miscarried so the writers retconned it as a dream rather than make her carry a fake baby to term when they didn't have to. Yet they still ended up with a new kid anyway the next year; at least that didn't last too long and the show got rid of him and survived it.

He was called "Seven" and the episodes were very strange. And no mention of him once he was gone. (are those episodes even run in syndication?)

What about all the sitcom "pets" that would come and go before finally disappearing for good without ever being mentioned? Like Tiger the dog on The Brady Bunch, and the dog on Married With Children, and the dog on Mad About You. There were plenty more.

r237

His picture was on a milk carton later on.

I couldn't believe what R234 was saying, so I looked it up. Jesus Christ, how weird! Was this just part of an effort to keep Willis and Shepherd from having to film scenes together?

The Drag Queen Episodes from All in The Family

Something upthread reminded me of the episode of Mary Tyler Moore when all the men in the office were in love with Mary and fantasized (individually) about having her as their girlfriend. I was just a little kid when I saw it, and I was really creeped out by that.

r240, it was the first episode of the final (5th) season of Moonlighting. Cybill was pregnant with twins during the 4th season so they wrote it so that Maddie was in Chicago staying with her parents and over 1/2 of the 4th season was a solo David Addison solving cases in Los Angeles on his own. There were short scenes of Cybill interwoven into these episodes where she was filmed from the waist up, but then they decided to write it into the storyline - Maddie wasn't sure if the baby was Bruce Willis' or Mark Harmon's (who had guest starred at the end of season 3). Towards the end of Season 4, a pregnant Maddie returned but engaged to another man - not Mark Harmon - who she met on the train from Chicago to L.A.

If you've never watched Moonlighting, I recommend it but make sure you stop after Season 3.

I didn't think the All In The Family episodes with Beverly La Salle were bizarre. I thought they were very funny. Beverly La Salle was a very positive character; funny and nice and likeable. I thought his death was one of the saddest things ever on a tv sitcom.

Was Bev the one who choked on the ham sandwich?

[quote] What about all the sitcom "pets" that would come and go before finally disappearing for good without ever being mentioned? Like Tiger the dog on The Brady Bunch, and the dog on Married With Children, and the dog on Mad About You. There were plenty more.

[italic]Gimme A Break![/italic] did the opposite: one week the Kaniskys' goldfish, Gertrude, would die, and then she would keep coming back to life, reappearing and dying in some other unusual way. Yet she actually outlived the Chief and Grandma Kanisky and moved with Nell, Addy and Joey to New York, and when Nell tried to get her a boyfriend named Gus, the boyfriend predeceased her.

The finale of Mad About You had a scene of twenty years later where the daughter realizes the dog they call Murray cannot be the same dog they had before and when she was born.

Every episode of My Two Dads.

R208, that's not even the most bizarre line from that episode. Mr. Owens' line "you can't get AIDS just by fooling around" and his reaction to that was far funnier than the slanted headline by the lazy context-ignoring uploader would suggest.

Moonlighting was a great show through season 3, but there were a lot of behind the scene problems (not all were attributable to Cybill and/or Bruce, despite all the stories). The writers were really creative in dealing with the problem of completing new episodes, hence episodes like "The Straight Poop." But when Cybill got pregnant they just didn't know how to deal with it and went off the rails.

r1

The cast always said they liked that as well as the dream sequences as they could do something different.

[quote]But nothing could top when Mr. Belvedere had Wesley get molested by his camp counselor.

Wesley's counselor was hot.

THE FACTS OF LIFE episode when a fashion photographer wanted to make squat, barrel-chested Tootie into a model...