The Golden Girls season 7.5 would've been better than Golden Palace

And they could've driven over to the Mortimer Club and let the air of the tires on Barbara Thorndyke's Cadillac Seville in the "free" parking lot...

As brilliant as the other three women were, there was no show without Bea. The two episodes of Golden Palace where she returned were wonderful and made it clear that you needed all four of them for the show to feel balanced. They'd be doomed without her one way or another.

Jean could've written and performed a one-woman show about the beauty of Rose's big breasts...

It was 30 plus years ago and they are ALL dead.

Let it go, Mary!

^ then why is Jean still hanging onto Rose's big Scandinavian breasts?

The finale kind of started out the right way: Sophia going with Dorothy, Rose moving in with her family. They could have had Blanche visit the daughter who was artificially ensemenated and find out there were some of her type of seniors in the area with a particular handsome gentleman who caught her eye and she decided to move there so she and her daughter could finally have a new start.

Then, when they sell the house, the buyers turn out to be Coco and his partner. After a tearful farewell between the girls, Sophia turns to Coco and his partner and says, "Hey Fancy Man, promise you won't turn my room into a sex dungeon. You already have the anchor holes in Blanche's room." Dorothy grabs her and pulls her out the door as the old episode ending tag plays. Coco's partner looks up at him confused and Coco shakes his head staring at the closed front door.

Also, I think it would have been a nice touch if they had shown the cast taking their final bows before the credits rolled.

R6 Sophia should've moved in with Angela. She was too old to be hanging out with Rose and Blanche. (They were young enough to be her daughters)

I can't watch the finale at all. It's just a poorly constructed episode. And everything comes at you so fast that you really don't feel anything. Plus, it comes right after the two parter where Rose almost kicks the bucket.

They should have introduced Dorothy's love interest earlier in the season and given time for it to truly blossom. Instead, they cram everything into 48 minutes.

The Blanche episode with Ken Howard was ten times better. Of course, the writers just dropped it afterwards.

I stop at Home Again, Rose which for me makes much more sense as a series finale. Rose has a health scare, and the girls rush to her side. It reinforces the series theme, which was that these four ladies would be together through thick and thin. Had they dropped the non-existent B plot with Blanche's daughter and put Miles in there instead it would have been a perfect episode.

Bea wanted to quit after season five.

[quote] "And they could've driven over to the Mortimer Club and let the air of the tires on Barbara Thorndyke's Cadillac Seville in the "free" parking lot..."

While the Seville may be the smaller, "sportier", and more appropriate model for Thorndyke, the DeVille is, at least in name, even better.

How can we make this happen?

^Get a Ouji board and a voodoo priest or priestess.

Nobody from the show is alive today. Sad. Even Becky with the bad hair is dead (Debra Engle 1953-2023, frontotemporal dementia).

My opinion exactly

I love season 7, so I could have seen another season being decent to good.

If definitely would have been better. The new characters and situation detracted from the show (and it didn’t even make sense that women their age would take on something like that!).

They could have brought on a new roommate whose personal circumstances reinvigorated the show.

Without Dorothy it didn’t work.

R17 R18 It's too bad Nancy Walker died in early 1992. Aunt Angela might've worked as the new roommate.

Nah, Nancy was a lot to take in her one episode. The new addition needed to be more human and less cartoon.

R20 I disagree

Angela was one of the weaker characters. We were supposed to believe she both was an old-school Sicilian who hangs with goats and has been in the states long enough to have a thick Brooklyn accent and big-city attitude.

And her tension with Sophia was one-dimensional. Don’t know of anyone hoping they had more time to explore their relationship.

R22 go jump in a lake.

I much preferred Angela to Angelo, I'll say that much.

May your sauce never cling to your pasta, R22!

NOW a warning?!?!?!

R20 agree , could never stand her. I loved Angelo though even if his accent was ridiculous, he was funny.

I love Nancy Walker as Ida Morgenstern, one of my favorite characters of all time on tv, but just do not feel she worked as Angela. Primarily because she was essentially given Estelle's schtick and Estelle did it better.

I would like to have seen Uncle Angelo become obsessed with Kim Kardashian...

By his own admission, he was a "butt man"

Dinah Manoff talks about the four Golden Girls in a 2021 interview.

"Well, each of them was -- and Betty still is -- a treasure, in their own way. Complicated. Complicated women. I got to know Estelle quite well, because she ended up being on our show for the last year or two. And I loved Estelle. I mean, I deeply, deeply loved her. She was a great lady and a real pro. And funny. I mean a funny person, not just a funny actress. Bea was very complicated and very interesting... and very likable in some ways and not likable in other ways. She ran a tough set. For instance, she did not allow any gum-chewing on the "Golden Girls" stage. And I got sworn at, when I was over there chewing gum. She was quite tough. But I also kind of found that, with Bea, it was like, "Oh, it's just Bea Arthur being Bea Arthur." You know? I mean, how cool to be yelled at by Bea Arthur! [Laughs]. And Betty is as darling as she seems. And Rue was charming. I didn't get to know Rue. But she was always nice and charming to me."

R9 great points. I thought Leslie should have been introduced before the Rose two partner so it's not such a whirlwind with Dorothy just dropping everyone in a matter of minutes.

And it would have been a nice touch to have the guy who made Blanche feel like a lady be her plus one to the wedding, even just a quick shot of him beside her.

I get that they needed to send Dorothy off somewhere but they had much longer to plan it that just the last 2 episodes, from what I understand there was no real hope that Bea would sign on for S8 so it wasn't a surprise to the writing team, but certainly feels that way.

OP I guess there wasn't such a thing as short seasons back then, I understand NBC cut their budget for S8 hence the move to CBS.

Does anybody know if the Dateline: Miami episode was to test audience reaction to no Dorothy? It's an early s7 episode where Bea appears for about a minute.

Incidentally it's the episode Betty got an Emmy nominations for over Rue's Rusty Anchor episode and Bea's finale submission.

You're off your game, girls.

This thread or variations of it has been done before. Multiple times.

R33 that thread is about Season 7. This thread is about how the show could have carried on after, instead of TGP

At Season 1 of Gokden Girls Sophia was 80. This means that at the Golden Palace she was 87-88. And she still had the energy to help run a hotel and restaurant?

Logic didn’t play any role in the imagining of Golden Palace. I recall watching the pilot at the time and thinking it was written in thirty minutes.

Plus where did they get the money to buy it?

Dorothy, Rose & Sophia were supposedly able to afford to buy into the house in s7 with what?

And why would they risk their finances and jobs to run a business for the first time? Sophia's food stall doesn't count as it burned down within weeks of opening

From the sale of Blanche's house, R37.

Blanche's house afforded the purchase of a good sized Miami hotel near the beach?

They should have dropped in that Rose won $$$ from her Sexual predator Dentist and Sophia's husband (did they divorce?) left her a windfall.

Whatever happened to the money from the sale of Rose's farm and Dorothy's house with Stan?

Sorry, shouldn't try to turn this into another inconsistency thread!

I’m pretty sure you can depend on AI developing seven more seasons within the next year or so. Creepy!

R39 Blanche and Rose were prostitutes for a while and made some good money. Sophia was their pimp. They had enough to buy a hotel. They never told Dorothy.

The royalties from the 1920s classic "Sophia Does Sicily" finally came through..

"Picture it: My vagina!"