Only Urkel Matters, Episode 0.0

(Photo Credit: Hilary Kramer)

“Introduction”

In this world that we live in, it seems that we disagree with each other more and more.  This makes it absolutely essential that we cling tightly to the things we can agree on.  One of these universally agreed upon truths is that we need to rediscover what it was to feel connected.  To grow together and bond with each other.  To love each other.  I’m sure I’m not the only one who asks himself these days, “What ever happened to predictability?  The milkman?  The paperboy?  Evening TV?”  I just wish that my old familiar friends were waiting just around the bend, you know?

                Fortunately, they are.  Heading around that bend takes you back to a simpler time.  A better time.  A time when there was nothing to do on a Friday night but watch middle-aged men get emasculated by their wives and families.  I’m talking of course, about revisiting the poorly-written sitcoms of the nineties, specifically the ones on ABC’s Friday night lineup, affectionately called “TGIF” (“Thank God It’s Friday,” obviously, although now they’d probably have to say that the G stood for “goodness” so that the atheists among us could also learn valuable life lessons from DJ Tanner’s creepy uncles).  From now until I get bored and quit, I’ll be watching and recapping episodes from this “Golden” era of television.  In actuality, “golden” is inaccurate.  These shows were not very good.  What’s lower than bronze?  Puce?  This was the Puce Era of TV.  I’ll be starting, of course, with Family Matters.

(Note:  I did some research to see if there were any lower medals than bronze.  There aren’t, but I did find out that athletes that finish in the Top 8 in their events receive a certificate, which I feel is an interesting bit of information)

(Other Note:  Do you think as soon as I publish this, Myspace Tom will get the first hit in years on his Google Alert for “Top 8?”  Hi Tom!)

                Why Family Matters?  Because it was one of the original TGIF programs.  Full House and Perfect Strangers were also in that lineup and were also popular shows, but neither of them had Steve Urkel in them.  I don’t remember any of the early episodes of Family Matters, so I’m super excited to see the exact moment that it dawns on the actors that this show called “Family Matters” will not be about the family, and that their family does not, in fact, matter.  It has to happen pretty quickly.  I mean, look at this DVD cover for season one.  Urkel takes up 85 percent of the photo!

                Family Matters is technically a spin-off.  Harriet Winslow, the mother in Family Matters, (I’d write matriarch, but let’s call a spade a spade: Mother Winslow is the matriarch of the Winslow family) played an elevator operator on the previously mentioned Perfect Strangers.  The show began on September 22, 1989 and ran on ABC until May 9, 1997.  CBS then picked it up for one more season, but canceled it due to poor ratings.  The final season included a six-month hiatus in the middle of the season, which is never a good sign.  The final episode, which I still have not seen due to an abhorrent job done by CBS’ advertisement team, aired on July 17th, 1998.

That’s enough background information for now. We have all the time in the world to get into dumb facts about dumb episodes of a dumb television show. Next week, I’ll begin the recap, starting with the initial episode, “The Mama Who Came to Dinner,” which is, of course, a terrible title for the pilot episode of a television series.

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