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[shadowkat]

Watching Breaking Bad - second season at the moment. Today while watching Pioneers of Television : The Western - realized why I despised Bonanza, and my mother who lived Westerns was never that into Bonanza - it was written and created by a misogynist - who stated that he didn't want any women characters, that there were too many Westerns and tv shows about mothers and wives, and he wanted one about father's and son's only with no women cluttering things up. Women characters never survived. (Jeeze.) Also found out that The Wild Wild West was canceled not because of ratings, but the US State Senate told CBS that they should cancel it for violence. It was too violent for audiences. (Ironic that, particularly since five years earlier, Senator Bird in a rousing speech in the Senate, convinced CBS to save Gunsmoke - his favorite Western.) The Government has less influence over television now than it did back in the 1960s, which is sort of interesting.

Oh, Harry Groener is on Breaking Bad. And he's incredibly gaunt. He looks ill. And almost unrecognizable.

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[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Yeah, except what was amusing was Michael Landon - who apparently used that show to learn everything he could about making a tv show, then went on to write, direct, produce and star in a show that focused on Women in the West, and how they survived - called Little House on the Prairie. The show focused more on Landon than whoever created Bonanza, I can't even remember what that guy's name was - he was only mentioned once or twice. They considered Landon to be the pioneer.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

What also hit me as interesting is a trend...apparently tv writers are often more replaceable than tv stars - they replaced the entire writing staff of Gunsmoke, but kept all the actors. And that's not the only show this happened with - also happened to ER, The West Wing, to a degree with Angel (replaced the showrunner three times), and others along the way. Demonstrating that if a tv show wants to last beyond 5 years, they often have to get rid of the writing staff - who got burned out or ran out of ideas.