Finished Welcome to Derry or rather, its first season finished and I doubt I'll watch more. It had some good moments, but It's not that good overall, IMO. It expands on the It lore in ways that diminish the mystery and add very little that's interesting, and which simultaneously insist that yes, this is a prequel to the recent film adaptations, while wildly cluttering the passage from point a to point b. The finale amounts to a horror F/X game of Quidditch. That is, there's a lot happening, but with an equivalent of, if someone catches the Snitch, it's over. We finished Dune: Prophecy: well-done, though we're still wondering about the ten-thousand years during which the culture and look of the Imperium change hardly not at all. I had always assumed that, despite empire persisting over that period, a LOT changed here and there, and there were peaks and valleys. We started watching the second season of Fallout. Very violent and not at all Seasonal, but still fascinating, and still rocking the 1950s retrofuturism.
I re-watched Go! (1999) for the first time since it came out. It holds up, after a fashion, and I had completely forgotten that it's a Christmas Movie in the same way that Die Hard is, only less so. The film's punchline plays on the fact. At the time, I liked it, but couldn't help thinking of it as I Was a teenage College-Age "Pulp Fiction" and I was less of a fan of that movie than most of the mainstream. I also hadn't realized that Go is the first place that most Americans heard "If you Steal My Sunshine," before the Canadian two-hit wonder's creators, Len, returned to obscurity. I think that they were only a one-hit wonder in the U.S. and elsewhere. You may have missed them entirely, but I was working with young people. However, Len had a second, though significantly less successful, hit in the Great White North.
JD DeLuzio > JD DeLuzioDecember 19, 2025 at 11:02am
Oh! Also, I continued, briefly, on my ongoing watch of the best-reviewed eps of Route 66, with "Welcome to Amity." At the current rate, I should be through the list by 2030.
It's a decent one, with the trademark effective location shooting and a fairly developed guest role for Susan Oliver. She apparently will reappear two other times in two other seasons, and I suspect that neither Buz nor Tod will say, "hey, she looks a lot like...." The ep would have been shorter if anyone in town bothered to explain the central mystery to Buz and Tod sooner, which they don't, despite everyone in town knowing exactly what the issue is and at least half of them not having any real investment in keeping it a secret.
JD DeLuzio > JD DeLuzioDecember 20, 2025 at 3:13pm
I appear to be in a one-person discussion. I've watched the final of the "best regarded" eps of Route 66's first season. There are about as many in the second, and about five each for Seasons Three and Four, and I've already seen one of those twice, so it doesn't bear a third rewatch, necessarily.
A few things to note:
-early 60s TV was much heavier than late 60s TV.
-the show had a commitment to location shooting that paid off.
-location shooting meant that they occasionally have to take a cinéma vérité approach for a scene or two.
-Buz does seriously problematic things (including hitting on a teenager at one point. Okay, she's a legal adult, and Tod raises a disapproving eyebrow, but still), but he's an interesting character, and it's not surprising that the show went downhill after he left.
-While Tod and Buz often play key roles, a number of episodes have them basically observing a story that could have happened without their involvement.
-If not for the different names, I would assume that, after the final season, Tod joined the police force in LA.
I was a mild Route 66 fan back in the day. The main problem for me was that it ran opposite 77 Sunset Strip on Friday nights, and I was a big fan of Warnre Brothers' detective shows. I did manage to see a few episodes of Route 66, though.
In those days, a show would run its complement of twenty-five or so episodes for the season, then air them all over again as repeats in the spring and summer. So, if two shows that one liked were counter-programmed, he could watch one for the first twenty-five weeks of the season, then switch to the other channel and watch the other show's full season in reruns. That's how I got to see Route 66.
Though the show was impressively written, I was not a big fan of "slice of life" stories, with blue-collar trials and tribulations. And, as you pointed out, in many cases, Tod and Buz were passive observers to the main action. Also, as you perceptively mentioned, the character of Buz Murdock, the "flawed" one, was the more interesting of the two fellows. But I guess I was too much of a square-shooter; I found his character less tolerable than that of Tod Stiles. I'm one of the few Route 66 viewers who preferred his replacement, Glenn Corbett as Lincoln Case, starting mid-way in the third season.
While I found most of the episodes ponderous, once or twice, I was startlingly impressed by one. The 23 February 1962 episode comes to mind. "You Never Had It So Good" opens with Tod and Buz working as labourers for a land development company. The president of the company has the idea of promoting one of his deckplate employees to the executive level, and he assigns the task to his assistant. Everyone expects Tod, with his Yale diploma, to be the one chosen, but instead the assistant selects Buz for the boardroom. The question is why?
And Route 66 was one of the first television series to reconcile its format at the end of its run (three years before The Fugitive did it). What I liked about the finale of Route 66 was that it wasn't an overblown production and the series characters didn't demonstrate any sappy, slobbery good-byes. Tod and Linc went on their separate ways in a natural, realistic parting.
JD DeLuzio > Commander BensonDecember 20, 2025 at 4:30pm
I've always wanted to see more than the, maybe, two eps of 77 Sunset Strip I've seen at some point, but it doesn't seem to be streaming anywhere right now, at least not in Canada.
On another note, I'm guessing you wouldn't be a fan of Go!
Richard Willis > Commander BensonDecember 21, 2025 at 2:18am
I've never watched Route 66, but I used to live on it. The L.A. County portion. I currently live a short distance from it and have been to its end at the Santa Monica pier. .
Replies
Finished Welcome to Derry or rather, its first season finished and I doubt I'll watch more. It had some good moments, but It's not that good overall, IMO. It expands on the It lore in ways that diminish the mystery and add very little that's interesting, and which simultaneously insist that yes, this is a prequel to the recent film adaptations, while wildly cluttering the passage from point a to point b. The finale amounts to a horror F/X game of Quidditch. That is, there's a lot happening, but with an equivalent of, if someone catches the Snitch, it's over. We finished Dune: Prophecy: well-done, though we're still wondering about the ten-thousand years during which the culture and look of the Imperium change hardly not at all. I had always assumed that, despite empire persisting over that period, a LOT changed here and there, and there were peaks and valleys. We started watching the second season of Fallout. Very violent and not at all Seasonal, but still fascinating, and still rocking the 1950s retrofuturism.
I re-watched Go! (1999) for the first time since it came out. It holds up, after a fashion, and I had completely forgotten that it's a Christmas Movie in the same way that Die Hard is, only less so. The film's punchline plays on the fact. At the time, I liked it, but couldn't help thinking of it as I Was a teenage College-Age "Pulp Fiction" and I was less of a fan of that movie than most of the mainstream. I also hadn't realized that Go is the first place that most Americans heard "If you Steal My Sunshine," before the Canadian two-hit wonder's creators, Len, returned to obscurity. I think that they were only a one-hit wonder in the U.S. and elsewhere. You may have missed them entirely, but I was working with young people. However, Len had a second, though significantly less successful, hit in the Great White North.
Oh! Also, I continued, briefly, on my ongoing watch of the best-reviewed eps of Route 66, with "Welcome to Amity." At the current rate, I should be through the list by 2030.
It's a decent one, with the trademark effective location shooting and a fairly developed guest role for Susan Oliver. She apparently will reappear two other times in two other seasons, and I suspect that neither Buz nor Tod will say, "hey, she looks a lot like...." The ep would have been shorter if anyone in town bothered to explain the central mystery to Buz and Tod sooner, which they don't, despite everyone in town knowing exactly what the issue is and at least half of them not having any real investment in keeping it a secret.
I appear to be in a one-person discussion. I've watched the final of the "best regarded" eps of Route 66's first season. There are about as many in the second, and about five each for Seasons Three and Four, and I've already seen one of those twice, so it doesn't bear a third rewatch, necessarily.
A few things to note:
-early 60s TV was much heavier than late 60s TV.
-the show had a commitment to location shooting that paid off.
-location shooting meant that they occasionally have to take a cinéma vérité approach for a scene or two.
-Buz does seriously problematic things (including hitting on a teenager at one point. Okay, she's a legal adult, and Tod raises a disapproving eyebrow, but still), but he's an interesting character, and it's not surprising that the show went downhill after he left.
-While Tod and Buz often play key roles, a number of episodes have them basically observing a story that could have happened without their involvement.
-If not for the different names, I would assume that, after the final season, Tod joined the police force in LA.
I was a mild Route 66 fan back in the day. The main problem for me was that it ran opposite 77 Sunset Strip on Friday nights, and I was a big fan of Warnre Brothers' detective shows. I did manage to see a few episodes of Route 66, though.
In those days, a show would run its complement of twenty-five or so episodes for the season, then air them all over again as repeats in the spring and summer. So, if two shows that one liked were counter-programmed, he could watch one for the first twenty-five weeks of the season, then switch to the other channel and watch the other show's full season in reruns. That's how I got to see Route 66.
Though the show was impressively written, I was not a big fan of "slice of life" stories, with blue-collar trials and tribulations. And, as you pointed out, in many cases, Tod and Buz were passive observers to the main action. Also, as you perceptively mentioned, the character of Buz Murdock, the "flawed" one, was the more interesting of the two fellows. But I guess I was too much of a square-shooter; I found his character less tolerable than that of Tod Stiles. I'm one of the few Route 66 viewers who preferred his replacement, Glenn Corbett as Lincoln Case, starting mid-way in the third season.
While I found most of the episodes ponderous, once or twice, I was startlingly impressed by one. The 23 February 1962 episode comes to mind. "You Never Had It So Good" opens with Tod and Buz working as labourers for a land development company. The president of the company has the idea of promoting one of his deckplate employees to the executive level, and he assigns the task to his assistant. Everyone expects Tod, with his Yale diploma, to be the one chosen, but instead the assistant selects Buz for the boardroom. The question is why?
And Route 66 was one of the first television series to reconcile its format at the end of its run (three years before The Fugitive did it). What I liked about the finale of Route 66 was that it wasn't an overblown production and the series characters didn't demonstrate any sappy, slobbery good-byes. Tod and Linc went on their separate ways in a natural, realistic parting.
I've always wanted to see more than the, maybe, two eps of 77 Sunset Strip I've seen at some point, but it doesn't seem to be streaming anywhere right now, at least not in Canada.
On another note, I'm guessing you wouldn't be a fan of Go!
I've never watched Route 66, but I used to live on it. The L.A. County portion. I currently live a short distance from it and have been to its end at the Santa Monica pier. .
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