TV Shows That Were Movie Spinoffs

Seeing that the news just broke earlier the other day that the acclaimed movie Good Will Hunting will be getting its own TV spinoff–which, we’re still confused by seeing that it’s been over 15 years since the movie was released–you may not have already known. As a huge fan of the film, we really hope that the sitcom version of it with different actors doesn’t water down the original for us. Regardless of how the thing turns out, it’s not a new idea for some execs to try the strategy, with a few other people doing the exact same thing, making shows out of movie spinoffs.

5. Clerks: The Animated Series

While the 1994 comedy has become somewhat of a cult comedy amongst people, the animated TV show is often forgotten about–mainly because it was done without any of the original cast members. Lasting just two episodes on ABC, the show had nearly zero chance of succeeding from the get-go, as the network failed to connect with an older audience during test-screening, and then ran the episodes of out order when they actually did air. For us, we’ll just stick to the movies to get our laughs.

4. Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: The TV Show

Does it get any more worse than this? We mean, hell, even the name itself is so off-putting that it makes us want to leave the room. After the 1989 movie with basically the same name scored hugely at the box office, Disney thought they could score rave reviews by trying to duplicate the success with an off-show with a similar premise. The show did last three seasons from 1997 to 2000, so it wasn’t a monster failure, but, come on, it’s kind of hard to imagine this show working for longer than the 66 episodes it even did.

3. Blade: The Series

While we’re not huge sci-fi fans, we admit that the movie Blade is still one of our all-timers. It was during a high school soccer trip on the team bus that we watched it for the first time, and after that, it was one of the rare flicks in the genre that we could watch more than once. But the idea to make a TV show from the movie wasn’t one that ever got our attention, and, seeing how it was cancelled after just 12 episodes, it didn’t seem to appeal to you either. One can argue that the guys watching the show enjoyed it while it was on, but the network never seemed to fully commit to the price tag it took to film an entire season, thus pulling the plug on it.

2. Clueless

“As if.” We remember seeing this show on the TGIF back during the fall season of 1996, mixing a few of the original cast members from the widely popular movie into the spinoff on ABC. Though it lasted three seasons and 62 total episodes, not being able to land Alicia Silverstone as Cher on the sitcom really made this tough for teens to accept–as the silver-screened version became her signature role. With strong cultural references and one-liners, the movie outweighed the TV show in many ways, hurting the chances for it to survive.

1. Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventures

Based off the 1989 film, this show actually has the distinction of being tried as a TV show not just once, but twice–as both a live action comedy and animated series were made. The animated series was first, debuting in 1990 and lasting a few seasons on both CBS and Fox Kids. While most kids love cartoons, the show was cancelled after just 21 total episodes, making way for the live action version–which was a serious mistake. Lacking any star power whatsoever, the show bombed, lasting just seven episodes and just over one month on FOX. The Bill & Ted movies might garner some laughs, but the two attempts of TV shows lacked big-time in that area.