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I know this is going to read like a plug but it’s
not, actually it’s an excuse for writing about TV. I’ll
try to explain. Last weekend I had the unique thrill
of watching pop-culture icons Batman and the Joker
make a guest-appearance on STATIC SHOCK, the Kids WB
animated series I co-created. It looks like the
episode went over well with the audience, too. I’ve
read many good reviews. I’ve received well-wishes
from dozens of fans. I’ve got some great e-mails
from little kids who discovered the show only because
Batman was on it. All in all, an unexpected triumph.
Except...
Except there are some comic book fans who are
confused by what the crossover does to the continuity
of the DC and Milestone universes (answer: nothing,
actually) or to the continuity of DC Comics’
animated shows (answer: nothing that matters, really).
There’s just a few of those guys out there, mind you
but they’re strident. Anyone who has read my old
columns knows my radical
stance on comic book continuity (part 2 is here.
Click the links if you care). The short version is
this, I think comic book continuity should be treated
as TV continuity traditionally has, that is to say,
every show has its own, individual continuity - even
when that show shares characters from other shows. The
old sit-coms Seinfeld and Mad About You share
characters but both shows conveniently ignore that
fact whenever they feel like it. This allows them to
have all the fun of crossovers, without the silly
baggage of both shows having to keep it all straight
(and, wonder of wonders, you can watch and enjoy
either show without ever watching the other one).
This is the right answer for comics too, because
complex interlocking storylines across dozens of
series will inherently prove to be absurd. Let me
demonstrate.
For the purposes of our demonstration, we postulate
that any TV show that shares characters with another
series is in the same universe as that series. With
the help of the guys at the Milestone
E-group and their discovery of a wondrous TV
crossover website that lists an astonishingly large list of spinoffs and
crossovers, I will first reveal to you a stunning
tapestry of interconnected TV shows, then prove that
none of those shows' episodes actually occurred. I’ll
do the last with two magic words: St. Elsewhere.
For those of you don’t know, St. Elsewhere was a
slick, well written and acted drama series about the
doctors, administrators and patients of the fictional
Boston hospital, St. Eligius (nicknamed St. Elsewhere
by the staff). After a long, award-winning run, in the
very last moments of the show’s final episode, it
was revealed that all of the events of the show were
merely the prolonged daydream of an autistic child.
None of it "really" happened. Whether you
like this final twist (for what it’s worth, I didn’t),
it’s a legitimate ending to a self-contained show.
But if St. Elsewhere played by the rules of comics,
either they wouldn’t have been allowed to do it, or
they would have precipitated a crisis in TV Land far
bloodier than DC Comics’ Crisis On Infinite
Earths.
Why? Because crossover-wise, St. Elsewhere is the
Kevin Bacon of TV shows.
Stay with me now, this is complicated but kind of
fun.
Characters from St. Elsewhere have appeared on
Homicide, which means that show is part of the
autistic child’s daydream and likewise doesn’t
exist. It gets worse. The omnipresent Detective John
Munch from Homicide has appeared on X-Files,
Law &
Order and Law & Order: SVU. Law & Order
characters have appeared on Law & Order: Criminal
Intent. X-Files characters have appeared on
The Lone
Gunmen and Millennium. Characters from Chicago Hope
have appeared on Homicide. Characters from Picket
Fences have appeared on Chicago Hope. All those shows
are gone (if you count cartoons, which makes this game
much too easy, the X-Files characters have appeared on
the Simpsons. The Critic has also appeared on The
Simpsons. Dead).
Characters from Picket Fences have appeared on
Ally McBeal. Ally McBeal has appeared on The
Practice.
Characters from The Practice have appeared on Boston
Public. Autistic daydreams, every one.
But that's not all. St Elsewhere characters have
appeared on Cheers, so Fraiser doesn’t exist.
Neither do Wings, Caroline In The City or
The
Tortellis but who cares? Well, maybe you do, because
Caroline In The City once crossed over with Friends,
which crossed over with Mad About You, which crossed
over with Seinfeld and The Dick Van Dyke show. None of
them happened in our new, shared continuity.
St. Elsewhere also shared characters with The White
Shadow and It’s Gary Shandling’s Show.
Garry
Shandling crossed over with The Andy Griffith show
(no, really!). So Gomer Pyle, Mayberry RFD, and
Make
Room for Daddy/The Danny Thomas Show are gone. Make
Room For Daddy takes out I love Lucy.
And there’s more, St. Elsewhere also shares
continuity with M*A*S*H, so Aftermash and
Trapper John
MD are out of there.
Now here’s a good one, St. Elsewhere shared a
patient with The Bob Newhart Show, so the Bob Newhart
Show is part of the grand daydream. The Bob Newhart
Show crossed over with Murphy Brown, which in turn
links to, among many others, Julia, The
Nanny,
Everybody Loves Raymond and I Dream of
Jeannie!.
Meanwhile, the series Newhart was revealed to be a
nightmare had by Bob Newhart’s character on the Bob
Newhart Show. Newhart crossed over with Coach, which
connects it to Grace Under Fire, Ellen and
Drew Carey.
Drew Carey takes out Home Improvement and NYPD
Blue.
All of these shows (and many more that I left out
or missed) are daydreams of St. Elsewhere’s autistic
kid.
This is by no means an exhaustive list. Links to
the Happy Days, All In The Family and Diagnosis Murder
universes would take out another 20 or 30 shows. If we
can get to The Mary Tyler Moore Show, who knows how
many would fall? My favorite possibility? A link to
Knight Rider, of all things, would remove every single
Star Trek series. I wouldn’t mind some research help
from my vast and loony readership on these and any
other shows you guys can think of, E-mail
me. No
cartoons though, that way lies madness. The Scooby Doo
movies alone encompass a good chunk of the space/time
continuum.
All of these would help me prove my Grand
Unification Theory, which posits: "The last five
minutes of St. Elsewhere is the only television show,
ever. Everything else is a daydream."
So what does this prove, other than the fact that I’ve
got too much free time? Well, my point and I do have
one (I can steal this catch phrase because, as I’ve
already proven, Ellen never existed), is that while
guest-shots and crossovers can be fun, obsessive,
cross-series continuity is silly.
It’s silly in comics too. Relax and enjoy the
show.
Dwayne McDuffie
is the co-creator of STATIC SHOCK. His first script for
this season, "Power Play," airs on the Kids WB this Saturday, February
2 at 8:30 AM, EST. Dwayne went to high school with former all-time
Jeopardy
earnings champion, Chuck Forrest. Since Cliff Claven, the mailman from
Cheers
also appeared on
Jeopardy, that means that Dwayne doesn’t exist. If you’re reading this,
neither do you.
DwayneMcDuffie.com
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