Monday, April 21, 2008

About WGN's 60th Anniversary Celebration...

Good thing you didn't take my advice. Yours truly did watch WGN's celebration and it turned out to be well done. Jim Belushi actually did a decent job of hosting (yes, I'm surprised myself) - though he was a little wooden. Personally, I would've prefered Dean Richards or Bill Murray, but Belushi did an alright job.

(This blog praising Jim Belushi? OMFG! What is going on here? And the F stands for "fool".)

While the special covered material that has appeared on other retrospective WGN specials in the past, it is still great to see those clips from yesteryear (and there were some that didn't air during the 50th Anniversary Celebration, which aired in 1998.)

Ironically, WGN didn't mention its ties to The WB or The CW. As you recall, the WB and UPN shuttered their doors in 2006 to form The CW. WGN was a founding affiliate of The WB in 1995 and aired popular WB shows like Dawson's Creek, 7th Heaven, Smallville, and The Jamie Foxx Show.

And as far as syndicated programming goes (understandable why they didn't air any clips - quite expensive to acquire), the station was home to everything from Space: 1999 to Charles In Charge, and from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine to Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. What could've have been cool was if WGN aired those wonderful Andy Griffith promos during the 60th Anniversary Celebration from the summer of 1989 when Griffith was up against The Cosby Show at 6 p.m. (one of the promos was set to Elvis Costello's "Watching the Detectives.")

No comments: