Do you accept the TNT show?

[Herofan]

Since tv shows and movies are fantasy, there are always inconsistencies and changes in timelines. Dallas had a "Dream Season" and at some point decided to forget about some of the movies. I feel like that as a viewer, I can make my own reality as well. With that said, do you accept the TNT show as part of the Dallas universe, or do you like to forget it? Personally, I like to disregard it and pretend it never happened.

I'm sure every aspect has already been discussed here, but this is just my two cents: For me, there was nothing about the show that rehashed the feel of the old Dallas for me. Someone once said, "It was like watching a Lifetime movie instead of Dallas." That about summed it up for me.

Of course, I loved seeing the original actors, and I guess they did the best they could with what they had to work with. Even with the original actors presence, instead feeling like Dallas, it felt more like a different show paying homage to iconic characters from the past, somewhat like when Tom Wopat made a guest appearance on Smallville, and he and John Schneider rode around a while in his blue Dodge Charger. Actually, I think that briefly felt more like The Dukes of Hazzard than TNT Dallas felt like Dallas. Or to describe it another way, it was like a brand new show starring Larry Hagman and Patrick Duffy, and they were trying to give their characters the J.R. and Bobby persona, but it was surrounded by an entirely different atmosphere.

I thought a different Southfork interior was strange as well. that added to making it feel like a different show. trying to understand, perhaps the producers thought the old interior just didn't match up to modern rich-people standards; I get that. I do feel, however, that they should have just updated the old interior; that would have given a better feel of Dallas.

So, I like to forget it ever happened. What about you?

 

[jeffewing]

For me, I enjoyed the first two seasons. The third season just seemed to make a wrong turn and never got back on the right track. I wouldn't say I would disregard the whole TNT series though. They definitely could have done more homework. It would have made much more sense to make Carmen Theresa and given her the new backstory and family. Then there is the fact that there was no such thing as Barnes Global on the original show. The company that was split between Cliff, Pam, and Katherine was Wentworth Tool and Dye, and didn't Cliff lose his 1/3 of that company twice on the original series?

I completely get updating the interior of Southfork, but as much as the ranch was a main character on the original show, you'd think they could have kept it some what the same. I never liked making the original living room the dining room or the dining room Bobby's office.

 

[Piggyrella Sanderson]

I just answered this question in this post.

Besides, you just CAN´T kill off Katherine Wentworth JUST LIKE THAT.

"Go figure! Moi, dead!"​

 

[Werewillie Oleson]

 

[Rove]

They definitely could have done more homework.

That's THE statement of the week. I'm unclear who was the driving force behind the Dallas revival, I'm assuming it was the showrunner. But you would expect if you're going to revive such an iconic series you would at least familiarize yourself with the original series and reunion movies or better yet, hire a die-hard Dallas history buff who could act as consultant on the series.

Scene 9; The Ewing family gather at the Cattle Baron's Ball. Consultant note. This should read Oil Baron's Ball.

As noted everywhere (just not on Soapchat) there were far too many continuity errors with TNT Dallas. Minor ones can be excused but there were gaping holes in this version. Think the Ramos family. Think Cliff adopting some kid off the street. Think Christopher Ewing did not recognise he was about to marry his cousin, Rebecca Suter. Had she been living under a rock since Lorimar Dallas?

I wish TNT Dallas never existed and the brand was left alone. Lorimar Dallas wasn't perfect, especially towards the end and the reunion movies weren't much to write home about but TNT Dallas has left a bitter taste in my mouth. Commercial television can spend big on reality garbage but someone high up the chain can not spend a few million dollars on giving us a Dallas movie to tie up loose ends.

 

[Brian Kinney]

The moment it turned into CSI: Mexico with the cocaine lab I think I knew it was finally over. That was in the second half of the 3rd season. In that moment I would have snorted every line Momma Ryland offered me if I had been in that scene. Enough to fall into a coma and be spared the final episodes of Mexico formerly known as Dallas. In the second to last episode I think there was only one scene on Southfork, everything else was located in fake Mexico (somewhere in Texas I guess).

So much history and much of it left untouched. Yeah, I think Cally's daughter should have been at J.R.'s funeral with her. Or James and his son (whom I - dare I say it? - actually didn't mind in the original show). Ray and Donna's daughter. Jenna's kids Charlie Wade or Lucas. Enough characters which could easily been recast and where almost no history would have hindered the writers.

But it started wrong: the Ramos family instead of Teresa, who would have been the perfect start for a family who's connected to the Ewings - and so it ended wrong: Christopher... since it was such a good idea to kill the mirror character Bobby in the original.

The TNT Dallas creator was too arrogant towards the original. Even the later seasons of the original were relatable in a sense. Cally, Michelle or James revenge against J.R. for different but good reasons. What exactly was the reason of Mamma Ryland to be a superbitch? (Sorry, I admire Judith Light, and yes she made that role at least entertaining). The complete makeover of Cliff Barnes into Emperor Palpatine - horrible! Dragging Gary and Valene back into their 1979 status quo? Killing off Katherine Wentworth? She - who could have been a believable Empress Palpatine without anyone wondering!

I really wanted to like TNT Dallas and some episodes I enjoyed. Sometimes it felt like old Dallas - but these scenes involved either Bobby, Sue-Ellen or J.R., a scene with Lucy and John-Ross. I liked the actors of Pamela Rebecca, Elena, John-Ross and Christopher and my highlight of those three seasons was the notorious threesome. Dramatic, hot and without the crime show nonsense. I liked Anne's daughter. But there were too many other characters I didn't care for and except for the threesome and Mamma Ryland's drug testing I mercifully forgot almost anything else.

Many years after original Dallas' cancellation I was still able to name all of J.R.'s, Bobby's and Cliff's secretaries in order of their appearances on the show. But I don't remember the names of the cowgirl who fell in love with Christopher or Cliff's adopted son or Elena's mom and bro.

 

[Barbara On A Broomstick]

Nope and never.
Like Pam's dream it was a very bad memory thats slowly being erased from my memory.

It had a clueless CC in charge who killed Dallas stone dead with her ridiculous storylines, plots and bad casting. After the one star of the show died ie Larry, it was time to stop and put it out of its misery.

It had no heart and no soul and without that and a cast of actors to care about it isnt Dallas

 

[Rove]

In that moment I would have snorted every line Momma Ryland offered me if I had been in that scene.

In this regard I think there would have been a conga line of snorters :floor:

 

[pete lashmar]

As a life long fan of Dallas, who isn't blind to errors made during the original run I think I was blindsided by the TNT series.

I always felt there was a huge amount of life left for the show and there wasn't a supersoap kind of series to get my teeth sunk into - television had changed so much in the years Dallas had been off air.

So here we were, back at Southfork with many familiar names and faces....but it wasn't Southfork, the characters I knew for 14 years, that I watched every week and binge watched on DVD looked the same, but were completely different.

Bobby, Sue Ellen and J.R were just off on my perception of the characters, whilst Cliff Barnes - the loser with a smile had morphed into a character from the Sopranos.

It was Dallas but not as I knew it and although I loved seeing Patrick, Linda, Ken and Larry it soon became clear that this show wasn't about the Ewings, it was about everyone else with a Ewing involved in one of their plots.

I was expected to believe that in a multi millionaire family, who always got the headlines, no one knew what Cliff's daughter looked like.

My joy of it being brought back was destroyed by CC who had no idea about the show, it's history, it's legacy or it's fans.

Yes it's Dallas, but in an alternate universe and therefore doesn't belong in any way as a contiuation to the Lorimar series.

 

[Sea - Boo! - Er]

I've said before that Dallas TNT was a reboot disguised as a continuation by the presence of some original actors. Even so, I accept all the screened versions, reunion movies and all, but it's a devil of a time trying to make sense of the continuity.

 

[Frankenstein Underworld]

Or to describe it another way, it was like a brand new show starring Larry Hagman and Patrick Duffy, and they were trying to give their characters the J.R. and Bobby persona, but it was surrounded by an entirely different atmosphere.

Yes, "an entirely different atmosphere" best sums up the look and tone of the new show. It was so unlike the original, and it was odd seeing those characters in that setting.

I liked John Ross's scenes with JR and Sue Ellen, and I thought Pam and JR both got decent enough send offs. That said, I still believe what they did to Cliff is criminal (pun intended.) I also hated the emphasis given to outside characters like the Ramos family, the Rylands, and the drug cartel. The Ewings were often peripheral characters, rather than the main ones.

I thought a different Southfork interior was strange as well. that added to making it feel like a different show. trying to understand, perhaps the producers thought the old interior just didn't match up to modern rich-people standards; I get that. I do feel, however, that they should have just updated the old interior; that would have given a better feel of Dallas.

The set designer gave some bogus answer about trying to make the set look familiar to original viewers, but aesthetically pleasing to new viewers. Frankly, I think he failed on both fronts. The set was smaller, rooms were in the wrong place, and he even botched trying to make the back of the house align with the interior set. It was horrid. But then again, he also designed those awful portraits of Jock, Miss Ellie and JR. I also hated the Ewing Energies office he designed. They were supposedly on the same floor as the original Ewing Oil offices, but the layout was far too huge and open to ever fit in that suite. So yes, it was a mess. Oddly enough, all of the sitcom continuations have meticulously recreated their original sets.

So, I like to forget it ever happened. What about you?

Overall, yes. There are a few scenes I enjoy watching, but certainly not entire episodes. As lousy as it may be, the original Dallas ends with WOTE in my mind.

 

[Michael Torrance]

I was not a Dallas fan--for me the show up to the dream season was a good story with which I caught up in the 90s. So when it started, I was excited to watch it, and there were a lot of things I liked about its first season. The Ramos family and their retroactive insertion into the show's deadline was a big wild card for me, and an off-putting one, and again this was coming from a non-fan of the original. I just have a thing about respecting a valuable IP like an iconic show. Still, I thought the first season had promise, and a lot of strong performers.

My problem actually started when Cliff turned into a Stavro Blofeld-type villain, gambling with the life of his daughter for the sake of revenge against J.R. Then it became obvious that Cidre was going to use the characters as mere stand-ins for the ones she actually wanted to portray in her own show, not a soap and not a Ewing-family based show. Third season with the cartel was the one that was the final straw. I actually only watched these on Tivo when I heard the show was cancelled, to see how it would end (or so I thought). Cidre somehow managed even to make her own creations end up lackluster (like the initially engrossing Leland family and their gothically morose family drama).

I know fans of TNT Dallas always ask "wouldn't you rather have the show with another season, even if run by Cidre instead of not at all?" as a dilemma, but it always feels to me like giving somebody the choice between being shot or being decapitated. I shudder to think what she would do with another season.

 

[Werewillie Oleson]

I shudder to think what she would do with another season.

Me too, but it's probably a different kind of shuddering.

 

[Rove]

I shudder to think what she would do with another season.

It was best it was cancelled. Christopher was dead. Elena has a bastard child. JR's unknown daughter appears from thin air. Who knows what Cynthia & Co. had in store for Season 4. Oh the horror!

 

[Spooky Owl!]

The ominous and wintery vibe was nice, and the casting of John Ross was good. And I think the second half of Season 2 -- involving JR's masterpiece, and the investigation into oldPam's death --- was the best nuDALLAS ever got.

But, as is usually the case with these reboot things, the show runners never sufficiently familiarized themselves with the original show. So the Ewings wound up feeling like secondary characters in their own series.

Plus, the plots and new characters just came at you at a ridiculous pace, and were far from compelling or convincing. Of course, the later seasons of the original series were frustratingly wrong, too. And Katzman had less excuse than tone-deaf, hapless Cidre.

 

[stevew]

All good points here but I do accept it as I accept the Dream season and the movies. A find those 3 pieces weren’t just bad writing but horribly disrespectful to the viewer. But if I were to pick and choose I’d end Dallas right before Bobby turned around in the shower. What follows would be in Val’s imagination at best. But I don’t feel I can disrespect any viewer and erase any of it - even if I was given the shoe to run.

 

[Frankenstein Underworld]

All good points here but I do accept it as I accept the Dream season and the movies. A find those 3 pieces weren’t just bad writing but horribly disrespectful to the viewer. But if I were to pick and choose I’d end Dallas right before Bobby turned around in the shower. What follows would be in Val’s imagination at best. But I don’t feel I can disrespect any viewer and erase any of it - even if I was given the shoe to run.

Original Dallas, the reunion movies, and TNT's Dallas are all their own thing. The dream season was already retconned by the writers, and while the reunion movies are crap, they clearly follow the original show's continuity. TNT's Dallas simply strayed too far from the source material for my liking, which is why I don't look at it as canon with the original series.

Other people obviously see it differently, which is fine. It's subjective.

 

[Werewillie Oleson]

If you don't accept the TNT series, if you think that it's not a part of the real DALLAS saga, does that mean you believe that JR is still alive?
And I'm not talking about fanfic scenarios, but what you really believe.

And I guess it also means that you don't believe that this is John Ross Ewing:

 

[Herofan]

If you don't accept the TNT series, if you think that it's not a part of the real DALLAS saga, does that mean you believe that JR is still alive?
And I'm not talking about fanfic scenarios, but what you really believe.

And I guess it also means that you don't believe that this is John Ross Ewing:

That is a very good question, which causes me to look at it closer. It's difficult to put into words, but it's something like this: For me, it's like "Smokey and the Bandit III." "Smokey and the Bandit" is a classic that will live on among fans forever. Everything just seemed to click, and people loved it. As for the third one, most people agree that it's horrible. It only has a cameo from Burt Reynolds, and Sheriff Justice is basically a parody of himself from the first one, and it only did a fraction of what the original did at the box-office. At the time it came out, it seemed to make a little black mark on the franchise, but as time went on, one just forgets about #3, and when "Smokey and the Bandit" is mentioned these days, everyone thinks of the original. There were a few funny moments with Sheriff justice in #3, and if I sees those on Youtube, I accept those, but I have forgotten the movie.

So, as for TNT Dallas, I will accept that JR is dead, but I will probably never watch the series ever again, unless I simply look at individual scenes of the original characters, because it didn't appeal to me. It will fade away into the past for me, and when I think of Dallas, it will be of the original series, especially the first few seasons. Since I will never watch the TNT series again, I suppose I accept some of it, but I will create my own memories and pretend it had the flavor of the old series, and I will also pretend that the Southfork mansion was still the same inside. Maybe I can pretend somebody had another bad dream for the parts I didn't like. Is that clear as muddy water?

 

[Rove]

you don't accept the TNT series, if you think that it's not a part of the real DALLAS saga, does that mean you believe that JR is still alive?

Of course I accept JR Ewing is dead. I've always associated the actor with the role and this also explains why I've never liked recasts....full stop. It's why I have such huge respect to the writers and producers of Lorimar Dallas for honoring Jim Davis by accepting his death and keeping both the character and actor an integral part of Lorimar Dallas. It even followed through with TNT Dallas despite my objections to that colour-by-numbers painting of Jock.

Larry WAS J. R. Ewing. His death was also honoured by the writers and producers of TNT Dallas though not as effective as the fight for Ewing Oil was back in the day. I've mentioned this before but it's probably worth repeating here because of the nature of the thread.

I now view Dallas in chapters. Lorimar Dallas, Reunion Movies and TNT Dallas. I've somehow trained myself in watching these three entities as part of the Dallas Universe. Who knows what's installed for Dallas in the future. I'd rather the series be told in a continuation but given the same treatment as those golden years of Lorimar Dallas.