Mustard
Telly Talk TV Fanatic
I think of Dallas as a 1980s show, although the first 2 seasons do have a 1970s feel to it with the fashions. At the start, it does feel very 1970s, but on the whole Dallas is clearly 1980s, especially with the ruthless neo-liberal capitalism that J.R. Ewing embodies and the 1980s as a decade being remembered for governments pursuing such policies and ditching the post-WW2 Keynesian economics completely. Bobby Ewing generally plays the role of the sort of Keynesian resistance to what J.R. is doing at Ewing Oil, although Bobby does occasionally become just like J.R. In the Battle for Ewing Oil in Season 6, I usually find myself siding with J.R. more.
Seaviewer
Telly Talk Warrior
I'm going to go out on a limb and say the 70s. Obviously, in chronology it covered the whole decade of the 80s and parts of both the previous and following and evolved accordingly but it's roots were firmly in the Carter era with the family aspect. When it allowed the 80s glitz to take precedence over that is when it started to fail.
Luke_Krebbs_Ewing
Telly Talk Champion
Dallas is very much an 80's show.
That's really down to the continual prominence of the shoulder pads in the fashions of that time.
And of course the big hair styles, which Linda Gray & Morgan Brittany had.
That's really down to the continual prominence of the shoulder pads in the fashions of that time.
And of course the big hair styles, which Linda Gray & Morgan Brittany had.
ArchieLucasCarringtonEwing1989
Telly Talk TV Fanatic
Dallas is an 80s show, even though it started in the late 70s and ended in the early 90s, it's an 80s show because that's when it was in its heyday and most of the episodes and seasons were made in the 80s.
JR in the 70s was the precursor to what was to come in the decade to come.
JR in the 70s was the precursor to what was to come in the decade to come.
Kenny Coyote
Telly Talk Star
Ultimately, I'd say the 80s...but one with its roots firmly in the 70s. That's why they didn't show off their wealth. It didn't start out as a show about a family with a glamorous lifestyle. They went in that direction in the 80s and it was alright to a degree, but they tried to take it too far.
Willie Oleson
Telly Talk Schemer
I think I want it to be a 70s show.
All these prime time soaps should have started 5 years earlier (for the good drama) and end in the mid-eighties in an over-the-top 80s fashion (massacre, earthquake, whatever).
Aftermath movies in 1986, all fake news reports about the tragic events, including fake interviews with the survivors. ("My empire...my power...it's all gone…")
All these prime time soaps should have started 5 years earlier (for the good drama) and end in the mid-eighties in an over-the-top 80s fashion (massacre, earthquake, whatever).
Aftermath movies in 1986, all fake news reports about the tragic events, including fake interviews with the survivors. ("My empire...my power...it's all gone…")
Grant Jennings
Telly Talk TV Fanatic
I would argue that "Dallas" is about maintaining the status quo and thus is more of a 70s series. "Knots Landing" has an undercurrent of 70s post-Watergate/post-Viet Nam paranoia but I think the aspirations and ambitions of its characters make it an 80s show. On the surface "Dynasty", with its shoulder-padded women in positions of power, is 80s but I believe it is overwhelmingly 60s in tone. John Forsythe said he was told Blake Carrington was the type of man who would have been involved in the JFK assassination; the plot for the final season involves the aftermath of WWII. While the other prime-time soaps looked outward the major plots of both "Falcon Crest" and "The Colbys" are centered on the core families with all the drama taking place in their homes; this makes both of them decidedly 50s to me. "Flamingo Road" set in a town which seems to be frozen in the past is 50s or possibly earlier.
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Snarky Oracle!
Telly Talk Supreme
I think I really have to agree with that. These shows started out with a '70s tone (including S1 of both DYNASTY and FC) and they needed to in order to give substance somehow to the '80s melodrama they would unleash. And, yes, ending in maybe 1985 would have been ideal (given how they crashed in quality --- although I'd hate to miss S10, per DVD count, of DALLAS or S9 of DYNASTY).
The big-scale TV miniseries genre of the late-'70s seemed to have a connection to the '80s nighttime soaps and the corruption that both initially hinted at but the latter really didn't want to pursue. By S8 of DYNASTY, the show was loathe to even name the party to which Blake and Alexis belonged while running for governor (it's called "Republican"). DYNASTY, in particular, wanted -- and most needed -- to reflect the '8os obsession with the perceived Americana of the '50s and the upheaval of the '60s, but much like the '80s themselves, was much too self-absorbed to pull it off (but it was always lurking there).
And the connecting decade between the '60s and '80s was verboten of which even to speak, at least in the smug revisionism of the '80s.
I think it was inevitable that these shows morphed into what they were in the '80s, but the further they went, the more and more they lost what they were originally about.
That said, I like both the crass '70s version of DALLAS with Jock's plaid polyester bellbottoms and Ellie's porcelain dogs, but also the more-focused early-'80s period which (largely thanks to Paulsen) guaranteed its legend post-'WSJR?'.
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Willie Oleson
Telly Talk Schemer
But the early 80s still had a rebellious undertone, then came a few years of posing (in shoulder pads, naturally) and then the decade just petered out, literally waiting for the 90s to take over. So sad, so tired.
Snarky Oracle!
Telly Talk Supreme
I recall hearing a couple of people in the fall of 1985 state with remorse that "the '80s are just over". Not that I minded that, as the Emperor's New Clothes sociopolitical dynamic of the '80s in the States sucked royally; the Challenger disaster in January 1986 was the first event that had felt "real" for five years (at least, in the American media and/or politics).
And there was a strong sense of forlorn finality to the Spring 1985 cliffhangers.
A drabness had somehow kicked in by the latter part of 1985. In keeping, somehow, with the tannish-beige look and cluttered flavor of the nighttime soaps in the 85/86 season.
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Taylor Bennett Jr.
Telly Talk Winner
Snarky Oracle!
Telly Talk Supreme
Definitely both.
Willie Oleson
Telly Talk Schemer
That's poll pissing. I'm gonna tell Sarah.
ArchieLucasCarringtonEwing1989
Telly Talk TV Fanatic
Weren’t Dallas and Knots both the last shows that started in the 1970s to still be on the air by 1986? I read this somewhere once, though Knots only started in December 1979 and most of season one was in 1980, while Dallas began filming in late 1977/early 1978 airing in the spring of 1978, so I would say Knots was more 80s than a 70s-80s hybrid like Dallas was
Snarky Oracle!
Telly Talk Supreme
But then 1980 is more a '70s year than it is an '80s year. It just was.
Billy Wall
Telly Talk Dream Maker
Dallas was definitely more of an 80’s show. When you think of the 80’s, you think of Reagan, Michael Jackson/MTV, Rubik’s Cube, Hulk Hogan, The Dukes of Hazzard(also premiered in the 70’s) and a smiling JR with his cowboy hat. Lol
When I think of the 70’s, I think of All in the Family and The Jefferson’s.
When I think of the 70’s, I think of All in the Family and The Jefferson’s.