Happy Anniversary, Fox!

Has it really been 25 years? Last night, after encore presentations of the pilot episode of Married... with Children and The Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire, the FOX network aired a special presentation looking back at 25 groundbreaking years of broadcasting; featuring some of the network's stars and hosted by none other than by Ryan Seacrest.



A lot of childhood and early-teenage TV-watching memories were brought back seeing this special. All of those hilarious, gritty, and somewhat cheesy Caught on Tape specials. Fox had many quality shows back in the day. Married... with Children. Living Single. The X-Files. That '70's Show. In Living Color. King of the Hill. Early Family Guy. I'm surprised there were no Martin clips. Also back when The Simpsons was "Must See TV"... wait a minute, that's another network. But yeah, you couldn't tear me away from the set if you tried. I never watched Beverly Hills 90210 or Melrose Place originally but they were groundbreaking shows and I'm glad they had a place here.

The reality segment was pretty crazy. I'm surprised they would want to remember many of the insane projects they actually green-lighted. Especially Who Wants to Marry a Multi-millionaire? All the bad publicity some of those shows garnered. The Swan, anyone? Oh, well, at least they have American Idol. And how can you have a FOX reality montage without including this little gem?

Even though I've been rolling my eyes at some of the storylines in Glee's second and third seasons, Kurt's coming out to his father was one of the most poignant scenes in recent television history. It was nice to see it included.

This special was brilliantly made overall. But one of the things that was really frustrating about it and really stood out to me was that it highlighted the fact that FOX really cancels shows prematurely. A lot of them. Firefly, Boston Public, Arrested Development, Futurama. I could go on.

But frustrations aside, congratulations, FOX. Here's to 25 more years.