So much conversation about Buzz and Sonya, whether they existed or not in the syndicated episodes, do you think Bubba existed in the NBC episodes?
shareYes. He was mentioned in the CBS Family sketches and was away at reform school during the NBC episodes.
shareYes. According to quasi-revisionist history, Bubba always existed - even during the NBC seasons, where Fran apparently gave him a chemistry set that he used to nearly burned down Mama's porch with.
share" where Fran apparently gave him a chemistry set that he used to nearly burned down Mama's porch with."
Yes I remember that being said, BUT that was said from the syndicated version's perspective. Just like in the last episode where Mama flashes back to when her first child was born, her house looks just like it does in the syndicated episodes....rather than how it looked in the NBC episodes.
So yeah I'm sure from the syndicated episodes's perspective Bubba ~as well as Iola~ always existed and Iola and Mama always probably hung out, BUT I'm talking about in the ACTUAL NBC episodes. Did Bubba exist?
Just as I'm sure in the from the perspective of the NBC episodes, Buzz and Sonya will ALWYAS exist, even if they don't in the syn, episodes.
It just appeared to me that Eunice and Ed were a CHILDLESS couple in the NBC episodes.
It sounds to me like you're asking if he was literally there during the NBC seasons. In that case, no. He wasn't. Aside from sporadic mentions during TCBS and the Eunice TV movie, the Bubba character didn't make a physical appearance until season three. But when a TV show, or movie, retroactively revises history, the updated version overrides or expands what was earlier said or presumed. That means, Bubba and Iola always existed, even during those NBC seasons where they weren't spoken of.
It's like when a soap opera introduces a previously unseen/unmentioned child of a main character, who was on the show and childless during the time when said child would have already been born. The viewers *know* that during that time, when they were literally watching, there was no kid but accept the rewrite as history. Fiction has no period.
The syndicated seasons and the NBC seasons take place in the same universe. The 1983 and 1988 versions of Mama's Family are the same show, in the same cannon. This is why when it returned in first-run syndication it was set in the production order of season three, rather than it being the first season of a brand new show.
The house looks slightly different, simply because the show was later taped at a different sound stage. They obviously went out of their way to try and recreate the set to look as close as it did before. We know that the house looked slightly different before, but we're supposed to consider it the same as it had always been. We know nothing was ever said of Ed and Eunice having had Bubba during seasons one and two, but season three revised that. So to get back to your original question - yes, Bubba did theoretically exist during the NBC years. Off camera, stealing cars, blowing up porches, running away, but he was existed.
I guess I always kinda looked at the show as taking place in slightly different TV universes, mainly b/c they are just SOOOOO different! Like Mama started out as being a cranky old woman who NO ONE wanted to be around, to being a "cool granny" that everyone wanted to be around and who was the life of any party she attended. It's like on the Family Sketches ppl DREADED seeing Mama come in the house, but in the syndicated version of MF, everyone wanted her around.
If you were to watch a typical Family Sketch, then watch a typical syndicated episode of MF, it's hardly even recognizable as the same show or character.
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I liked both, but I don't think the original Mama could carry a whole 30 min sitcom on her own.... The original Mama was great as a secondary character with Eunice as the main character, b/c it was Eunice who had the redeeming traits, and Mama was meaner than even Archie Bunker IMO. At least Archie did have a soft side at times, where as the original Mama, I can't remember right off her ever showing any compassion.
In Mama's Family they sorta switched Eunice and Mama, and made Eunice to be the total villain almost.
Bubba existed in the "Family" sketches on the Carol Burnett Show. So yes, he probably existed in the NBC episodes.
shareThat's true, but again, the Family Sketches from the Carol Burnet Show, is STILL a different version of the show.
I look at the show in 3 versions; There are the Family Sketches, the NBC episodes of Mama's Family and then the Syndicated episodes of Mama's Family.
In ways it seemed to me that Bubba existed in the Family Sketches, then went out of existence in the NBC episodes, then was revived for the syndicated episodes.
Also there was another boy, Billy Joel ~sometimes called Raymond~ in the Family Sketches, but he was nowhere to be seen in the NBC episodes.
I also look at the show in 3 versions: The Family sketches, the Eunice special, and Mama's Family.
Both Bubba and Billy Joe existed in the Eunice special.
In the unedited episode of The Wedding, Eunice mentions that she and Ed "had" to elope. To me that implies she was pregnant, so at least one of her kids was "referred to" during the NBC phase.
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Some of you guys are such downers. "So-and-so was there, but such-and-such was and that's how it was..."It's Mama's Family, not WW2 history. Use your imagination. Believe what you want.
Mr. Rogers would be so sad.
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You're welcome. Carry on!
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