TVXOHOF REDUX - LUCAS & MARK McCAIN

With a month of posts dedicated to 'The Rifleman', the August induction into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame would have been the perfect time for Lucas and Mark McCain... if it weren't for the fact that they both are members of the Hall already.

Back in 2002, during the online hiatus between the Tubeworld Dynamic website and the Inner Toob blog, Lucas and Mark McCain were inducted together that summer. They were the Western pair in that year-long salute to TV duos. (Even though I didn't have an online presence from April 2002 until August 2004, I at least kept inducting new members into the TVXOHOF.)

The McCains were inducted along with Andy and Opie Taylor, with a hypothetical "Born To Re-Run" suggestion that the Mayberry sheriff and his son were the reincarnations of Lucas and Mark.

Lucas and Mark McCain easily filled the requirements to become members of the Hall, as they each had three separate appearances on TV. (They were the same three programs for both, but they didn't appear together in the third.)

"The Sharpshooter" episode is now shown as the first episode of the series, but it was originally broadcast in 1958 during the second season of 'Zane Grey Theatre', serving as a pilot for 'The Rifleman'. Then the actual show was launched and ran for five seasons.

Their third TV appearance is in one of the great hubs for Toobworld - the TV movie "Gambler IV - Luck Of The Draw". In it, gambler Brady Hawkes made a cross-country trek to San Francisco in 1906 for a big poker game. Along the way he ran into many of the greatest TV Western characters of all time, from shows like 'Cheyenne', 'The Virginian', 'Maverick', 'Wyatt Earp', 'Bat Masterson', 'Kung Fu', and 'The Westerner'.

(About the only ones missing were Matt Dillon, James West, the 'Sugarfoot', 'Hondo', 'Bronco', anybody from the 'High Chaparral' and Kid Curry and Hannibal Heyes, 'Alias Smith and Jones'. Of course, for Toobworld purposes, it's a good thing those last two didn't appear, due to recastaway problems.)

Hawkes was rescued by Lucas McCain when he was ambushed near the McCain ranch in New Mexico. Since McCain was well-known as "The Rifleman" more than twenty years earlier (as often depicted in the series), it's not surprising that Brady Hawkes knew who he was.

Later in Colorado, Mark McCain was seen working on the set of a silent movie. He was drafted into performing as a stunt man for a scene and inadvertantly created the first fictional portrayal of the Lone Ranger. (Here's hoping that Mark McCain would have a bright future as a silent movie cowboy star in Toobworld.)

So there's the three requirements:

'Zane Grey Theatre'
'The Rifleman'
"The Gambler IV: Luck Of The Draw"

Chuck Connors died in 1992, not long after the "Gambler" TV movie, but John Ernest Crawford is still going strong as an actor and musician in the Los Angeles area. (I follow him as a Facebook friend.) So there's always a chance that Mark McCain might one day re-appear in Toobworld. It may seem like a long shot, given the status of TV Westerns in today's television landscape, but who knows?

After all, 'Cheyenne' Bodie showed up in an episode of 'Kung Fu: The Legend Continues'!

BCnU!

"ALPHAS" BITS

The pilot for 'Alphas' provided several bits of trivia which could theoretically link the series about mutants (for lack of a more capsulated term) who work together in a secret government project.

1) 'CSI: NY'

This is the most blatant connection. At least one member of the NYC CSI team can be seen outside the Thompson Hotel after a man jumped to his death. It doesn't have to be any particular character from the CBS show; a lot more people would be working in that department besides the six or seven we'd see on a weekly basis.

2) The 'Law & Order' franchise

The New York Sentinel is a paper modeled on the New York Times style, a rival to the NY Ledger which is more of a tabloid paper. If I remember correctly, it shows up in the later years for the opening credits of 'Murder, She Wrote' once Jessica Fletcher moved to Manhattan, but I can't be sure on that.  However, it did appear in an episode of the series where it sported a tabloid style of its own.  (It must have been a temporary experiment to increase sales.)



3) Honda Civic commercial, "The Prize"

As far as I can tell, Crunchy-O's is a fictional cereal. (The more healthy-oriented Early Harvest may be a fiction cereal as well.) But it was used in a blipvert for the Honda Civic and the giant version of the cereal box doesn't give any indication of a manufacturer's name (Arnold's Acres?), which I think would have been verboten if there was a product placement crossover.




4) 'Lost'

And finally, one of "The Numbers" from the sequence featured in 'Lost' was displayed in the interrogation room where a Federal witness was assassinated.......

BCnU!

FORD FIESTA

In remembrance of the late Betty Ford (as well as for just the pure enjoyment of seeing these classic scenes), here are Mrs. Ford's two forays into Toobworld as herself.

First up, the first and the best -

Lou Grant and Mary Richards have gone to Washington, D.C., on a press junket for the weekend. And after two days of waiting for Lou's old contacts to reach out and invite them to parties, Mary finally bails on him to have dinner with a Congressman (played by Dabney Coleman). This is what happens when she gets back from her evening out.....

About six years later, Mrs. Ford is in Denver with her husband, former President Gerald Ford, to attend the famous Carousel Ball (which actually does exist, so it has its own televersion too!) And there they run into oil tycoon Blake Carrington.....

So her presence is what ties 'Dynasty' to 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show', and the two of them serve as the linking steps between 'Batman' and 'Phyllis', 'Rhoda', and 'Lou Grant'. (Later, nearly all of the Carringtons are wounded at the Royal wedding in Moldavia, the homeland of some antique stamps which were stolen by the Riddler. And of course, Phyllis, Rhoda, and Lou are all friends of Mayr's.)

Because it turned out that Betty Ford really had visited Lou in his hotel room, then it stands to reason that all of his visitors were actually there. Even though we didn't see them, their life during prime time must be accepted just as would be the case for whatever happened during commercial breaks, between episodes, and after cancellation.

So these are the other people who attended, and what TV shows they can link to 'The Mary Tyler Moore Show':

John Glenn - 'Frasier', and yes, even 'Name That Tune'!

Eric Sevareid - 'Taxi' and 'Call To Glory', which has a Toobworld tweak: Sevareid somehow looked the same in 1963 as he did twenty years later....

Ethel Kennedy - 'Cheers'

Hubert Humphrey - His links are all to variety shows (hosted by Dean Martin, Red Skelton, and Pat Paulsen.) But those hosts can make connections to other shows in which they appeared as themselves. For example, Dean Martin guest starred in 'Half Nelson', 'Vega$', 'The Lucy Show', and 'Make Room For Daddy', and all of them could now be added to this link.

As for 'Dynasty'? There's always 'The Colbys'.......

If only Betty Ford appeared on 'The Hollywood Squares', sitting in the seat that used to belong to Paul Lynde and Whoopi Goldberg.

Then we would have had the Betty Ford Center Square.....

BCnU!

"FRANKLIN & BASH": WELCOME TO THE CLUB!

From 'Guiding Light'

With their second episode out of the box, 'Franklin & Bash' made their Toobworld occupancy legit. (The Toobworld Dynamic believes just about every show belongs in Earth Prime-Time; it just might take some time to find the proof to make it official.)

While doing a little research into their firm's latest murder case, Jared Franklin discovered that a large bet had been placed at an online betting parlor against a successful outcome.

To illustrate the case for bettors, the website used the cover of the National Inquisitor, which splashed lurid details about the case: "She Came Upstairs And Killed Me.")

In 2003, the National Inquisitor became a member of the TV Crossover Hall Of Fame for its use in episodes of 'The Naked Truth', 'Guiding Light', 'Wiseguy', 'Columbo', 'Alf', and 'The Bold & The Beautiful', among others.

And now we can add 'Franklin & Bash' to the mix!

BCnU!

COLONEL KLINK MEETS BATMAN

The scheduling is not lost on me......

I've written about the appearance by Colonel Klink in the 1960's only recently:

Klink showed up in the 1960's in a building which the dynamic duo was scaling. Since he looked no older than he did when he was incompetently in charge of a POW camp more than twenty years before, it's the Toobworld Central theory that he served as the guinea pig for the suspended animation process that was later used to freeze the Fuehrer (as seen in 'The Adventures of Fu Manchu' and 'The Man From U.N.C.L.E.')

BCnU!

FROM PAWNEE TO SCRANTON... LITERALLY

Kona Gallagher of CliqueClack TV has made the case for a TV crossover character to be the new manager at the Dunder-Miffline/Sabre branch in Scranton.

All it would take would be a move from Pawnee.....

BCnU!

BUCKLAND IN TV LAND

So, having splained away the more problematical appearance by Abed Nadir in the season finale of 'Cougar Town' back on Friday, I should also turn my attention to the other special guest character, Ted Buckland (from Bill Lawrence's previous series 'Scrubs'.)

Big thanks to Rob for pointing the way to that video!

This was straight-up crossover, pure and simple. Ted (or "Buck", as he hoped people would call him) was in Hawaii, where he served as a Jonathan Richman-like troubadour commentator on the attempts by Jules to convince her son Travis to come back to Florida. Either Ted was in Hawaii because he was on vacation, or because he ran away after losing his love. (Gooch ran off with Hooch; as Laurie told him, "You didn't stand a chance".)

Either way, eventually Ted was going back to wherever Sacred Heart Hospital was. (Somewhere near the Seaworld in California.) Ted is just too tightly wound up and buttoned down to toss aside his life with (nearly) complete abandon.

And eventually, the Hawaiian lifestyle would eventually recognize him as the foreign anti-body in its eco-bio-system and find some way to karmically cast him out. How can I be sure of this? Because Bobby Brady's taboo idol knows all.

A 'Cougar Town' episode set outside their usual environs was the only way Lawrence could do a crossover with 'Scrubs'. If one of the 'Scrubs' characters showed up in West Gulfhaven, the audience would think Sacred Heart Hospital was located nearby. (And there is a Seaworld in Florida.) And a 'Cougar Town' resident wandering the corridors of Sacred Heart would achieve the same effect.

By the way, the options for which 'Cougar Town' character could appear in any revival of 'Scrubs' would have to exclude at least Jules, Ellie, and Jules' dad, Chick, as they all played important roles in that previous series. Too many questions as to why people at Sacred Heart wouldn't notice the resemblances.

So there is no splainin needed for the appearance of Ted, for there was no Zonk. Ted "Buck" Buckland was just enjoying some fun in the sun... and bringing it down to a sad, subterranean level.

BCnU!

"COMMUNITY" TO "COUGAR TOWN" - AND BACK AGAIN

Earlier this season, did you see the 'Community' episode "Critical Film Studies"? (Most people know it as the "Pulp Fiction" episode.) In it, Abed channeled his inner Andre Gregory - as seen in the 1981 movie "My Dinner With Andre" - and delivered a memorable monologue about being invited to be an extra on the set of 'Cougar Town':

The capper came on the last night of May Sweeps, Wednesday, May 25, 2011, when actor Danny Pudi showed up in the background of a scene in the season-ender for 'Cougar Town':

At first, it looks like it's a confirmation that 'Cougar Town' is just a TV series and that what we're seeing is Abed - as "Chad" - doing his atmosphere people schtick on a fictional series. For some televisiologists, the best splainin they could hope for is that 'Community' takes place in Earth Prime-Time, the main Toobworld, while 'Cougar Town' is in that same TV dimension which houses 'Hi Honey, I'm Home' and those TV movies that look behind the scenes of classic TV shows.

But this is not a Zonk. 'Community' and 'Cougar Town' both still exist in the main Toobworld.

Oh, that could be Abed that we saw in the background. But it's not Abed playing a character named "Chad". It's the actual Abed Nadir - visiting West Gulfhaven after the end of his school semester at Greendale Community in Colorado.

If you remember what he said about his Hollywood experience, he was asked to walk through a scene in the background for a show called 'Cougar Town' which starred Courtney Cox. But in the 'Cougar Town' scene, he was sitting at a table outside the Subway sandwich shop and Courtney Cox was nowhere to be seen. Instead we had Dan Byrd and Busy Philips as their characters Travis Cobb and Laurie Keller, respectively.

The scene described by Abed was for a TV show within the Toobworld reality which was called 'Cougar Town'. The scene with Abed shown during 'Cougar Town' was Toobworld reality.

Does that make sense?

Abed wasn't acting as "Chad". That was really Abed. And as for Courtney Cox, there's been no real mention to her in connection to 'Cougar Town' within the show. There just happens to be a divorcee in West Gulfhaven named Jules Cobb who happens to look like Courtney Cox. And the name 'Cougar Town' doesn't even come into play within the series, unless West Gulfhaven does have that reputation - and it probably does, thanks to women like Barb.

So, again, the 'Cougar Town' mentioned within 'Community' is not the same show as seen by the TV audience viewing at home in the Trueniverse.

Which reminds me of this Inner Toob post from My 15, about the two-part season finale of 'Community':

Also thanks to Alan Sepinwall for pointing this out, but you can see Busy Phillips and Dan Byrd among the students during that big apocalyptic attack on the Pistol Patty's ice cream truck near the end of Part Two. This could mean that Laurie accompanied Travis to Greendale Community College so that he could check out another option for school. And they didn't have to fly from West Gulfhaven, Florida, but instead from the 'Cougar Town' season finale in Hawaii. In fact, the whole gang could conceivably be there on campus, but all we saw were Laurie and Trav.

You know Jules would shoot down Greendale as an option after seeing the paintball carnage!

So it's possible that Abed got the chance to talk with Laurie and Travis and then decided to follow them back to West Gulfhaven to see it for himself. And, having been discovered, he bolted in case they thought he was stalking them.....

BCnU!

A "D'OHHSE" OF ROUND-HEADED BUFFOONS

When Springfield had a film festival in 'The Simpsons', and when Bart's football team hosted the team from Arlen, Texas, animation styles were mixed with the guest appearances by Jay Sherman of 'The Critic' and Hank Hill's family from 'The King Of The Hill', respectively.

It looks like it's going to happen again, probably next season, when Ricky Gerais, Stephen Merchant, and Karl Pilkington will appear on 'The Simpsons' as their "tooniversions" in 'The Ricky Gervais Show' on HBO, which animates their podcasts.

That's pretty much all the info I have so far. Gervais wasn't very forthcoming in his blog:

"I won't give the joke away but they are featuring a little clip of The Ricky Gervais Show in a future episode."

So stay tooned!

Sorry about that, Chief......

TVXOHOF, 05/2011: HONEY WEST

As usual, we're running late with the monthly induction into the TV Crossover Hall Of Fame, which I'd like to blame on the recent Blogger troubles. But the truth is - I'm just lazy.

By tradition, May usually has a "Queen Of The May" theme, mostly to ensure that at least one woman is inducted into the Hall each year. (No fear on that score - Aunt Bee Taylor and Joan Rivers were inducted in January and March, respectively.) But it also gives me a chance to showcase a smokin' TV babe, one worthy of the "Homina Thrice".

There was a sad reason why our choice for this May was selected - actress Anne Francis passed away earlier this year, always one of the sexiest women in television. And among the many TV characters she brought us (recurring roles in 'My Three Sons', 'Riptide', 'Dallas', 'The Drew Carey Show' and 'The Man From U.N.C.L.E.', plus memorable guest appearances in 'Columbo' and 'The Twilight Zone'.), was the sexy investigator Honey West.....

In Toobworld, Honey West first appeared in a second season episode of 'Burke's Law' ("Who Killed The Jackpot?") and by the next season had her own series (although it lasted only the one year). Decades later, when 'Burke's Law' was revived with Amos Burke now working with his grown son, Anne Francis returned to the role in "Who Killed Nick Hazard?"

However, her character's name was now Honey Best. (It's pozz'ble, just pozz'ble that this was an attempt to avoid paying royalties to the original creators of the role.) But for Toobworld, she was still Honey West - O'Bviously her last name changed because at some point in the years following the cancellation of her own series, Honey got married to someone named Best.

Perhaps he was a descendant of Marshal Sam Best, a Western Legend known as 'Best Of The West'. And it could be that Honey Best gave birth to Jerry Best in 1970, a character later seen in 'The Bernie Mac Show'.

With those three appearances, Honey West qualifies for entry into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame. But there is another reason as well - she is a multiversal, at home in several fictional universes created by Mankind's imagination.

She began life in novels by a husband-and-wife team who went by the pen name "G.G. Fickling". And at the height of her fame on TV, she was seen in comic books as well. (If there is a fictional universe based on board games, then she has a home there as well!)

So here's our salute to Honey West, the latest inductee into the TV Crossover Hall Of Fame. Sadly, it's in memoriam, as I think Honey passed away around the same time as the woman who portrayed her. She could still be alive, but if anyone ever attempts to bring her back to television, it will have to be a show located in the Land of Remakes.

Because for Toobworld, there can be only one......

BCnU!

For More:
http://www.mysteryfile.com/Honey%20West/Honey_West.html

TVXOHOF REPORT: RAE CUMMINGS

With the news of the cancellations of 'All My Children' and 'One Life To Live', I was reminded of a character who was one of the very first inductees into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame.....

From Kosmix.com:
Rae Cummings is a soap opera character played by Linda Dano. She first appeared on One Life to Live in 1978 as a minor character. She left the show in 1980 and returned almost two decades later, in 1999, as a practicing psychologist. Rae was involved in many major storylines and in 2000 she was given an extraordinary one of her own. In a search for her long-lost daughter(taken away at birth), the character of Rae crossed over into the other three ABC soaps.

In All My Children, Rae discovered that she was the daughter of Myrtle Fargate. In Port Charles, she found an important clue. Back on One Life to Live, she discovered her daughter was Skye Chandler (who had crossed over from All My Children). Rae ventured on to General Hospital, where she and Skye were involved with the Quartermaine family. Rae then wandered back to One Life to Live, blackmailed and married Asa Buchanan and finally left on a world cruise with her lover, John Sykes, in 2004.

BCnU!

TRIVIAL TV = TRIAL TV

One TV network in Toobworld that doesn't exist in the real world is Trial TV. We used to have Court TV, but now I think it's called Tru-TV.

Trial TV has been around since the late 1990's and it's still going strong. Recently, the consultant for the CBI by the name of Patrick Jane, who's sometimes called 'The Mentalist', was on a memorable episode of 'You've Been Served' starring Karen Cross, in which he revealed the true murderer of another killer (using candles held by the audience.)

Back in 1999, Trial TV reported on the upcoming trial of a mobster named Michael Sanricci, which was supposed to be presided over by Judge Harold Wabash. As it turns out, they were in cahoots together and thanks to the manipulations by a modern-day Paladin known only as Mr. Chapel, they both ended up dead.

Here are some frame grabs from both reports by Trial TV:

The network serves as a trivial link between 'The Mentalist' and 'Vengeance Unlimited'......


BCnU!

"THE DEFENDERS": CROSSED OVER AND CROSSED OFF

I've got a feeling that 'The Defenders' will never see the dawn of a second season.  (They should never have appropriated that name; it brought a curse down on them!)

But before they rode off into the cathode sunset, the series got their official connection to the TV Universe, through a shout-out on that other Las Vegas crime drama.

One of my fellow "Extras" hunters, Artie from Howell, brought it to the attention of David Bianculli in his website "TV Worth Watching". (The link is to the left, my legal beagles!)

artie from howell said:
On the March 10th Episode of 'CSI', "Bombshells", one of the suspects
was implicated by a series of payments made to a legal firm. The name
of the legal firm was Morelli & Kaczmarek...the names of the partners
in the Jim Belushi/Jerry O'Connell CBS series, 'The Defenders'.

[Oh, that's a good one -- even if it melds a decent show to a bad one.
Thanks! - DB]

BCnU!

"FAWLTY TOWERS" & "ARE YOU BEING SERVED?"

Major Gowen was a permanent tenant at the Torquay hotel known as Fawlty Towers. His main preoccupations in his later years was the delivery of the morning papers and the prompt opening of the hotel bar at 6:00 PM. But the Major must have had other interests, and one of them appears to have been fly fishing. The Major went into London to visit the Grace Brothers department store in order to buy a fresh supply of flies. As he told Mr. Humphries, his dexterity had diminished with age and so he was no longer able to do his own fly. (Which Mr. Humphries took the wrong way, of course.) Not many in Toobworld are immortal, so it's safe to assume that Major Gowen has passed away, perhaps not long after the death of Ballard Berkeley in the real world "coincidentally".....

SHOWS CITED:

'Fawlty Towers'
'Are You Being Served?' - "Memories Are Made Of This" This Tele-folks Directory profile would not have been possible had it not been for one of my best friends, Michael Cleary, who pointed out that Berkeley appeared in both series. And what makes it work is that his character in 'Are You Being Served?' was never named. He's listed in some episode guides as "Fisherman" and in others as "Customer".

BCnU!

A PHONE-Y "SEINFELD" CROSSOVER

This blipvert would count towards any eventual induction of Frank and Estelle Costanza into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame. It's also a "certified" spin-off from 'Seinfeld' as far as Toobworld Central is concerned.....

BCnU!

ELIZABETH TAYLOR IN "CAN'T HURRY LOVE"

Elizabeth Taylor's entry into the TV Crossover Hall of Fame was mostly due to her four show stint on all of the Monday night CBS comedies back in 1996 in an inter-connected story.

Here is the second part of that quartet - a Nancy McKeon sitcom called "Can't Hurry Love"

BCnU!

MAKING THE LINKIN' CASE: "N.Y.P.D." & "KOJAK"

Dan Frazer played the Chief Of Detectives in the 'NYPD' episode "The Witness". His character wasn't given a name and was only referred to as "Chief".

Could he have been Frank McNeil, the Captain who oversaw Lt. Theo Kojak and the other detectives in the 13th Precinct of Manhattan South? Since I had no clue about how rank works in the NYPD, I asked a friend of mine who only recently retired from the force in the last few years......

Captain is the highest civil service title one can achieve in the NYPD. After captain it is discretionary, at the authority of the Commissioner, you can be promoted to deputy inspector (gold leaf), inspector (eagle), deputy chief (one star), assistant chief (two stars) or a super chief (three stars) who usually head a bureau, patrol, narcotics, OCCB, etc. So Chief of Detectives is really a captain ('cause that was the last official test he took, passed and was promoted to) acting in the rank of Chief of Detectives.

Usually ranks after Captain follow that line as I laid out above and don't skip a rank. However, to be a commissioner or deputy commissioner the chain of rank doesn't necessarily hold. Bernie Kerik is the latest example. He was a simple investigator or Detective 3rd grade who was made Police Commissioner by the mayor because it's a civilian title. Do you follow me so far?

So to answer your question which I already have, the Chief of Detectives is a Captain, acting in a higher rank. Which means that if the commissioner wanted to, for disciplinary purposes which I doubt would ever happen, he can bust a Chief down to a Captain, no lower.

Thanks, Mo!
But apparently it must have happened, because by the time we meet up with Frank McNeil again, he's not the Chief of Detecives anymore. Whatever may have caused the change, he's only in charge of the 13th Precinct. Later in the 'Kojak' series, however, McNeil must have finally redeemed himself in the eyes of the Police Commissioner and was once again made the Chief of Detectives. (It was probably a new Commissioner who gave him his old job back.)

And that would have been a perfect "Game Of The Name" theory - had it not been for Dan Frazer's second appearance on 'N.Y.P.D.', in the episode "Cry Brute".

Detectives Peconic and Corso both addressed him as "Captain", so that fits in at least with having the Chief of Detectives holding the rank of Captain. But then Corso actually states his name this time around - he addresses him as "Captain Laney".

(Somebody on that show must like the name "Laney". It was also the name of the couple at the center of the housewives as prostitutes investigation.)

In a way, I'm glad this happened. I wasn't that happy with the splainin for Frank McNeil losing his job as Chief of Detectives in between 'N.Y.P.D.' and 'Kojak' and then reclaiming it years later.

However, I'm not about to give up on the claim that both of these Dan Frazer roles are the same guy. But my new splainin may seem too far out there for such a gritty, "realistic" cop show, especially after I declared that previous splainin not realistic enough, mundane as it was.

You see, I'm going to hit the 'Primeval' reset button.

First off, let me remind everybody that the Toobworld Dynamic is inclusive of all TV show genres - the main Toobworld sitcoms, sci-fi, Westerns, period pieces, legal dramas, medical shows, reality programming, commercials, mini-series, TV movies and some cartoons (those that crossover into the real world.) If a show is banished to another TV dimension, it's only because it clashes with the overall dynamic.

So 'N.Y.P.D' shares the same world as 'Gunsmoke' and 'Star Trek'. Or to keep it all on the same timeline, with 'Family Affair' and 'The Invaders'. And theoretically, since they all share the same world, they should be able to cross over with each other.

The British sci-fi series 'Primeval' serves as a Toobworld "Essential" because of a very important plot point - at the end of the first season, Toobworld's timeline was altered back in prehistoric times and certain changes occurred. Some drastic, others trivial.

Toobworld Central uses the timeline alteration to re-adjust certain problems in other TV shows - like the different President in 'Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea', a different California governor in an episode of 'Monk', and we're going to use it to fix the difference between the two Dan Frazer episodes.

In 'Primeval', the timeline alteration caused one member of the Anomaly Research team to never exist in the first place. However, although Claudia Brown was now gone, there was a woman named Jenny Lewis who looked exactly like her and served in the same general capacity as Claudia did.
That's the route we're taking here. With the adjustment of the Toobworld timeline, Chief of Detectives Captain Laney no longer existed. Instead, he was replaced by his exact double, Captain Frank McNeil. Only in this new timeline, although he was still a Captain when those 'N.Y.P.D.' stories once again play out, he is no longer the Chief of Detectives. And the only thing that needs to take place off-screen between the two TV series is that he transfers out of the 27th Precinct to the 13th Precinct where he'll work with Lt. Theo Kojak instead of Lt. Mike Haines.

And dat's de name o' dat tune, as Baretta would say!

BCnU!

THE BUILDING BLOCKS OF A CROSSOVER

'Fringe':
Back in the 1980's, when Dr. Walter Bishop was performing experiments on children in Jacksonville, Florida, he tested young Olivia Dunham (identified as "Subject 13") for mental acuity with a challenge to put together a group of blocks correctly in some sort of significant pattern. She complained that she couldn't do it, but Walter kept sharply insisting that she finish it.
'Alias':
Around that same period of time, young Sydney Bristow assembled the blocks under the supervision of her father Jack. It was all part of "Project Christmas", which tested the aptitude of children to see if they should be recruited later in life to be spies.
Although "The Indicator" blocks are admittedly a very trivial connection, it forges a link between the two series that holds as strongly as a crossover.

Both shows were produced by JJ Abrams, making it a similar situation to the Toobits-winning Coffee Bucks - the coffee franchise that has been referenced in 'Scrubs' and 'Cougar Town', both of which were produced by Bill Lawrence. BCnU!