Evening Entertainment: Patton Oswalt, Brian Posehn and Sarah Silverman in the comic book store pilot SUPER NERDS

How does a sitcom featuring noted Andy Milligan fan Patton Oswalt and current "Deadpool" writer Brian Posehn working in a comic book store not get picked up?  Espeically when it has Sarah Silverman as a customer?  The laugh track doesn't help and it lacks some polish, but there's certainly potential there.  It's still an interesting piece of nerd culture history, though when it was made in 2000, it may have been a bit ahead of the times in terms of the cultural zeitgeist, as Evan Dorkin's similar WELCOME TO ELTINGVILLE pilot suffered the same fate two years later.  Watch it before it gets pulled!

Evening Entertainment: The unsold pilot for HIGH SCHOOL USA (1984) with Crispin Glover, Jon Gries & an all-star cast

Sure, you may be aware of the 1983 made-for-TV movie HIGH SCHOOL USA, featuring Michael J. Fox, Nancy McKeon, Todd Bridges and an all-star cast of notable '60s TV stars, but few recall that the film was successful enough to warrant an attempt at a TV series, with several cast members (Crystal Bernard, Crispin Glover, Jon Gries) returning for the pilot that never went anywhere. Directed by Jack Bender (CHILD'S PLAY 3) and written by Zucker Bros. collaborator Pat Proft, the pilot also features Barbara Billingsley, Henry Gibson, Jerry Mathers, Ricky and Harriet Nelson, Julie Newmar, Ken Osmond, Burt Ward and Dick York.

Evening Entertainment: Jake Kasdan's 2002 pilot for a TV series based on ZERO EFFECT starring Alan Cumming

Jake Kasdan's 1998 film ZERO EFFECT, featuring Bill Pullman as an incredibly introverted private eye and Ben Stiller as his long-suffering assistant/only real human contact, garnered plenty of great reviews even if it wound up barely released to theaters.  The film, however, built up enough of a (deserved) cult reputation to warrant NBC to want to try to turn it into a television series.  The series never came to fruition, but at least we have this entertaining pilot, featuring Alan Cumming in the role of the reclusive hero and David Julian Hirsh as his sidekick.  If you've ever wondered what it would be like if Cumming had played Sherlock Holmes instead of Benneton Cuminbun, this is about as close as you'll get.

Evening Entertainment: The 1999 Sci-Fi Channel pilot (?) "Warped in Space"

Here's an oddity -- a pilot (or perhaps just a special) made for the Sci-Fi Channel (back when it WAS "Sci-Fi") starring Jim Jackman as the captain of a ship that's been all-but-destroyed due to an asteroid field.  He finds himself trapped with a trio of space losers (including an alien with the body of a woman and the voice of a man) in a hyper-frenetic situation with loads of ridiculous effects and plenty of quick-fire cultural references.  "Red Dwarf" looks like an obvious inspiration, but co-director/producer Chuck Cirino was also a director of mid-'90s oddity "Weird TV" and the Shadoe Stevens special "Shadoevision," both of which share similarities to this one.  Cirino is better known as a composer for a vast amount of the films of Jim Wynorski and Fred Olen Ray, and star Jackman played "Major Asshole" in SPACEBALLS.  Writer Eric Truehart later wrote episodes of "Invader Zim," including the great "Dibship Rising."

Evening Entertainment: Ray Walston and Vincent Schiavelli return for the TV series based on FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH

Today commemorates the 100th birthday of everyone's favorite Martian, Ray Walston, so check out the pilot episode of "Fast Times," a short-lived 1986 TV series in which Walston reprises his role of Mr. Hand from the classic FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH.  With Patrick Dempsey, Courtney Thorne-Smith and Dean Cameron as Spicoli!

2001 pilot for "Electra Woman and Dyna Girl" reboot starring Markie Post

Oh, sure, NOW the CW is all about superhero shows.  This wasn't the case in 2001, when the pre-CW WB Network commissioned this pilot for a prospective series reviving Sid and Marty Krofft's fondly-remembered but completely silly distaff dynamic duo starring Deidre Hall.  This pilot plays the concept for laughs, starring Markie Post as an alcoholic, bitter, surly Electra Woman, who gets a brand new Dyna Girl in an effort to revive her career.  It's actually an entertainingly misanthropic good time, but it makes sense that it wouldn't have been turned into a series -- the original isn't exactly well-known, and the concept of the reboot would just tick off humorless fans of the first series.

Evening Entertainment: The pilot for David Lynch's "On the Air"

ABC was hoping for the next "Twin Peaks" when they got Lynch and Mark Frost to create a new TV series for them -- what they got was "On the Air," one of the strangest sitcoms ever aired on network TV.  The story of a young, dense actress (Marla Rubinoff) who becomes the star of a new TV series featuring a cocky has-been (Ian Buchanan) features a mesh of absurdist slapstick humor that nothing has ever been close to replicating.  Only three episodes of the seven produced were aired before the series vanished (and it's never been released on DVD), though  it has developed a deserved cult rep over the years.  With Miguel Ferrer, Marvin Kaplan, David L. Lander, Tracey Walter (who isn't blind, he suffers from "Bozeman's Simplex") and Kim McGuire, CRY-BABY's Hatchet Face.

Evening Entertainment: Pilot for "I am the Greatest: The Adventures of Muhammad Ali" animated series

Oh, sure, Mike Tyson has a new animated series on Adult Swim, because the idea of Mike Tyson solving mysteries is zany, but he's hardly the first pugilist to make the leap into cartoons.  In 1977, the former Cassius Clay did it first, using his own voice and devoid of irony.  Of course, his floating like a butterfly and stinging like a bee didn't do much for audiences, as the show was gone by the end of the year, but c'mon, he fought Superman the next year!  In the pilot, he faces off against an alligator.  Tyson couldn't even win at the board game.

Evening Entertainment: Pilot for 1992 TV series "1775" starring Ryan O'Neal, Leslie-Anne Down, Adam West, Danielle Harris and Jeffrey Tambor

Has the U.S. ever produced a successful period sitcom?  This pre-Revolution-set comedy stars Ryan O'Neal and Leslie-Anne Down as the heads of a family running an inn in Pennsylvania.  It's no "The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer," but it does feature HALLOWEEN series regular Danielle Harris, Jeffrey Tambor (who was, I believe, contractually obligated to be in at least three sitcoms a year for most of the '80s and '90s) and Adam West as George Washington.

Evening Entertainment: Unsold pilot for "Galaxy Beat," a 1994 sci-fi comedy from "Sledge Hammer" writer with Gregory Harrison, Roddy McDowall and Tracy Scoggins

Broad science fiction comedy is a tough sell on television -- just look at the short run of "Quark."  "Galaxy Beat" is a perfectly entertaining pilot that probably could have been developed into a highly entertaining show if they'd allowed to develop it.  The pilot, written by "Sledge Hammer!"'s Alan Spancer, is filled with sight gags, many of which work quite well.  (There are also a lot of cultural references that date it quite a bit.)  But Harrison seems to be enjoying himself as the amazingly-named Dax Steelbrow, and the supporting cast (which also includes "The Flash"'s Alex Désert and the voice of Michael Dorn) is just as solid.  Much of it works at least as well as SPACEBALLS.

Evening Entertainment: 1974's Mad Magazine TV Special

"Mad TV" wasn't the first time the venerable comic book that mocked everything it could took a shot at the small screen.  In 1974, they took a shot at making a pilot for a potential animated series that feels completely like the magazine in animated form, featuring cartoon adaptations of the likes of Dave Berg, Al Jaffee, Mort Drucker, Don Martin and more.  The pilot, unfortunately, led to nothing, but at least you can see it for yourself.  (Dangerous Minds has a longer write-up about the project here.)

Watch This Thing - "The New Big Ball With Neil Hamburger" Unsold Adult Swim pilot

I really have no idea how the hell this game show hosted by noted anti-humor technician Hamburger (aka Amarillo Records founder Gregg Turkington) would have translated on a weekly basis, but I'm sure glad the pilot was picked up.  With special celebrity guest Corbin Bernsen!

(Seeing Hamburger open for Tenacious D, and the unsuspecting audience's response to his schtick, was a highlight of whatever year I did that in.)

Watch This Thing - Anthony Perkins in 1990's darkly comic pilot for "The Ghost Writer," from the writer of "Sledge Hammer!"

Anthony Perkins never quite found another great role after PSYCHO, and in the '80s, he embraced his most popular character in full, starring in several sequels and embracing a variety of twisted roles.  One of his last was in, of all things, a sitcom, in the 1990 pilot "The Ghost Writer," playing a widowed bestselling horror author with a goth son (RIVER'S EDGE's Joshua Miller) who remarries a woman with a daughter suspicious of the goings on that surround them.  It could have been an "Addams Family" for the '90s - it's written by Alan Spencer, who lent "Sledge Hammer!" similar sensibilities, but the series never got past the pilot stage.