Knot?s Landing and Mission: Impossible

I stopped watching Knott?s Landing about halfway through the series when it diverged from Dallas. After a full season of Bobby being dead on both
shows, Dallas declared the last year a dream and did a hard reset, but
Knott?s landing ignored it and left Bobby dead.
Now maybe 40 years later through the miracle of streaming reruns I saw the final season.
It begins with Valene, missing and kidnapped and blown up. I don?t even
know who half the characters were. Donna Mills is long gone as well.
It?s not very interesting since it involves a bunch of people fighting for
a company that I have no idea what it does.
But there is a big two part finale where Val and Donna come back. I think Donna?s stuff was mostly shot separately. There?s a lot of her waving from across the street going on. But Bobby is still dead.

In its final season, Mission: Impossible stopped taking place in foreign countries and stayed put in the US of A fighting drug runners. In his IMDb entry, Ian says that this was a network mandate to save money although I
don?t see how that works; it?s not like they were actually shooting
overseas in Latveria!

There?s an episode with an uncredited Farrah Fawcett. And a reunion between William Shatner and Barbara Anderson.
But the most fun comes towards the end. A mission blows up in their faces
and they?re exposed so Barney and Willie just pull out their guns and
murder all the bad guys!

Jesus, if we had known they could do that, it would?ve really streamlined
the show!

Also, they answer a question I always wondered about. You can?t tell if a person is wearing a mask when you kiss them. Even if you kiss them hard.


--
The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but it is still on my list.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Verily, in article <1545201534.790696044.116318.anim8rfsk- cox.net@news.easynews.com>, did anim8rfsk@cox.net deliver unto us this message:

But the most fun comes towards the end. A mission blows up in their faces
and they?re exposed so Barney and Willie just pull out their guns and
murder all the bad guys!

Jesus, if we had known they could do that, it would?ve really streamlined
the show!

Also, they answer a question I always wondered about. You can?t tell if a person is wearing a mask when you kiss them. Even if you kiss them hard.

That sounds more like Mission: Impossible than like the Knotts Landing I remember. Interesting. I guess it spun out into melodrama at the end, as dramas so often do.

--
The True Melissa - Canal Winchester - Ohio
United States of America - North America - Earth
Solar System - Milky Way - Local Group
Virgo Cluster - Laniakea Supercluster - Cosmos

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 1/22/26 2:57 AM, The True Melissa wrote:

Verily, in article <1545201534.790696044.116318.anim8rfsk- cox.net@news.easynews.com>, did anim8rfsk@cox.net deliver unto us this message:

But the most fun comes towards the end. A mission blows up in their faces
and they?re exposed so Barney and Willie just pull out their guns and
murder all the bad guys!

Jesus, if we had known they could do that, it would?ve really streamlined
the show!

Also, they answer a question I always wondered about. You can?t tell if a
person is wearing a mask when you kiss them. Even if you kiss them hard.

That sounds more like Mission: Impossible than like the Knotts Landing I remember. Interesting. I guess it spun out into melodrama at the end, as dramas so often do.

You can't jump into a soap in the last season after skipping most of it
and expect to like what was going on.

There was a lot of stuff in the middle that Anim skipped that I liked.
But that is basically when Greg Sumner and Paige mostly took over "Nots Landing". So I think they were dominating the show at the end. Joan Van
Ark got flakier and flakier with the show so I think she was pretty much
gone by the end. Donna Mills also left the show at some point.

I enjoyed "Knots" more after the first few seasons, and loved the Greg
Sumner stuff. I think it stayed pretty good to the end, and the series
finale was a decent wrap-up IIRC.



--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 1/22/26 7:18 AM, Ian J. Ball wrote:

On 1/22/26 2:57 AM, The True Melissa wrote:

Verily, in article <1545201534.790696044.116318.anim8rfsk-
cox.net@news.easynews.com>, did anim8rfsk@cox.net deliver unto us this
message:

But the most fun comes towards the end. A mission blows up in their
faces
and they?re exposed so Barney and Willie just pull out their guns and
murder all the bad guys!

Jesus, if we had known they could do that, it would?ve really
streamlined
the show!

Also, they answer a question I always wondered about. You can?t tell
if a
person is wearing a mask when you kiss them. Even if you kiss them hard.

That sounds more like Mission: Impossible than like the Knotts Landing I
remember. Interesting. I guess it spun out into melodrama at the end, as
dramas so often do.

You can't jump into a soap in the last season after skipping most of it
and expect to like what was going on.

There was a lot of stuff in the middle that Anim skipped that I liked.
But that is basically when Greg Sumner and Paige mostly took over "Nots Landing".

Heh. ;)

So I think they were dominating the show at the end. Joan Van
Ark got flakier and flakier with the show so I think she was pretty much gone by the end. Donna Mills also left the show at some point.

I enjoyed "Knots" more after the first few seasons, and loved the Greg Sumner stuff. I think it stayed pretty good to the end, and the series finale was a decent wrap-up IIRC.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Verily, in article <10ktf4b$33doq$1@dont-email.me>, did
ijball@mac.invalid deliver unto us this message:

You can't jump into a soap in the last season after skipping most of it
and expect to like what was going on.

True, and not just soaps. Anyone who watched the last season of (e.g.)
House, M.D. first would wonder why anyone bothered with such crazy
nonsense.

--
The True Melissa - Canal Winchester - Ohio
United States of America - North America - Earth
Solar System - Milky Way - Local Group
Virgo Cluster - Laniakea Supercluster - Cosmos

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Ian J. Ball <ijball@mac.invalid> wrote:

On 1/22/26 2:57 AM, The True Melissa wrote:

Verily, in article <1545201534.790696044.116318.anim8rfsk-
cox.net@news.easynews.com>, did anim8rfsk@cox.net deliver unto us this
message:

But the most fun comes towards the end. A mission blows up in their faces >>> and they?re exposed so Barney and Willie just pull out their guns and
murder all the bad guys!

Jesus, if we had known they could do that, it would?ve really streamlined >>> the show!

Also, they answer a question I always wondered about. You can?t tell if a >>> person is wearing a mask when you kiss them. Even if you kiss them hard.

That sounds more like Mission: Impossible than like the Knotts Landing I
remember. Interesting. I guess it spun out into melodrama at the end, as
dramas so often do.

You can't jump into a soap in the last season after skipping most of it
and expect to like what was going on.

There was a lot of stuff in the middle that Anim skipped that I liked.
But that is basically when Greg Sumner and Paige mostly took over "Nots Landing". So I think they were dominating the show at the end. Joan Van
Ark got flakier and flakier with the show so I think she was pretty much gone by the end. Donna Mills also left the show at some point.

I enjoyed "Knots" more after the first few seasons, and loved the Greg Sumner stuff. I think it stayed pretty good to the end, and the series finale was a decent wrap-up IIRC.

Donna returned just for the finale and thought she could take the company
away from Sumner, but she failed and moved back into her old house or next-door.

A really weird thing is that the houses seemed undecorated. They were just blank walls with no paintings or anything on them and hardly any furniture.



--
The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but it is still on my list.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

In article <MPG.43dc12f045f12a40989a33@news.eternal-september.org>,
The True Melissa <thetruemelissa@gmail.com> wrote:

Verily, in article <10ktf4b$33doq$1@dont-email.me>, did
ijball@mac.invalid deliver unto us this message:

You can't jump into a soap in the last season after skipping most of it and expect to like what was going on.

True, and not just soaps. Anyone who watched the last season of (e.g.) House, M.D. first would wonder why anyone bothered with such crazy
nonsense.

It isn't uncommon for the last season of a series to be the worst,
before they finally give up the ghost. M*A*S*H, All in the Family,
Roseanne are all good examples. They seem to devolve into caricatures of themselves. And losing key characters along the way doesn't help.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Verily, in article <super70s-F6DDA8.18053622012026@hub.eternal-
september.org>, did super70s@super70s.invalid deliver unto us this
message:

It isn't uncommon for the last season of a series to be the worst,
before they finally give up the ghost. M*A*S*H, All in the Family,
Roseanne are all good examples. They seem to devolve into caricatures of themselves. And losing key characters along the way doesn't help.

Yeah, that's definitely so. I wonder if that will change in the future, though. Now that there's often a hiatus between seasons, perhaps the
creators just won't come back when they no longer have any stories to
tell.

--
The True Melissa - Canal Winchester - Ohio
United States of America - North America - Earth
Solar System - Milky Way - Local Group
Virgo Cluster - Laniakea Supercluster - Cosmos

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

HELLO DOWN THERE

A 1969 underwater comedy with a good cast that?s one of the worst movies
ever made. Ivan Tors, the guy behind Flipper, decided to take the props he
used to make Around the World under the Sea and make a comedy, but he
forgot to bring the funny.

Tony Randall, Jim Backus, Ken Berry, Roddy McDowell, Arnold Stang and
Richard Dreyfus as the boyfriend who wants to be a musician and is terribly dubbed. I must?ve dozed off, but Arnold Stang disappears halfway through, which would seem difficult since he?s in an underwater digging machine. The
end is all footage of the Navy presumably coming to the rescue, but there
is nobody to rescue because the movies already done.

THE ASTRONAUT

Kate Mara headlines a 2025 film that actually isn?t the worst thing I?ve
ever seen her in but then I recently finally watched the second worst
fantastic four movie.
She plays a returning astronaut in a plot that makes no sense whatsoever
and might have made a bad episode of the outer limits 60 years ago. There
is no outer space action, it?s all on the ground after the mission.

--
The last thing I want to do is hurt you, but it is still on my list.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.6
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)