TV Serials That Withstand the Test of Time

 For me, Lucy, Little Wonder, The Cosby Show, Family Ties, Different Strokes, Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie and lately Nero Wolfe that I saw on Youtube were some of the best in English. Friends and The Big Bang Theory were good too, of the more recent ones. Murder, She Wrote and Remington Steele were also good, among older ones. So was Three's Company.

In Hindi, Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi, Mahabharat, Hum Paanch, Tehkikaat, and Tu Tu Main Main come to mind readily. I missed some because I was in the U.S. when they ran on Indian T.V. Surabhi was a show about Indian culture that was hosted well by Renuka Shahane.

Thinking of Titles

Everything needs a title, and it's tough to think of one..for a film, a TV show, or for a position. In Tamil nadu, and Andhra/Telangana, every star has a title, I am told..the titles could be Superstar, Star of Stars, Never-before-seen-star, or any other bizarre set of words. The announcement when a monarch entered his court, whether it was Akbar in Mughal-e-Azam or Shivaji in his court, included their titles.

Naming something-your child, or the brand your company has conceived-has the same problem-namely, the name. And once you name someone or something, it's branded for a long, long time. Naming films would be an equally difficult job, I am guessing.

Trying to recall names of some popular shows we watched on American TV in the late eighties, the following come to mind- The Cosby Show, Family Ties, Hawaii Five-O, Miami Vice, Remington Steele, Murder, She Wrote, ..or those later, such as Friends, Castle, The Big Bang Theory, Game of Thrones, etc. one can see a pattern of using the names of places, characters (or real ones, as in Cosby's case), and sometimes, the subject- such as Family Ties starring Michael J. Fox, or Friends.

I personally prefer short titles- Rajni, for instance, or Mahabharat, but Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi was also a favourite TV show when it ran.