User Reviews

This episode will always be a special episode for me. Not because it was the best episode -- because it was far from it -- but because I was on hand for the filming of it.

I was a sophomore at UCSD and we made a field trip to Hollywood to watch the filming of my favorite show. This was that episode.

What I remember about it is sitting in bleachers that faced the living room set. Most of the other scenes that occurred in the 2nd half of the episode were either pre-taped and the producers recorded our laughter as we watched on TV monitors above our seats, or the action happened on a set behind us that we had to watch on TV.

It was an average episode but was special for me because I got to watch my favorite program filmed live. It also featured cameos by Danny Bonaduce and Gary Coleman so I feel fortunate that I was able to watch it film live.

As I remember it shot very quickly (under and hour) basically in real time except for one scene in which Ed O'Neil flubbed a line and they had to start over.

That was in contrast to the other show we saw shot that day: Nurses. That one took about 4 hours and all of the scenes with Loni Anderson were pre-taped and shown on a monitor as our reactions were recorded for the laugh track.

The highlight of that was meeting David Rache of "Sledge Hammer!" fame. "Sledge Hammer!" was one of my favorite shows of the Eighties, and he was a very nice guy, and he came over and shook all of our hands in between takes. We asked him what happened to Sledge Hammer! (which was canceled) and he responded "I've moved on to bigger and better things!" Class act.

The reason this episode drives me crazy, not because of the main story or acting or anything. The big reason I dislike this episode is because it lacks consistency. This is the main reason most shows with many season tend to go downhill. The writers should consult the subject history before writing a new episode. Season 1 there was an episode where house were being broken into and AL got a gun and Marcy went off the deep end about it and got a dog. She said how much she hates guns and all kinds of anti 2nd Amendment garbage, fine, Story movement. Now this episode comes along and Jefferson has a shotgun not a foot from his wives head and she has no problem with that, but to protect ones house that must cross some insane line. It would be different if it had not been a major plot point but you cant just flip like that without having the character grow in an episode to enplane how and why. Not just throw in a gun and it is all fine with no explanation on why she no longer has a problem being around fire arms.

When the apple from Al's tree falls into the Darcy's yard, it triggers a property line dispute that escalates to ridiculous extremes.

And by 'ridiculous extremes', I mean cartoonish silliness that ranges from Al electrocuting Marcy in her hot tub, to Al Jacking up the Darcy's house, to Jefferson destroying the side of the Bundy's home with a rocket launcher. It takes the lunacy just a little too far for my liking - what might be okay for Bugs Bunny or Wile E. Coyote doesn't quite work for Married With Children. I think I prefer the show to keep things within the realms of plausibility (that said, my favourite episode is the one where Al meets the aliens, but even that is more believable than blowing up a house with a rocket without serious repercussions from the law).

This episode guest stars two former child actors, Danny Bonaduce from The Partridge Family and Diff'rent Strokes' Cary Coleman (who utters the line "Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Bundy?").