Top 10 80's Television Sitcoms

During the 80's the U.S. experienced a dramatic change in television sitcoms. The 70's had been an era in which sitcoms were the voice of social issues, injustices, and political viewpoints. In the 80's viewers no longer wanted to turn to television to be goaded into social action; they wanted to watch T.V. as an escape from an increasingly hectic world. Light-hearted humor returned to sitcoms.

Morals and values remained part an element of sitcom plots, but sitcoms of the 80's were more escapism than anything else. As proof of this, consider one of the most popular sitcoms of the 80's Alf.

Alf (1986 - 1990)

Alf was an alien life form who crashed on the garage of an average middle class American family, the Tanner's. Alf's given name was Gordan Shumway, but the Tanner family called him Alf for short. Willie (Max Wright), Kate (Anne Schedeen), Lynn (Andrea Nelson), and Brian (Benji Gregory) Turner spent their time trying to keep Alf a secret, while he tried to understand the bizarre life and customs of earthlings.

Alf's perception of earth and endless sarcasm kept the 80's sitcom moving. It also gave viewers an opportunity to look at ourselves through the eyes of an alien. Many of Alf's observations were accurate, others provocative. The humor was in Alf's true evaluations of earthlings and human life. Alf was a sitcom that poked fun at our own customs and traditions without offending us.

In 1990 when Alf stopped production, he left earth with two other Melmacians who found him and took him away to populate a new planet. He escaped just before the U.S. government Alien Task Force closed in on his location.

An animated version of Alf aired on Saturday morning T.V. for a couple of years. Currently Alf re-runs air in Canada and other parts of the world, but not the U.S.

If Alf returned to U.S. television, he would have to be more than a fury, adorable creature. In order to hold audiences today an Alien Life Form would need to incorporate high-tech computer animation and other-word abilities.