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TV Friends Forever Thanks To Spinoffs

Recently, there has been talk of a spinoff of The Office starring Rainn Wilson’s Dwight Schrute character and his beet-based farming life. Ah, spinoffs. They don’t seem to happen as often as they used to, Joey aside. Once upon a time, a Mary Tyler Moore Show could begat a Rhoda which could begat an animated series starring her never before seen doorman Carlton. That Carlton spinoff only lasted one episode. It won an Emmy.

However, clearly this talk of an Office spinoff means spinoffs are back. You already have characters people like and know. You move them to a swanky new town, give them a love interest and a friend who is a minority. Good to go. It is a license to print money, provided your show takes place in the U.S. Mint. Anyway, more spinoffs are on the way. Here is just a smattering of possible series:

  • 30 Rock spinoff where Kenneth goes back to his hometown and works on his family’s farm with an eccentric cast of characters. Maybe it’s a beet farm. Maybe NBC is just hedging their bets.
  • Crossover spinoff with the Raising Hope baby and the Modern Family toddler as adults. They solve crimes. Their mentors? Rizzoli and Isles.
  • 2 Broke Girls spinoff filled to the brim with nothing but crude stereotypes and horrendous pun based gags. Maybe with the horse?
  • Ringers spinoff featuring the long lost triplet of the twins played by Sarah Michelle Gellar. She’s a CPA and her life is fairly dull but, you know, Sarah Michelle Gellar!
  • Some of the people from Terra Nova go through another time thing and end up on a still cooling Earth. It’s going to be a pretty short run for that show.
  • Wacky comedy spun off from Breaking Bad starring Skinny Pete and Badger. A real “laff riot.”
  • One of the sexy, sexy vampires from True Blood leaves the town True Blood takes place in. (Blood Falls? I’m going to go with Blood Falls) The sexy vampire runs a haberdashery in Wichita, Kansas. It loses a lot of the supernatural element, but there is still plenty of nudity and, somehow, quite a bit of gore.
  • Episodes spinoff of about remaking the show Episodes, with Matt Leblanc replaced by David Schwimmer. Very meta.
  • Mad Men keeps moving into the future, but what if they started moving into the past? In the spinoff, the whole gang gets in a time machine to, like, the 1860s or something. Don Draper and company in The Civil War. Think about it. Maybe they solve crimes. This is probably just a remake.
  • A spinoff of New Girl starring Winston. The plot is doesn’t matter. It’s really all part of a plan to repeatedly replace the black roommate with another black roommate.
  • A spinoff of Last Man Standing where Tim Allen wakes in a world where he truly is the last man standing. It’s like I Am Legend, but only with jokes about how this is all because dudes moisturized or whatever.

There you have it. Get ready for these spinoffs in the future. Also, TV networks, I’m available to run any of these shows. Like a good spinoff character, we can get to know each other first. Then we can solve crimes together.

Chris Morgan is a writer living in Los Angeles. You can follow him on Twitter (@CMorganExaminer) and/or listen to his podcast.