Welcome back to ’80s Couch Surfing, a series in which I watch and review two episodes of a sitcom from the 1980s. Today’s entry is Out of This World (1987-1990), a sitcom about a half-alien girl with superpowers who is living with her human mom and talking to father Burt Reynolds over a crystal.

Season 3 Episode 17: Evie’s Magic Touch

In the competition for “worst 1980s sitcom,” the great debate is usually between Out of This World and Small Wonder. They’re both terrible, don’t get me wrong, but at least they’re the interesting type of terrible with some scifi elements. I can think of several other shows that were just plain bad (like Webster) or cringy. But hey, it’s been a while since I watched this show, so let’s see how bad it can get!

In this episode, it’s the day of Evie’s senior prom, and her mom is still (!) making her dress. Also, the town mayor/police chief Kyle is there to hang out for some reason, which is totally normal. The mayor of my town often crashes on my couch and makes quips while we cautiously back away and call animal control.

This is Evie’s date, Chris, who is wildly happy with his Chicken in the Basket Assistant Manager promotion. He’s not the most ridiculous looking in the show, either, because Evie’s friend Linsey blows out her hair to the point where it would give Marge Simpson a serious challenge. Chris comes back after a bit to tell Evie that his boss is making him work that night and he’s going to have to skip prom to raise money for college tuition. She’s only slightly upset about this, much the same as any high school girl would be if told this mere hours before the prom she’d been dreaming about for months.

I have to fixate on what slim shred of a plot exists here or otherwise I might start whimpering in pain at the jokes. Sorry, I meant the “jokes.” You have to put that in quotes, because these “jokes” aren’t funny, original, or delivered at anything less than a glacial, obvious pace. If you needed a show to demonstrate the worst of sitcom joketelling for some sort of community college class, take this right here.

Anyway… must go back to the plot for survival! A guy shows up at Evie’s door named Gordon (the guy, not the door). He says that Chris asked him to take Evie to the prom instead. He’s a perfect choice, seeing as how he’s coming right off a breakup and is a fountain of tears and guilt trip. Evie uses her magic powers to summon Gordon’s ex to the front door and, why not, they head off to the prom together.

After a couple of pointless filler scenes, Chris shows up to take Evie to prom out (Linsey agreed to fill in for him at Chicken in a Basket). So Evie has this headlining power to stop time by touching her fingertips together, which would be the most amazing ability if it wasn’t frittered away on a lazy teenage girl. Here, she uses it to instantly prepare for prom. They almost make it there, too, until Linsey starts a fire in the restaurant and — instead of calling the fire department — runs to the prom to get Evie and Chris to help clean up.

You’d think that would ruin the night, but Evie uses her “magic” to turn the restaurant into a dance floor. Only good laugh this episode came from when she said, “Close your eyes and imagine this isn’t a chicken restaurant.” Chris [gesturing to the eight-foot chicken statue]: HOW?

Anyway, they dance, there’s a montage of their relationship up to this point as well as (why not) her mom and dad’s dating years. And that’s it. I guess they had a good dance? It’s such a nothing episode that I’m just shocked by how little substance there is — plot, acting, “jokes” are all flat and underwhelming. It’s the wood pulp filler of processed TV.

Season 2 Episode 19: Beano the Kid

In the annals of sitcom history, “Uncle Beano” has to go down as the dorkiest, laziest name ever given a character on TV. And all you need to know about him is that he’s fat, totally obsessed with food, and is one of the very few people who knows Evie is a half-alien with superpowers. And now we’re going to get an episode all about him.

I should also mention (to explain the screencap up there) that Out of This World was partially made and occasionally directed by Charles in Charge’s Scott Baio. I’m going to try to ignore that fact, seeing as how Baio turned out to be a serious creep, but full disclosure and all that.

As this episode opens, Beano is preparing a speech for the businessman’s club while Donna is getting a bunch of stuff together for a charity thing. Some of the items are Beano’s old childhood toys, so he’s tripping hard on nostalgia. Me? I’m already so bored that I’m playing a game called “things that happen in sitcoms that would never happen in my home.” The mayor just barging in without knocking to make some stupid comment and then leaving without closing the door? A kid walking a bike right into my living room? Everyone around here was born in a barn, apparently. Or a space barn.

Beano’s so wistful about his lost youth that Evie decides to use her powers to “make him a kid again.” Evie’s powerset in this show was pretty flexible — mostly she stopped time and teleported, but she also seemed to be a wish factory that could do the dumbest things if the script called for it. In this case, the script called for Beano’s *mind* to revert to a childlike state but his body (weirdly enough) to remain the same. I guess they couldn’t spring for a talented child actor, but since the guy playing Beano is perhaps the best actor I’ve seen on the show so far (and I’m not joking here), I’m OK with it. Of course, none of this is amusing or anything surprising, it’s just leaden plot beats that any college freshman taking a scriptwriting 101 class could churn out.

I think that’s where the real disappointment of shows like Out of This World and Small Wonder lies, because the premise of these shows are kind of cool and wacky in a fun way, and if they were actually treated with some imagination and talented writing, they could have been something. But no, we get the cheapest possible interpretation of “half-alien living on earth” possible.

After Beano goofs around a bit, Evie tries to change him back… and can’t. That brings the family to the magic crystal cube thing, which is — and I am totally not making this up if you’ve never seen the show — a communication device for her dad (voiced by Burt Reynolds) to offer advice and be the ultimate remote parent. I was never clear why he didn’t stick around to be with his wife and daughter, but Reynolds is a busy man and here he can literally phone it in.

Troy (the dad) tells them that “all the gleeping in the world” can’t change Beano back if he doesn’t want to be an adult again. Until then, Evie’s got to babysit him. I, however, am wondering why this renewed 10-year-old Beano not once questions why he’s in the body of a very large adult man. I have two 10-year-olds in the house, and I think that they’d notice such a change.

It’s here where the episode gets a little bit racist, as Beano says things like “what a gyp!” and talks like an Indian about to scalp Evie. I guess we could argue that this was the product of its time, but still… it makes an uncomfortable show a little bit more so. Also, I can’t believe that Evie is truly bound to a chair with a telephone cord. Especially since she has the power to stop time and gleep all this away.

Chris — the boyfriend that Evie doesn’t trust enough to tell the truth about who she really is — comes over because this is one of those sitcoms where they keep cycling through the regulars as they pop in and out of the house. Beano continues to act up, because apparently this is ALL the writers know about 10-year-old boys, and kind of amuses me by dressing like a hunchback monster. Obviously, the actor is having a good time, so that makes one of us.

Over at the health club, Donna is trying to talk Beano up to the businessmen association of whatever. I think it’s the guy who did KITT’s voice in Knight Rider, but what really has my attention is the how weird 1980s sitcom sets were. This is a gym, but also Donna has a work desk here in the middle of the floor taking up 50% of the room. I would imagine it would make for a really awkward fitness session to be doing yoga and leg presses three feet from a middle-aged woman staring and perhaps licking her lips.

Knight Rider guy gets the line of the episode when he tells the mayor that he won because his opponent was, I quote, “a devil-worshiping communist who died of a heart attack a week before the election.” It’s such a randomly awesome line that I had to single it out here.

Anyway, Beano ends up impressing the guy by bringing a bunch of toys into the place (I really don’t want to explain it) and then he sees a very ’80s leotarded girl come in and is ready to be an adult again. End episode.

Ugh. Double ugh. Apart from the strangely catchy theme song, this show is painful. It’s a sitcom without the com, and a scifi show where the lead does nothing useful or interesting with her powers. And it went on for four seasons. That was the hell in which we lived back then.