1 Season Wonder: Baby, I'm Back

That's right! I'm baaaack.

And it's baaaack.
Welcome to 1 Season Wonder.

Today, it's this forgotten (yet still feels forgettable) gem from 1978, starring everybody's favorite "big dummy" and the girl who would later go on to be both Tootie amd Regine.

It's Baby... I'm Back.



Meet Raymond Ellis. a Washington D.C. man with a wonderful family (his stone-cold foxy wife Olivia, and their two dyno-mite kids Jordan and Angie) and a wonderful life in the nation's capital. He's also a compulsive gambler, and because of  his habits he suddenly abandons his family one day and left for California. But years later, after picking up a groovy good job, Raymond gets his life together and returns to DC and his family. But after the wife just declared him legally dead, the family had moved on, with Olivia now engaged to a new man--an Army Colonel named Wallace Dickey, and the kids getting a new dad. With Raymond now back in their lives, Olivia, Jordan and Angie must deal with the man whom left them years ago, and Raymond must deal with the family that moved on and see him as the roadblock to their new happy lives, the new man that now has his now-ex-wife's heart and the mother-in-law (Luzelle) that will do anything to keep the man away from her daughter's new family, new life and new happiness.
Hilarity Ensues!

According to Wikipedia, this really is the plot of this series. And it surprised me, because years ago when I first heard of it when messing around on YouTube watching old network TV spots (just to see what television looked like back in the day), I thought of it as a random generic sitcom. From what I got out of it, I thought it was about the main character being a rising music star coming back to his hometown and catching up with his former flame. Well, I was sorta right. He did come back home, and wanted to hook up again with his flame (who is his wife), but the rising music star part was way off -- as I learned he's actually a deadbeat employee at a Cali racetrack.

Created by Lila Garrett and Mort Lachman, this series stars Demond Wilson (Lamont on Sanford and Son) as Raymond, Denise Nicholas (later for In the Heat of the Night) as Olivia, Helen Martin (known for That's My Mama and Good Times and especially as Pearl Shay on 227) as Olivia's mother -- and Raymond's thorn-in-his-side mother-in-law -- Luzelle, Tony Holmes as Ray and Liv's son Jordan and a young Kim Fields as their daughter Angie. Airing on CBS from January 30 to April 24, 1978, it had modest ratings but not enough to continue as you can see here.

Went I went into it, I expected very little... But I got a lot I didn't think could be seen on a sitcom. I've never seen many TV shows where deadbeat fathers whom left the family years ago actually came back and tried his best to get back on their good graces; usually these are plot points or storylines, not the start of a whole series. And most usually, the loser dads stay gone, and we never seen them again. I'm usually not a fan of these characters (yeah, I'm supposed to but still).

Watching the title sequence, Raymond's voice-over narration didn't help his case already. Leaving his family was terrible and enraging enough, but doing it to satisfy his gambling is strike two, and going after other women despite being married means "YOU'RE OUT!!" in terms of likability. The fact that I have to hear this in the title sequence for every episode drive this in and pushes it into infinity (and that's even if and when Raymond has grown as a character in my eyes). The series does well in displaying the Ellis family's feelings toward Ray since his sudden return. Olivia has anger, heartbreak and resentment to him; Jordan doesn't see him as his father anymore and resorts to referring to him by his name (and I don't blame him as most kids don't have the same love for their dads when they abandon them, hating them for thinking of them as nothing; I've been there myself, though my dad did come back after a while), Angie is okay with the news as she was a baby when Ray left and during scenes with them we see a sweet humbling relationship between them, and...to say it short, Luzelle cheered his legal death in the first episode (that's all you need to know).

As for the writing, it's really decent for a black sitcom of the decade. It's not exactly Good Times, The Jeffersons or Sanford and Son-level compositions but it's up there with the jive speak, jokes, the occasional bittersweet moment and the like, along with references to the movies and other TV shows of the decade. I wasn't gaffawing at most of the jokes as I do with these shows, but I damn sure was laughing. When a moment comes when it's either genuinely sad or bittersweet, it feels just like it. The reunion scene in the pilot "Living Proof" was a wild but perfect mix of emotions from the characters upon Raymond's random return.

The cast gave fantastic performances.
Wilson was a great second banana as Lamont Sanford, but he does carry this series real well too. While he still held the laughs good, he did nice during the dramatic scenes as well. And had he not, he sure had a talented group to work with. Nicholas was a beautiful force to be reckoned with as Olivia; she held down both comedic and dramatic scenes with ease, and almost had me in tears during her character's reuniting scene with Ray in the pilot. Holmes some great talent as Jordan; while he showed a bit (a lot) of brash and sass in some scenes, he was very good in early scenes showing well-done pathos in Jordan's anger and sadness after reuniting with Ray.

Sure, Luzelle filled the trope of the spiteful Mother-in-Law, but Helen Martin's performance had me rolling every other time she talked. The sass is delicious (and it's not the last time, as I'll remind you in a moment).

While this series didn't last, it was pretty good to watch while I was able to all these years later.

Why It's A Wonder: I assumed the ratings were pretty decent, since all 13 episodes aired no problem, and would've had another season or two had CBS had enough clout to do so. but since it was a midseason replacement (and other stronger shows got in the way), it really didn't stand a chance--and it's a shame, because a show like this was and still is needed on TV (at least story-wise) and would've been both empowering and entertaining to see that in real life there are men out there who love their families enough to come back after being deadbeats (granted they shouldn't be deadbeats in the first place, but hey, I'm not God, so I didn't make the Ten Commandments...)

And there it is, Baby, I'm Back, the twelth series added to the 1 Season Wonders Hall of...(for the moment I'll call it) Acclame (my own spelling of Acclaim). Yeah, that'll work.

Thank you for being here. And see you soon another edition of 1 Season Wonder.

I'm Andrew. Abyssinia.