Family Ties aired for seven seasons (1982-89) and was extremely popular for most of them. It starred Meredith Baxter-Birney and Michael Gross as liberal, baby-boomer former hippies from the 60s raising their children in the 80s. The real star of the show was Michael J. Fox as the one and only "Alex P. Keaton" who ranks highly on my Top TV Characters of the 80s list. Fox won the Emmy three years in a row (1986-88) for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series. "Alex" was a conservative Young Republican who represented the exact opposite of his parents' political and socio-economic views.

I saw a quote that described the core of the show very well. The Museum of Broadcast Communication entry states, "this highly successful domestic comedy explored one of the intriguing cultural inversions characterizing the Reagan era: a conservative younger generation aspiring to wealth, business success, and traditional values, serves as inheritor to the politically liberal, presumably activist, culturally experimental generation of adults who had experienced the 1960s."

Family Ties was a sitcom, so there was a lot of comedy sprinkled in as well. The show was extremely well written and even won an Emmy for Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series (1987). The show also had its share of emotional drama. I can't hear Billy Vera's song "At This Moment" without immediately remembering the episode when "Alex" and his girlfriend "Ellen" broke up. I could not find a video of this scene, but here is a link to the song being performed live if you do not remember the tune.  We witnessed a lot of coming of age stuff since we saw these kids grow up on our TV sets for 7 years of their lives.

Family Ties is truly one of my favorite shows from the 80s. And now you can watch episodes for FREE online! Even though the series originally aired on the NBC network, the episodes are available on CBS.com. Click on this link to take you to the Family Ties page where you can watch episodes from the first four seasons.

Not many people remember that Tom Hanks actually had a small role in the first season as "Uncle Ned" before he really broke out as a movie star. You can go to the site to get any of the other episodes, but here is a link directly to an episode of Family Ties featuring Tom Hanks called "The Fugitive, part 1."

The theme song for the show, sung by Johnny Mathis and Deniece Williams, ranks on my popular Top TV Theme Songs list. If you were a fan of Family Ties like me, I am sure were pleased to hear these episodes are available online now. Enjoy! If you did not read my issue on hulu.com, click on that link to take you there because that site has a huge catalog of other great TV series (and movies too) available to view for free on line. You would be surprised what you can watch for free right from where you are sitting reading this right now.

That will wrap up another short issue of Kickin' it Old School. I have some Family Ties episodes to catch up on now. Thanks for reading. If you are interested in reading more of my 80s related issues, please click there for a summary of those. You can also always click on the Archives in the upper left hand column or use the Google Search Box at the top of the right hand column to find any other issues you may have missed. If you are a fan of Kickin' it, PLEASE CLICK ON THE FACEBOOK LOGO in the upper right hand column. This will take you to the new Fan Page where I ask you to then click on "Become a Fan". Even if you are not a Facebook member yet, please consider joining and registering as a fan at that page. Let other 80s fans know about it as well! Peace and much love.

Check this out: Now, I am not saying that this movie is all that great as a whole, but in my opinion this particular scene from the 2000 comedy Dude, Where's My Car? starring Ashton Kutcher and Seann William Scott has to be one of the single funniest scenes I have ever seen. I hope you enjoy it, too...

Dude Wheres My Car Chinese Foooooood - Funny bloopers are a click away

Quote of the day: "Family is not an important thing, it's everything." -Michael J. Fox