I may have been familiar vaguely with the site for years, but I came to the AVC in late 2013 for their reviews.  Not anything recent like Revenge or Arrow or Person of Interest or really anything I was super excited to talk and read more about around then.  I came after being linked quite a few times from Wikipedia for older shows, probably Buffy but who knows where I started.  For months afterwards, I poured through the TV Club Classic section and eventually the TV Club proper section for just about any review of a show I’ve seen before starting to post in 2014 on the TV Club.  Sadly by 2015, the TV Club Classic was sputtering to an end thanks to low readership (and money) and TV Club seemed to be on its way to a massive cut (that really started the following year).

I long had an idea of starting my own website and had even tried briefly on WordPress back in college before finding I was the only one interested really in publishing content (having four people write for a site is so much easier than two or eventually one) and the workload of college led me to abandon the site in the usual way sites die (regular content which turns irregular and then peters out.  The fact that if a post of mine hit double digit readers it was a special occasion certainly made that decision easier.  That idea of a personal site stuck with me and was reinvigorated by my commenting and the writing I got to do there but the thought of actually starting something again on my own was too much of a deterrent and there was no way I was a popular enough contributor to try to convince others to make a site more dedicated to reviews that would pick up where the AVC left off.

Thankfully for me, a far bigger name in Dikachu did just that with the AVCAD and while I wasn’t sure if it would take off, I was there at the beginning hoping it would transform into something like I imagined.  I also have to give credit to Bull Pucky for actually manning up and starting Classic Coverage off there, but I instantly saw the potential and wanted to help make it successful.  Doctor Who is a show I came to well into the revival’s run (around Series 6) and at some point, had decided I was going to work my way through the classic series episodes and had just started Season 6 when the AVCAD began.  I was dutifully following along with the fantastic AVC coverage of the show as I watched but I hated the gaps left by unreviewed serials and the way it jumped around, a way I refuse to watch TV.  Thanks to a number of months long breaks, my reviews still haven’t reached where I left off nearly two years ago but once again I resolve to change that.

As I’m sure you can tell, Classic Coverage never took off at the AVCAD (when I posted there and apparently after) though I must acknowledge the work of Drunk Napolean’s Simpsons and  Gooch’s Arrested Development work that I did see while I frequented the site (plus I’m happy to report that The Disreputable Dog with Stargate SG-1 and Remus Lupin the Third with Black Books have already kicked things off here).  I am well acquainted with how much work it is doing them and not only are the comment numbers low (I saw multiple 0 comment totals especially early on), after a day, they are basically forgotten to time.  I’d be lying if I said it didn’t weigh on me as I debated whether to devote hours to a task seen by few and I’m sure many of you felt similarly.

When DoU came to me and pitched this site, while I didn’t think it was going to be accepted, I eagerly helped (probably more than I should) largely because she is super pretty and I will do anything in the world for her, but also because as I tinkered with the menus, I realized this was the chance to preserve these reviews.  To make them more visible when they are posted, to more visibly preserve them (and not just in an ever-growing word document of html formatted links), and to encourage more people to do what I had done a few years ago and dive into old shows they had just started watching, or reviews before they even came on board the site.

So let me introduce the new Classic Coverage.  We are separate to the DoU spearheaded TV coverage but I want to grow this into an essential part of the site to give the fans of classic TV a chance to dive into the shows they love, the shows they are discovering, and a group of people to share it with.  All you have to do (and this is for episodes that haven’t just aired which fall into DoU’s purview) is format the title as [Show]: S##E## “[Episode Title], select the Category of TV, and Tags of Classic Coverage and [Show Title] and anyone here is ready to post show reviews that will be preserved for years to come and visitors to always have a place to come and see them.  I myself am picking back up Doctor Who (these will “air” every other Monday at 7PM EST starting today) and maybe down the line Star Trek: The Original Series as well (I’ve been building up a decent sized backlog and once I get a few more weeks done, I hope to start it), but I hope that the Classic Coverage tag under TV on that menu above will be filled in no time.

I’m not going to set up sign ups.  Just do the work to write the reviews and that show is yours to have and to hold.  There’s no obligations, no deadlines, no nothing (please don’t abuse this by writing one or two reviews and then refusing to give up the show even after you’ve long since abandoned it).  Just an outlet for all of us that I hope you will all join me on that will persist on this site for years to come.