TV Rewind | Small Wonder: An ode to nostalgia

Why Small Wonder worked?

Small Wonder has a huge fan base all over the world but it has a special place in the heart of the Indian audience. The 90s brought in a revolution on television. We were moving past Doordarshan and with the introduction of new content, there was an increasing interest in shows like Small Wonder and Bewitched that were broadcast with Hindi dubbing. It helped that many cartoons by Disney were dubbed in Hindi too, thus, the audience was getting familiarised with American content on their TV screens.

Small Wonder was the story of a family and that appealed to an average Indian consumer.

In the show, Ted Lawson is a robotics engineer who creates an Andriod in the form of a human girl and to acclimatise her to regular life, he brings her home. She gets the name Vicki and is treated like Ted and Joan’s daughter. Joan treats Vicki like a real person and this translates to her son Jamie as well.

The show depends on Vicki’s lesser understanding of the real world which provides the laughs for the major part of the show. Her ability to learn fast and her physical strength is often highlighted in the show.

How Small Wonder changed?

As the actor who played Vicki, Tiffany Brissette, was growing up in real life, the makers had to find a way to incorporate those changes in the script. Which is why the later seasons had the storyline of Ted further improving the robot so that it could eat.

The show had a short life span of four seasons, which in today’s time isn’t a lot but the 90s kids still fondly remember the theme song of the show.

The best bits

As much as we loved the Lawsons, the Brindles added their own touch to the show. Harriet Brindle was the annoying neighbour who would drop in unannounced whenever she wanted and for the longest time, we thought she would be the first one to blow Vicki’s cover but thankfully, that never happened.

TV Rewind | Breaking Bad | That 70s Show | AHS Roanoke | Friends | The West Wing | Sharp Objects | Patrick Melrose | AHS Murder House | Arrested Development | Two and a Half Men | Girls | The Good Wife | Dead Set | Dexter | Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip | The Office | Parks and Recreation | Fringe | Broadchurch | Seinfeld | Lost | Mad Men | Sex and the City

Small Wonder is certainly not the greatest show that we have seen but sometimes a big dose of nostalgia is more than sufficient to compensate for quality.