“A remarkable encyclopedia.” —TV Guide “A must-browse for media freaks.” —USA Today “Irresistible and enthralling.” —Hartford Courant “Full of fool’s gold and genuine TV treasures.” —The New York Post The three hundred best and worst TV series ideas— known in the industry as “pilots”— that never made it to primetime. From the adventures of a Samurai D.A. to the antics of an invisible alien baby, Lee Goldberg details the greatest shows you never saw.

"A television pilot is a sample episode of a proposed weekly series. An unsold pilot is much, much more. It's fresh faces and old favorites lining up for a one-night stand with the viewing public. It's producers, writers, directors, and network executives scrambling to keep up with the changing trends in American taste. It's the betting stub you're left with after your horse has lost the race...The networks are in the entertainment business and lucky for us consumers, even the business-behind-the-business is entertainment. Pilots may be lunacy, but as long as they make them, as long as they sneak into primetime, we can all pretend we can run a network" --

Unsold Television Pilots is a detailed compilation of all the unsold television series concepts that, from 1955 through 1988, reached the development stage at the networks--but didn't sell. Pilots are listed by year and title and include production credits, plot synopsis and when applicable, air dates. The Introduction explains what a pilot is, and how the television marketplace works now and has worked in the past. An exhaustive index (actors, writers, directors, producers and pilots) and separate lists of pilots that are based on movies, pilots that are continuations of cancelled series, and pilots that are spin-offs of characters from other series are also included.

This reference work, the most complete guide to aired and unaired television pilot films ever published (or made available in any way), contains 5,190 alphabetically arranged programs, each with storyline information, performer and character cast listings, producers, air dates (where applicable), genre, and network or cable association. Also included are the unaired versions of pilots that became a series (like 90 Bristol Court, Hazel, The Middle and Perfect Strangers) and the updates of aired series that were never telecast (e.g., The Robinsons: Lost in Space, the 1997 version of Hawaii Five-0, the 2011 Wonder Woman and the 2001 Electra Woman and Dyna Girl).

THE BEST TV SHOWS THAT NEVER WERE"The Best Bathroom Reading EVER," - San Francisco Chronicle"A must-browse for media freaks." -USA Today"Irresistible and enthralling." -Hartford Courant"Full of fool's gold and genuine TV treasures." -The New York Post This lively and entertaining book looks at the three hundred best and worst TV series ideas-known in the industry as "pilots"-that never made it to primetime from 1955-1990. From the adventures of a Samurai D.A. to the antics of an invisible alien baby, Lee Goldberg reveals the most astonishing, funny, and bizarre shows that never were. "You'll slap your head in disbelief-try not to hurt yourself-at the idea of John Denver as a singing FBI agent. You'll wonder whether Joe Penny as a samurai district attorney would have been funnier-unintentionally-that John Belushi's 'Saturday Night Live.' For tube-historians, this is a must see." - People MagazineThis book was previously published as "Unsold TV Pilots: The Greatest Shows You Never Saw" and "Unsold TV Pilots: The Almost Complete Guide To Everything You Never Saw on TV"

Covering the years 1945–2018, this alphabetical listing provides details about 2,923 unaired television series pilots, including those that never went into production, and those that became series but with a different cast, such as The Green Hornet, The Middle and Superman. Rarities include proposed shows starring Bela Lugosi, Doris Day, Humphrey Bogart, Barbara Stanwyck, Orson Welles, Claudette Colbert and Mae West, along with such casting curiosities as Mona Freeman, not Gale Storm, as Margie in My Little Margie, and John Larkin as Perry Mason long before Raymond Burr played the role.

For everyone who has ever laughed at the television industry's knack for dreaming up wacky ideas, here is the ultimate TV reference guide. It's all here--from Groucho Marx playing billionaire J. Paul Greedy to Norman Lear's "McGurk", in which actors dressed in dog suits barked one-liners at each other. Includes over 300 annotated listings and a complete index of actors, writiers, directors, producers, and pilots.