Episode [x] – The Musical

Here’s how our home life has been (married nearly 30 years, it’s not a honeymoon any more). She sets up the sewing tables in the ‘family room’ and I work from home more often.

During frequent runs out to the kitchen I get a sampling of what she’s watching on  TV while doing her projects. Her latest binge is “The Flash” but today they had “The Musical Episode”. What?

So we both stop work for a minute to wonder how many episodes it takes before television producers do this – Bernie turns to Sid, “hey it’s the umpteenth episode, it’s time for the musical”. “Ok, ok Bernie, let’s do it, but where’s Morty, we’re doing a musical we need Morty!?!?”

Using google and other resources, here’s what I could dig up for the incidence of “The Musical Episode” for some well-known TV series (alphabetical order).

 

Series	Episode Name	Season	Episode	Reference
30 Rock	Episode 210	3	10	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Episode_210
Buffy the Vampire SlayerOnce	Once More With Feeling	6	7	http://www.indiewire.com/2017/03/best-musical-tv-episodes-buffy-flash-30-rock-community-1201797198/
Community	Regionaly Holiday Music	3	10	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regional_Holiday_Music
Fringe	Brown Betty	2	20	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_Betty_(Fringe)
Grey’s Anatomy	Song Beneath The Song	7	18	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_Beneath_the_S
How I Met Your Mother	Girls vs. Suits	5	12	http://how-i-met-your-mother.wikia.com/wiki/Girls_Versus_Suits
Pushing Daisies	Dummy	1	2	http://pushing-daisies.wikia.com/wiki/Episode_102:_Dummy
Scrubs	My Musical	6	6	http://www.indiewire.com/2017/03/best-musical-tv-episodes-buffy-flash-30-rock-community-1201797198/
The Flash	Dynamic Duet	3	17	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duet_(The_Flash)
The Magicians	The Magicians	3	9	https://www.eonline.com/news/915346/the-magicians-is-doing-a-musical-episode-and-it-s-all-because-of-josh
The Office	Andy’s Play	7	3	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nepotism_(The_Office)
The X-Files	Improbable	9	13	https://tv.avclub.com/the-x-files-improbable-scary-monsters-1798179820
Average		4.6	10.6

So an average “The Musical Episode” comes up about season 4.6 and episode 10.6. And there’s no clear drop-dead where they’d pull the trigger on what could be serial killing. In the aftermath, we’ve got some interesting viewing.

If you know of other episodes that would help the stats, please send them in. It’s pretty easy to update the spreadsheet, and it’s interesting viewing too…