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Hugh Beaumont's narration in first season


Through much of the first season of LITB in the opening Hugh Beaumont would provide a voice-over narration of the topic and subject matter of the episode always concluding with "and that's our story tonight on LITB." It was a nice touch but I suppose because the TV Guide would usually list what the episode was going to be about it was thought as un-necessary

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Yeah, Beaumont's narrations were great. They should have continued that throughout the series.

IMO they probably stopped doing that because they had trouble finding suitable footage to correspond to the narration, or else they didn't want to bother to edit such footage together.

I suppose because the TV Guide would usually list what the episode was going to be about it was thought as un-necessary


I doubt it. After they stopped Ward's narration halfway through the Season (or however long it was), they attempted to accomplish the same function on the cheap, by literally copy and pasting a scene from the middle of the episode and playing it before the opening credits. That was abysmal!

To add insult to injury, the Shout Factory screwed up a lot of those copy and pasted scenes on their DVD release, and accidentally reversed their order so that they appear after the opening credits (i.e. they are presented as if they are the first scene of the episode, even though they are not...and of course, they again play a second time at their proper place in the episode). Ugh! That's the worst of the worst!

Apparently the original DVD release from Universal did not have that reverse order screw up, but it has an even worse flaw: those DVDs are craptastic double-sided discs.

TL;DR: Beaumont's narration is amazing. Copied and pasted scenes from the middle of the episode that are stuck before the opening credits in lieu of Beaumont's narration is terrible. Reverse-order copied and pasted scenes from the middle of the episode that are stuck after the opening credits in lieu of Ward's narration is exponentially terrible.

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And you can see them on the first season dvd

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I was blown away many years ago maybe on TV Land before that network went south when I heard the beginning of an episode of LITB with Hugh's narration and then say "and that's our story tonight on LITB." It was a blast from the past and I loved his voice.

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Beaumont's narrations never fail to pump me up for the episode.

They also should have had him narrate the opening credits to every Season. One of the narrators does almost-as-good of a job as Beaumont would have, because that narrator sounds like Beaumont; the rest of the narrators are terrible in comparison to Beaumont.

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