i hate that they softended the mom

I've always felt the same way. Cheers for Ellen Corby as to making her character feisty and blunt but yet having a soft edge. "The Sinner" was just on yesterday and it gave the feeling of a real Southern Baptist family with Olivia and Esther. It was not trendy back when the Walton's aired to have a character be ho-hum about organized religion but we all know there were plenty of John Walton's up in the hills. Further cheers to John Ritter for playing a character that was not trendy for the 1970's in a Southern preacher. I never thought playing Jack Tripper was much of an exercise for him. Anyways, part of the death of the Walton's came from the show going PC before the term was coined. They should have thrown a ton of cash at Richard Thomas to stay on especially when Grandma and Grandpa faded away.