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When did your favourite TV show "Jump The Gorge"?

Zulu Romeo

Zulu Romeo

World Famous Starship Captain
Admiral
OK, bear with me on this one.

There is a moment in the very old Simpsons episode "Bart the Daredevil" where Homer talks Bart out of jumping the Springfield Gorge on his skateboard, only to inadvertently do it himself - and fail, thus defining Homer as the lovable buffoon we all know and/or love, a good counterpart for the irreverent Bart and straight-laced Lisa. For me, that was THE moment that The Simpsons had truly arrived and become the brilliant show it would be for at least the following 6 seasons, having already had a diamond-in-the-rough first season.

Hence, in what might appear to be a blatant attempt to force a brand new slang term (or, if you will, internet meme) into regular use [Yeah, good luck with that - everyone], I now declare that the moment when your favourite show transforms from being something interesting but not spectacular, into something truly wonderful, shall now be known as "jumping the gorge".

OK, so it's not an original phrase, or concept, or even metaphor - but if you like, you can consider it the equal and exact opposite effect in comparison to "jumping the shark" (jumping the shark of course being that exact moment a show becomes less credible and suffers from declining quality, often due to a gimmick such as that one in "Happy Days" where Fonzie tries to waterski over a shark, hence the name).

So, at what point did your favourite TV shows reach that very special moment when it became more than watchable - it became unmissable? When did your favourite show jump the gorge?
 
My favourite TV show is the new Doctor Who. The "Jump The Gorge" moment came quite early, although it's not really a moment per se. I liked the first episode, but after the second one I knew it was great and I was hooked. In the second episode, the Doctor and Rose travel to the far future to see the end of the Earth (don't worry, humanity has stopped living there for millenia at that point). The whole concept impressed me. And it has that brilliant scene at the end where they return to 2005 London, in the midst of people going about their business. These plots sound pretty silly on paper, but it's pretty moving and profound.
 
Firefly's Jump The Gorge Moment was in The Train Job when Mal deals quite definitively with the badguy's henchman. I knew right there and then I would watch every episode of this series without fail for however long it lasted.
 
I'm a huge, huge, huge Lost fan. I watched both parts of the pilot and was intrigued. By then end of the third episode though... whoa. It was the best episode of television I had seen at the time.
 
Starbreaker said:
I'm a huge, huge, huge Lost fan. I watched both parts of the pilot and was intrigued. By then end of the third episode though... whoa. It was the best episode of television I had seen at the time.
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I think LOST had several Gorge moments - the aforementioned end of that episode was definitely the first of them. :) Arguably the next big Gorge moment was the whole of "Flashes Before Your Eyes" - the moment that the show had a new lease of life, and the whole show seemed to speed along much faster afterwards.
 
Buffy when Angel became Angelus after they had sex.
Angel when he just couldn't seem to care, and locked the lawyers in with Darla and Dru.
Those are the first 2 that spring to mind.
 
Battlestar Galactica

Probably in the Miniseries when Roslin, Lee and co jumped away leaving the civilians without jump drives (including that little girl) to get blown away by the Cylons.
Awesomeness
 
It was early in the first episode of Chuck, when Yvonne Strahovski first came on screen. I knew then and there that Chuck was "must see t.v.".
 
Mr Light said:
LOST, when they played the Dharma Orientation tape. Farscape, when they introduced Scorpius.
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Agreed on both counts, tho for Lost, it might have been earlier, when they first opened the hatch. Or the beginning of S2.

For DS9, I'd pinpoint Necessary Evil, half a season before they started in on the Dominion War plotline.

Dexter: in the first minute of the premiere. Definitely by the end of the premiere. :D

Heroes: Homecoming episode.
 
I only watched Lost because some American friends told me I should give it a shot but I thought it was pretty stupid... until Locke starts to walk after the plane-crash. That's when I realised I was underestimating the show.

I never really watched Scrubs properly even though some of my friends were into it, whenever I saw it I didn't find it funny. Then I saw My Bed Banter and Beyond and for some reason that episode motivated me to watch the show, so I went back and watched all the episodes I missed. My Overkill had a similar effect on me when I first saw it.

I started watching The West Wing because I was bored one night and it was on (Angel Maintenance) and I was convinced to come back the next week because of an ad telling me it was going to be the "most thrilling episode ever!" Turns out they screwed up the ad by playing it three weeks in advance, so each week I kept coming back until they finally showed the episode in the ad: Commencement. Anyone who has watched that show knows why that episode convinced me to stick around.

I had seen a few episodes of Arrested Development and didn't know what to think of it, then I saw the opening to the second season and Tobias being run over by a car because he dressed up as a Blue Man and crossed the road at the crest of a hill during twilight... I adored the show from that moment on. :lol:

I gave BSG a second shot and was gradually getting into it, but the ending of Six Degrees of Separation blew my mind and turned me into a fan. Baltar's fate changing because he prayed to God in his hour of need made me realise that there was something more to the show than your standard sci-fi offerings, it was willing to explore the spiritual.
 
BSG when everyone became super emo
SG-1 when they just wouldn't let it die (around season 8 I would say)
 
clint g said:
BSG when everyone became super emo
SG-1 when they just wouldn't let it die (around season 8 I would say)
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Please reread the OP and try again.

The BSG episode "33", though by the time Ron Moore had his "it's the characters stupid" moment, it was over.
 
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