There Are Times Where Showrunners Drop The Ball So Astronomically It's Hilarious, And I'm Not Talking

there are times where showrunners drop the ball so astronomically it's hilarious, and i'm not talking about when they actively ruin their own characters or story arcs. i'm talking about when they could have grasped some juicy character/actor and they didn't until it was too late lmao.

i am of course talking about two shows: the gilded age and turn washington's spies. i know the gilded age producers were screaming crying once they realized that tom blyth hit it big in the hunger games movie and they had wasted his appearance on a one episode, throwaway role as the would-be fiance of a protagonist's daughter just a year before. they uploaded the singular scene tom blyth had in the show on their tiktok as soon as TBOSAS came out. they knew what they missed out on lmao.

and turn...oh turn. there are so many things i like about you and so many things you could've done better. and yeah i'm biased but not having alexander hamilton be in the show from the get-go was a mistake. he was one of the rare outsiders who actually knew about the culper ring! if there's any aide de camp or figure you want to add to the relationship with ben tallmadge and washington, it's probably him. i need to find a source for it but apparently tallmadge and hamilton stood guard for andre the night before his execution, and they all talked pretty openly - nathan hale was brought up, and hamilton said that tallmadge never talks about hale because it's painful. i don't know, that's some very interesting, potentially historically accurate material right there. in your grasp! the show focused a lot on the french alliance, well who in the aide de camps spoke a lot with the french? hamilton + laurens + lafayette (to some level tilghman though i think he did translation). it was right there.

and the potential comradeship and also conflicting jealousy/contrast you could've elaborated on between tallmadge and hamilton. because lafayette is in the show, very clearly friendly with washington! how nice would've it been to add hamilton, a person who relates more with the show's tallmadge and sees the flaws in washington; and is yet someone who actively rejects/doesn't want washington's affection the way tallmadge does (but perhaps gets it more).

turn premiered in 2014 and i'm wondering if by then the producers had at least heard about a hamilton musical being made. because by mid 2015 (after season 2 premiered) it was a done game and everyone and their cousin knew about the musical. so they added hamilton to the last few episodes of season 3 and gave him some lines in season 4. i wonder if the producers sat there and remembered the conversation they had back in preproduction of season 1, like. "should we add hamilton?" "nah, he'll make things complicated. nobody cares about him anyways!"

ugh. such a waste.

omg that would be hilarious and incredible to read, i love uncomfortable trips down memory lane! you have my full permission especially since it's your post that kickstarted the repressed memories in the first place! :)

pls send the crack fic to me when you do make it, i'm cackling!

2016-2019 Hamilton fanfics were wild. King George would be a bus driver to American Revolution High School, where Washington was a fatherly teacher to the bullied and abused tweak Hamilton and his little gang of sad gay friends 💀

the craziest part of some of the shit Adams wrote about Hamilton is that it was written years after his death. like get a grip, we know you hated Hamilton, but the man was semi-recently killed. 1805 and 1806 are two of the most damning letters where he's shit-talking and calling Hamilton a bastard brat, a Scottish creole, insolent coxcomb, a creature in delirium of ambition, etc etc.

puppyfication of founding-fathers

British officer: What are your names?

Caleb: Don’t tell him, Ben.

Ben: Good job, Caleb.