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I remember this show airing on USA Network when I was growing up in the mid-1980s. When I recently saw it was available on one of the streaming services, I decided to give it another view.

The show centers around a supermarket and its eccentric employees. Howard Bannister (Don Adams) was the cranky supermarket manager and Edna was his undervalued but insecure work assistant and love interest. Many of the jokes centered around their sex life, their dormant relationship which has not led to marriage and his desire to leave the supermarket for greener pastures. In addition to the main characters, you also had the morally challenged assistant manager (Jack Christian), the lazy, incompetent security guard (Alf), the shallow, punky young girl (Marlene), the openly gay young man (Leslie), the undersexed teenager (Murray) and the airheaded, inarticulate mechanic (Viker).

While this show is not exactly classic comedy, it is not any worse than many of the other sitcoms that were airing in syndication at the time. Remember that the 1980s/early 1990s was rife with bad sitcoms (see "Small Wonder", "Out Of This World", "New Monkees") that were likely not good enough to air on the major networks. There were no ground breaking/special episodes dealing with sensitive topics or any major attempts at character development during the show's run. While the show is still watchable, it is somewhat mindless fare and not very memorable.

When I watched this TV movie, I had very low expectations. I've seen a few of these retrospective movies based on sitcoms (i.e. Diff'rent Strokes, Three's Company) and they are mostly train wrecks: bad acting, corny dialogue, characters that look/act nothing like the original actor they are portraying, hatchet jobs based on long standing grudges, a slightly exaggerated version of what really happened. Except for the latter, this movie did not fall into any of those traps.

This movie showcases the "Brady Bunch" years from the perspective of Barry Williams who played eldest son, Greg. The first thing that I noticed was the Brady kids were very believable as the original actors that they were portraying. Kaley Cuoco, who would go on to greater fame, was a dead ringer for a young Maureen McCormick. Adam Brody was also perfectly cast and very charismatic as Barry Williams.

The adults (Robert Reed, Florence Henderson and Sherwood Schwartz) were also very well represented. Reed (Daniel Hugh Kelly) was portrayed as a very complex person. On one hand, he resented being stuck on a simplistic sitcom as "The Brady Bunch" and frequently let Sherwood Schwartz know that in no uncertain terms. However on the other hand, he was very supportive of the kids and treated them like family, even offering career advice to Williams.

Schwartz (Michael Tucker) who frequently was on the receiving end of Reed's criticism came across as somewhat of a father figure to the children who seemed to have the patience of a saint. He had no misconceptions that the show was nothing more than a simple family sitcom, which was the norm at that time.

I was most surprised by Rebeccah Bush's portrayal of Henderson. It was apparent that she really prepared well for the role. At times, I thought that she really was Florence Henderson.

Although there were a few minor inconsistencies with William's book, the movie was well-paced, did not resort to cheap revelations and was satisfying in the end.