Little House: The Last Farewell

"Little House On The Prairie" was one of those rare shows that actually had a final episode for it's original run. Perhaps Michael Landon's long relationship with NBC had something to do with that. The plot is simple. A evil miner takes advantage of the law and buys Walnut Grove forcing the people of the town to take action. James Karen plays the bad guy "Nathan Lassiter" to perfection. At the time Karen did a lot of commercials on television, and after playing "Lassiter" sponsors were afraid to use him as their spokesman. Luckily for us he would go on to find more work in film and television. Michael Landon's writing and direction on this final show was wonderful. He was always able to get a lot out of his actors. Dabbs Greer, who plays "Rev. Alden" should have won the Emmy. His performance is both moving and touching. No doubt Michael Landon had something to do with that. How sad shows like this aren't made anymore.

The reason that Michael Landon blew up Walnut Grove was that he was ordered to destroy the sets when the final movie was filmed. He brilliantly incorporated it to be in a movie. Only two buildings was sparred. One was the church cause it would upset the Christian community and would be in extreme poor taste. Second was the Ingalls house cause it was iconic.

The main problem with this TV-movie finale of the "Little House on the Prairie" series is that it features the cast of the show's final season, by which time many of the better characters had been replaced by blander carbon-copies. So, you get the Carters instead of the Ingalls (with a few exceptions), Nancy Oleson instead of Nellie, Miss Plum instead of Miss Beadle, etc. The return of original series stars Michael Landon and Karen Grassle helps, but where's Mary, Adam, Albert, and Carrie? And, worst of all, Katherine MacGregor, who played town villianness Harriet Oleson, is nowhere to been seen. The Oleson family was the saving grace of "Little House", helping to cut through all the treacle, and the two most important Olesons, Harriet and Nellie, aren't in this movie. The story doesn't help, either. Couldn't they come up with a more uplifting plot than the destruction of the entire town?

Unless you're a die-hard fan, skip this one (as well as the other two sequel TV movies), and seek out the original pilot movie instead.

This episode happens to be my favorite one. The reason why Mrs. Oleson is not in it is because (if you have ever seen it) she is in the hospital in Minneapolis. She has been in there for 6 months. But Katherine McGregor (the person who plays her) was on a pilgrimage for India. I would recommend watching it, especially if you have seen the rest of the series, because I feel that I the best of them all.

I would much rather see this type of movie and/or show on TV anytime than some of the weird, grotesque things that are on now. What is this world coming to with all the zombies and vampires, etc. and wacky, idiot, reality TV that we have to see now? Why can't we have nice wholesome shows like they were back then? Why shouldn't they have blown up the buildings? I think that it was only fair that the townspeople took with them what they brought. The "landowner" should not be able to get that for free, too. He was only showing how very greedy he was and how unreasonable he could be. If he had been a "real" human being, he would have tried to negotiate with the townspeople to try to be fair.