30 Years Later: Fully Appreciating "Northern Exposure".

[Pink Freud]

During its prime 1990-96 prime time run on CBS, I never missed an episode. To me, the lovably quirky, neighborly, and slightly eccentric denizens of fictional Cicely, Alaska (actually Roslyn, Washington) became like personal friends.

With Amazon Prime Video now carrying the entire series on stream I'm able to see the series through 30-years-older eyes and personal prisms.
An appreciation for the Mayberry-in-the-mountains vibe.
An admiration for the worldliness and cultural/historical awareness of even its simpler citizens, in contrast to the insular 1960s information dome that covered and ensealed Mayberry of "The Andy Griffith Show".
A fresh fascination with the eclectic, genre and generation-spanning, scene-relevant choices of music in each episode.

My first exposure to this music mix was the memorable early-90s episode of barkeep Holling Vincour's annual mission to hunt down the legendary local forest beast Jesse the Bear. The final 90 seconds featured the most beautiful music I'd ever heard, perfect for the denouement's tone, setting me on a months-long pre-internet quest to find the source. If it's true that at the first moment of death we sense a blinding bright light pulling us along, then it was this tune that would fill our ears. It was Enya's "Caribbean Blue".

I discovered this only because on my very first date with a woman named Donna, she picked me up with her car stereo playing that very CD. Two years later, we were married.

My current wife and I love the Prime Video streaming of "Northern Exposure", helping us to relive the magical day 6 years ago when on the same day we visited both Roslyn, where we walked the streets for hours, feeling like we were on the series filming set (it's the actual town, where nothing had changed from the show) and enjoyed drinks at The Brick......after spending a few hours in Snoqualmie, visiting iconic locations from the first season of "Twin Peaks".

After five full, successful seasons on Mondays at 9pm (CST), CBS for all intents and purposes replaced movies-bound protagonist Rob Morrow with Paul Provenza after 8 episodes in Season Six, and moved the show to Wednesday nights. It found its own demise in such unfamiliar "exposure".

[WeeVikes]

During its prime 1990-96 prime time run on CBS, I never missed an episode. To me, the lovably quirky, neighborly, and slightly eccentric denizens of fictional Cicely, Alaska (actually Roslyn, Washington) became like personal friends.

With Amazon Prime Video now carrying the entire series on stream I'm able to see the series through 30-years-older eyes and personal prisms.
An appreciation for the Mayberry-in-the-mountains vibe.
An admiration for the worldliness and cultural/historical awareness of even its simpler citizens, in contrast to the insular 1960s information dome that covered and ensealed Mayberry of "The Andy Griffith Show".
A fresh fascination with the eclectic, genre and generation-spanning, scene-relevant choices of music in each episode.

My first exposure to this music mix was the memorable early-90s episode of barkeep Holling Vincour's annual mission to hunt down the legendary local forest beast Jesse the Bear. The final 90 seconds featured the most beautiful music I'd ever heard, perfect for the denouement's tone, setting me on a months-long pre-internet quest to find the source. If it's true that at the first moment of death we sense a blinding bright light pulling us along, then it was this tune that would fill our ears. It was Enya's "Caribbean Blue".

I discovered this only because on my very first date with a woman named Donna, she picked me up with her car stereo playing that very CD. Two years later, we were married.

My current wife and I love the Prime Video streaming of "Northern Exposure", helping us to relive the magical day 6 years ago when on the same day we visited both Roslyn, where we walked the streets for hours, feeling like we were on the series filming set (it's the actual town, where nothing had changed from the show) and enjoyed drinks at The Brick......after spending a few hours in Snoqualmie, visiting iconic locations from the first season of "Twin Peaks".

After five full, successful seasons on Mondays at 9pm (CST), CBS for all intents and purposes replaced movies-bound protagonist Rob Morrow with Paul Provenza after 8 episodes in Season Six, and moved the show to Wednesday nights. It found its own demise in such unfamiliar "exposure".

My wife and I thoroughly enjoyed that show. Thank you for the reminder!

[Pink Freud]

As much as we thoroughly enjoyed our early summer evening in Roslyn and drinks at The Brick, we were a bit startled to learn (1) the TV interiors of The Brick were a soundstage in Redmond WA; and (2) the famous "moose mural" on the side of Roslyn's Cafe actually depicts a camel, with the cafe's tagline "an oasis".

Very cool to still see the storefront KBHR studio window looking out on Cicely's daily life and residents with "Chris In the Morning" as the Greek chorus. John Corbitt (Chris) was a familiar site at the cafes and dining hotspots around Balboa Park with his lady love Bo Derek when I livid in San Diego and biked the neighborhood.