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All week long: Revisit the highlights and lowlights of 1987 with Popverse's Made in 87 week.

In the late 80s and early 90s, Full House ruled the airwaves. The family sitcom was a ratings success and its syndication package brought in additional viewers. However, by 1995, ABC was no longer feeling the love. While the ratings were still strong, production costs were rising, and television viewers were moving away from family-oriented sitcoms in favor of edgier shows like Seinfeld. That’s why ABC opted not to renew Full House after its eighth season.

However, there was still hope for the Tanners: The WB was interested in picking up the sitcom for two additional seasons. Unfortunately, negotiations fell apart at the last minute, ending Full House for good. The plans changed so late in the game that the writers didn’t have time to plan a proper series finale.

“It was hard,” Jodie Sweetin says during a panel at 90s Con 2024. “We didn’t really have a lot of time to say goodbye. It was only a couple of weeks that we found that we weren’t going to be going to [the WB].”

“We were working on a two-year pickup with the WB at the end of Full House,” Coulier says. “It just didn’t work out that way. I think [producers] Bob Boyett and Tom Miller, they wanted to go to New York and start producing plays on Broadway. And that’s what they did, and that’s what they still do.”

“Is the last episode the one where Michelle fell off the horse and lost her memory?” Candace Cameron asks. “That’s the one that aired, and the one with Andrew Keegan is the one that we shot. That was the last episode we recorded,” Sweetin answers.

Sweetin is referring to ‘All Stood Up,’ an episode where Andrew Keegan guest stars as a love interest for Stephanie. The episode was the last one the cast filmed, but it aired as the penultimate episode. ‘Michelle Rides Again’ was a two-parter which aired as the series finale, even though it had been filmed earlier.

While the series finale didn’t give the cast the closure they wanted, it did contain the surprise return of Scott Weigner as Steve Hale, who shows up to take DJ to prom.

In 1987, the iconic Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon debuted - and all our lives were changed. Watch this reunion of the original voice actors:

“Was prom in that last episode? Because Scott surprised me,” Cameron says. “I thought it was the prom one too, because we had to keep Scott backstage and a secret from you,” Andrea Barber says.

“Yeah, that was really a surprise that day in that episode,” Cameron says. “I had no idea Scott was going to be at the door. We thought it was going to be Joey Lawrence. They were just like, ‘It’s going to be a surprise guest.’ We kept trying to be like, ‘Who’s it going to be? Who’s it going to be?’ My guess was Joey, but then it was Scott.”

While the cast wish things had gone differently, they note that the series had probably run its course.

“I think at that point we kind of felt collectively that, I would’ve loved to do two more seasons, but collectively the thought was, how many more stories can we tell? And that’s what I kind of heard. That’s why we didn’t move to the WB for two more seasons,” Coulier says.

Get your wide-shoulder blouses and your Members-Only jackets, and go back in time with Popverse's Made in 87. Highlights include:

• Inside the chaotic rise and fall of The Lost Boys TV series that never made it to air
• How Bart Simpson was quietly toned down from being "so mean" before The Simpsons' first episode, as revealed by his long-time voice actor Nancy Cartwright
• Marvel Comics killed the X-Men in 1987 to reset the franchise - but it didn’t stick
• Why the Princess Bride’s iconic duel is an even better swordfight than you remember
• How The Golden Girls became a staple at gay bars in the 80s
• Inside Spider-Man’s chaotic 1987 bachelor party that Marvel turned into a real-life spectacle