Psych Was The First Show EVER To Remake Its Own Episode

Summary Psych made TV history by remaking its own episode, "Cloudy...With a Chance of Murder" in season 8.

The remake featured new actors in key roles and changed the outcome of the incriminating video scene.

The show's unique approach to remaking its own episode follows its tradition of unconventional and risky moves.

In 2014, Psych became the first TV series to produce a remake of one of its own episodes. Psych followed the adventures of Shawn (James Roday Rodriguez) and Gus (Dulé Hill) as the former pretended to be psychic and dragged the latter onto his jobs as a consulting psychic detective. Throughout the run of the show, the series loved to include pop culture references and homage classic media. The show even did its own versions of movies like Clue and Friday the 13th and shows like Twin Peaks.

When the show homaged other media, however, the episodes were not exact remakes of them, but more often, simply featured nods in the storyline, or even the same actors. A straight-up remake was reserved for one of the show's own episodes. Something like this would be surprising for any show, even if it had been on the air for 20 years, but the remade episode was only seven years old at the time. That didn’t stop the writers and producers from a taking a second stab at one of its earliest episodes.

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Psych Remade "Cloudy... With A Chance Of Murder"

The Season 1 Episode Was Remade In Season 8

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The remade episode in question is Psych season 1, episode 12, titled “Cloudy…with a Chance of Murder.” In the original episode, Shawn and Gus try to prove the innocence of a woman accused of murdering a womanizing weatherman. To do this, the two have to help her attorney, Adam Hornstock (Michael Weston) avoid a conviction and find the real murderer. At the end of the episode, Shawn watches a seemingly incriminating video of the accused with the victim, and is able to figure out the identity of the killer.

In Psych season 8, the series aired “Remake a.k.a. Cloudy…With a Chance of Improvement,” which took place in 2006 (the setting of season 1) and de-aged some of the characters. As pointed out on USA's website, it was the first time a TV show ever remade its own episode. It followed the same story as the original episode, but curiously recast a long list of characters with other actors who had already been on Psych.

Related Psych: The True Story Behind The Show's Pineapple Obsession USA's mystery comedy series Psych was known for its humorous obsession with pineapples, but why? Here's the true story about how it all started.

How The Psych Remake Was Different

The Remake Episode Brought In New Episodes And Changed A Big Scene

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The remake kept its Adam Hornstock actor but brought in season 5 guest star Ralph Macchio to play the prosecutor and Father Westley actor Ray Wise to fill the role of the judge. Lindsey Sloane, who played the bachelorette in “Shawn and the Real Girl” portrayed the defendant in the remake, replacing Jolie Jenkins.

Though the episode followed the same case, with the big reveal hinging once again on the incriminating video, the remake changed this scene. Originally, Shawn accused Priscilla (Tracy Armstrong), the one woman in the newsroom who the victim never took an interest in, of killing the weatherman because he never noticed her. In the original, Shawn’s theory was correct, but the remake offered a shocking twist by making a one-night stand with Woody (Kurt Fuller) her alibi. Instead, the murderer was revealed to be a new character, TV anchor Mortimer Camp (Carlos Jacott).

...the 'whole point of a remake is to choose something that showed serious promise but failed to live up to expectations.'

The remake of “Cloudy…With a Chance of Murder” featured quite a few of the same jokes and gags, but the execution was slightly different. One scene that carried over from the original to the remake was when Shawn insisted that Gus give Hornstock his tie, to make a better impression on the jury. It also featured a few lines of dialogue where Shawn makes an uncannily accurate prediction about his romantic future with Juliet (Maggie Lawson).

Psych has always had a reputation for unconventional, unusual, and risky moves, and the remake episode is certainly one of its most interesting endeavors. It would seem that this particular episode was chosen to be remade because the writers and producers felt that the original could have been better, hence the title. This is made clear by Shawn himself when he told Gus during the episode that the "whole point of a remake is to choose something that showed serious promise but failed to live up to expectations."

Related Psych: Every Nickname Shawn Has For Gus Through eight seasons of Psych and three movies, Shawn has introduced Gus with fake nicknames. Here's every made-up nickname Shawn has given Gus.

Other Shows To Pull Off Unique Firsts

I Love Lucy Pioneered Some Interesting TV Firsts

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Psych’s remaking of its own episode is right in line for a show that homaged so many other movies and television shows during its run, but a very unique idea that other shows have not replicated. Of course, everything in television has to be done first at some point, and there are other shows that have similarly had unique concepts.

Love it when TV shows cross over? The first crossover episode of television is credited to I Love Lucy. In a season 6 episode, Lucy wants her husband to get George Reeves to come to their party dressed as Superman. When that doesn’t seem like it’s going to happen, she decides to dress as the hero herself, and ends up out on a window ledge, only for Reeves as Superman to save her. The crossover was the first of its kind and paved the way for shows to exist in the same fictional universe as other series.

I Love Lucy was also the first show to use multicameras to film in front of a live studio audience and the first show to feature a pregnancy storyline.

In more modern television, there is also Community, which took the idea of a clip show and turned it on its head. Clip shows are often done as a way to save money in television. It’s a filler episode that allows the characters to look back on the events of the show, refreshing the audience on what’s been going on. Community’s clip show, however, saw the characters disagreeing about things that happened in the past, only to use clips that had never appeared in the show before. Like Pysch, it provided an innovative approach for the audience to admire.

The more television shows that continue to utilize new concepts like these, the more serial television becomes surprising for the audience and draws in more viewers.