History Main / Pilot

A pilot is a "test run" of a series concept, filmed and assembled to give the network an idea of what it will look like, how it will play and, via viewer testing, what kind of demographic it will appeal to. Usually the network will turn down the pilot. Sometimes it will throw it back to the producers and say, "try again". There are probably ten pilots made for every one series that actually makes it on the air, at least in American TV - some insiders have snidely claimed that Hollywood is more about making pilots than actually making shows.

** By the time of the spinoffs, the franchise was so large that any pilot was pretty much guaranteed a green light for a season. In fact, ''[[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine Deep Space Nine]]'' was picked up for multiple seasons right off the bat. (This is presumably why they felt safe with having the main character, Commander Sisko, openly express contempt for the beloved [[Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration Captain Picard]] - they knew they had time to win audience sympathy for Sisko.)
** The pilot for ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'', "Caretaker", is notable for its TroubledProduction and its cost to produce. There were numerous issues during production, including rewrites of the script, arguments over whether the captain should be male or female, and [[TheOtherMarty roles being recast]], which resulted in many reshoots and delays. The following four episodes were completed before the pilot was finished, resulting in jokes about whether or not the pilot would be shot by the time the series was over. As a result of all these complications, the final budget of the episode ended up being ''$23 million'', making it the most expensive episode of ''Franchise/StarTrek'' ever produced. For some perspective, when adjusted for inflation, this is more than it cost to make ''Film/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan'', and ''twice'' as expensive as the next most costly episode, "Broken Bow" from ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise''.

* The unaired ''Series/WonderWoman2011Pilot''.

** ''Anime/LupinIIIPilotFilm'' was the first anime adaptation, and has the distinction of being two slightly different pilots. Both are about twelve minutes, and contain the same art. The first was cut at feature film aspect ratio. The second was cut at television aspect ratio, and included an entirely different cast of voice actors. Video was later modified into the opening for ''Anime/LupinIIIGreenJacket''.

* ''WesternAnimation/ChalkZone'' was one of several Nickelodeon series to begin as a pilot on ''WesternAnimation/OhYeahCartoons''. Like ''The Fairly Odd Parents'', it actually had several of these on ''Oh Yeah! Cartoons''. Most of them were adapted as episodes for Season 1.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{The Fairly Oddparents}}'' had a few of these on ''WesternAnimation/OhYeahCartoons''.

* The pilot for ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'' is "Big House Blues". Unlike most pilot episodes, pretty much everything, from Ren and Stimpy's designs, voices and personalities to the animation is fine-tuned from the get-go. {{Creator/Nickelodeon}} aired it several times, albeit with some sexually-suggestive footage removed.

* ''Nobodys Watching'' was a Bill Lawrence pilot built on unbridled ShowWithinAShow UpToEleven. Ready? It was a sitcom within a reality show within a sitcom within a reality show within a sitcom. Despite being brilliantly written and unquestionably hilarious, its somewhat confusing "which show is it now?" plotline made it difficult to follow.

* ''Series/TheJokersWild'' had two pilots in 1968-69 hosted by [[Series/{{Password}} Allen Ludden]], the first having a panel of celebrities asking the questions. A third pilot comprised the last two-thirds of the awkward 90-minute ''The Honeymoon Game'' (1970), hosted by Jim [=MacKrell=] [[note]](the first third of said pilot was axed after the taping, replaced by a pitchfilm with creator Creator/JackBarry explaining that it wasn't good; as it turned out, it was a lame ''Newlywed Game'' derivative)[[/note]]. After airing for three months on KTLA in 1971, ''Joker''[='s=] wheels spun from 1972-75 on CBS and 1977-86 in syndication, an amazing run for a game show.

* ''[[Series/{{Pyramid}} The $10,000 Pyramid]]'' evolved from an unsold pilot called ''Cash on the Line'', whose bonus round became the maingame of ''Pyramid''. Supposedly, the bonus round of ''Cash'' was the only part of the format that execs liked.

* The pilot episode of ''Series/TheMonkees'' ("Here Come The Monkees") was filmed in 1965. It is very different from the later episodes. In it, the band has a manager played by Bing Russell, Davy plays a guitar (which is bigger than he is!), the band wears yellow shirts and brown vests as stage costumes, Micky Dolenz is credited as Micky Braddock, etc. When the series got picked up, it was edited and aired as the tenth episode! As an added bonus, Davy and Mike's audition tapes were tacked on to the end of the episode.

* ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'' has a 60-minute pilot version of "A Study In Pink", with the idea of this being the first episode of a series of 60 minute episodes. Instead, the BBC, despite loving the pilot, asked for three higher-budget, 90-minute episodes. This led to the pilot needing to be scrapped and a new version of the same story being written. The 90-minute version is considered much stronger than the pilot, as it spends more time establishing the characters, fixes some elements of the sets and plot that didn't work the first time, and also added the "archnemesis" subplot. Though the pilot version of "A Study in Pink" never aired, it is included in its entirety on the home release of the series.

A pilot is a "test run" of a series concept, filmed and assembled to give the network an idea of what it will look like, how it will play, and (via viewer testing) what kind of demographic it will appeal to. Usually the network will turn down the pilot. Sometimes it will throw it back to the producers and say, "try again". There are probably ten pilots made for every one series that actually makes it on the air, at least in American TV - some insiders have snidely claimed that Hollywood is more about making pilots than actually making shows.

* ''Series/OddSquad'' had an unaired pilot that was produced back in 2012, two years before the show would actually air. While it would eventually become the episode "Zero Effect" (which kept some dialogue and events from the pilot, such as Olive calming Otto down from a HeroicBSoD), it has some drastic differences with the show as people know it today, including having different actors for all of the characters, Odd Squad as an organization being more federal in nature (Olive and Otto hold out their badges to the ice cream man when confronting him, which they don't do in the show), and generally being DarkerAndEdgier compared to the show, among other things. The personalities of the agents are also quite different -- Olive is more of TheStoic compared to being a JerkWithAHeartOfGold, Otto doesn't have any BigEater tendencies, Ms. O is far less of a BadBoss, and Oscar has more of an assistant role to Ms. O than being a Scientist. In addition, the pilot takes place in "small-town anywhere America" rather than in Toronto.

* Both Creator/CartoonNetwork and Creator/{{Nickelodeon}} irregularly upload various pilots onto their websites to gauge interest. Most of these pilots naturally end up in this category.
** Both ''WesternAnimation/WelcomeToMyLife'' and ''WebAnimation/TrickMoon'' were produced by Cartoon Network with the hopes of being picked up for full series. Despite both being well-reiceved after being posted to CN's [=YouTube=] channel, the network ultimately passed on both.

* ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' has three pilots. In the first one (''Jesus vs. Frosty'', 1992), Cartman is called Kenny, [[NoNameGiven no name is given to the other three]], and both "Kenny" (Cartman) & Nameless Kenny die. In the second pilot (''Jesus vs. Santa'', 1995), the town of South Park is firmly established and the characters have personalities, to the point where Kyle is Jewish. All of the characters have the names they currently have (all except Wendy, who didn't have a name yet), and Kenny's the only one who dies. This could be considered {{Canon}}, but in Season 4, the kids made it themselves, to provide example of something kids would make. Creator/ComedyCentral saw the second pilot, and they asked Trey Parker & Matt Stone to make a 22-minute pilot. They made it with cutout animation just like the previous two, and it was accepted (although alterations were made before it actually aired, such as dropping Kenny's BackFromTheDead stunt from the ending). Later episodes used Maya instead for ConspicuousCG.

* The unaired ''Series/{{Dollhouse}}'' pilot was deemed too confusing, so a more linear version was shot. It could be said to be a case of ViewersAreMorons, but it could also be said that throwing the viewers in the deep end wasn't the best idea for [[AudienceAlienatingPremise a high-concept show in which they were essentially asked to cheer for slave owners]].

* ''Manga/DeathNote'' had the [[Manga/DeathNotePilot 2003 pilot]], which used a KidHero and played the Death Note's urban horror aspects up rather than the user's morality.

* There is a pilot out there for a "show" called ''Mercy Reef'', starring Justin Hartley as Aquaman, and Adrianne Palicki as the villainess. To the enragement of many a fan, it wasn't picked up, but it was leaked onto iTunes for free download. It is awesome.

* The [[Manga/Naruto1997 pilot]] for ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'' wasn't a ninja series, but instead involved magic. Instead of wanting to be Hokage, Naruto was sent on a quest to find friends under the orders of whom would later become Hiruzen Sarutobi after one prank too-many. Instead of a demon being sealed inside Naruto, the Demon Fox was his father.

* ''WesternAnimation/InfinityTrain'' had its pilot debut online before having a television airing on Creator/CartoonNetwork. The story would be recycled for the show's third episode, "The Corgi Car"; the plot elements largely remained the same beyond some minor tweaks to make the events fit better within the series chronology, with the biggest changes being stylistic. Of additional note is that ''Infinity Train'' was reworked into a {{genre anthology}} during its greenlight, with the pilot's main character Tulip only having the role during the first season.

* ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime'''s [[Recap/AdventureTimePilot pilot]] was made for and aired on Nickelodeon's ''Random Cartoons'', making it the rare show which aired on a [[ChannelHop different network]] than its pilot. Finn was named Pen in the pilot, presumably after creator Creator/PendletonWard. The main character's voice was also different, as the former voice actor is actually the older brother of the current one.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Invader Zim}}'''s 1999 pilot episode never aired on Nickelodeon, but was aired on Nicktoons on December 24, 2011 as part of Nicktoons' Winter Funderland. Interestingly enough, this wasn't the original version, but rather [[ExecutiveMeddling a redubbed version]] using Zim's series actor Richard Horvitz, rather than [[TheOtherDarrin Zim's pilot voice of Billy West]]. The original version of the pilot with all of Billy West's lines intact was previously made available as a bonus feature on the show's Volume 1 DVD release.

* ''Series/WhereInTheWorldIsCarmenSandiego'' had two pilots: "The Purloined Pooch" and "The Disoriented Express"). What made these relatively unique was that they were aired during Season 1 (as episodes 58 and 62, respectively) with a disclaimer at the start noting that there were some differences. Among the differences...

* There is [[Recap/AIBThePilot a pilot episode]] for ''WebAnimation/AnimatedInanimateBattle'', where everyone spoke and subtitles and, with the exception of Oodle, lacked limbs or faces.

* ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'''s pilot was adapted into the first act of the first episode "Death has a Shadow". It is largely identical except that Lois has blonde hair, and she, along with Sweetie and Meg, wears different colored clothing.