"Perils of Punky" was meant to be the final episode
Given the very dark tone of the episode. It is possible the original version ended with Punky Brewster dying.
- Doubtful. NBC wouldn't kill off a character in a show whose demographic is primarily children.
- For real world context in later interviews Soleil, Cherie and Ami have mentioned they used to do horror movie sleepovers when they worked on this show and they found that episode hilarious to make. Even if it freaked many a viewer out this seemed like a fun field trip at least for those three.
Punky's mom and dad were jailed soon after for abandoning her.
Chicago may be a big city, but anyone who'd abandon a child should be and will be apprehended. Punky liked Allen more than she'd been letting on.
Why else would she cry when Allen departed in season 3 ("Divorce, Anderson Style")?- She probably thought he'd become a Nurikabe again.
A TV reunion movie was planned in c. 1998 with a now-adult Punky getting married.
Wouldn't she have made a beautiful bride? And we also see the adult Cherie (Cherie Johnson, fresh off her role as Maxine on Family Matters) and Margaux (Ami Foster) and a proud Henry Warnimont, now 80 years old, walking his adopted daughter down the aisle.- Her groom: Allen Anderson.
- Now Jossed. A Punky revival is now running on Peacock, NBC's streaming service with Punky as a single mom who runs into Travis, her ex (played by Freddie Prinze Jr.).
- And apparently her long-lost mother returns in another episode, possibly Jossing the second WMG— unless she did serve time for leaving her daughter behind in that supermarket, or she was arrested and detained on another offense, inadvertently causing the separation that affected Punky's whole life.
