Ok im going through all of these forums seeing many various things like Bea leaving the show and all that. I'm sorry if these have all been answered and all that but i dont feel like going through all these forums and topics looking for them so i thought i would just ask them here.

1. Why exactly did Bea leave the show? It was a megahit and i would think it could've lasted two more seasons...3 give or take.

2. What exactly happened after season 5? Did they get new writers or something?

Now here's a question related to the Golden girl's story in the show.

3. Remember when Michael and Elaine got married in one of the episodes (Mixed Blessing) i beleive....ok i know she kicked Michael out but whatever happened to their child? I remember she was pregannt when they got married and i don't beleive i have ever seen one episode where they bring Michael and Elaine's child up. Anyone have any answers?

If anyone can help me out on these questions i will GREATLY appreciate it. Thank you all for your time. =MY favorite Golden Girl

Well, for #3, Michael's wife's name was Lorraine, and I believe it was mentioned in the ep. where Michael came back (don't remember the title, sorry) that she wasn't pregnant after all. It was just a false positive. At least I think that's what happened. Maybe I'm getting confused w/ Designing Women, b/c there was a similar plot on DW w/ Julia's son Payne.

And as for why Bea left the show, I think she felt it had run its course. She was also worried that the pop-culture refrences and such would make the show dated in reruns, b/c people might not get all the refrences 10 years later or whatever.

Anyway, hope that helps somewhat!

- Kristen

yes it did actually thank you but now what about the writers or whatever...or maybe im just weird haha.

I've wondered about the Michael and Lorraine baby as well. In "Mixed Blessings" they announce that they're going to have a child but in the final episode which Michael appears in ("All That Jazz") he just says that Lorraine kicked him out. There is never another mention of the baby from Season 3 onwards. I suspect this might have something to do with the change of producers in 1989. With it being such a minor mention in one episode, they might have overlooked it when going through the old episodes. That said, they might have decided there wasn't a worthy story in it.

To answer question 2, there was a change of producers/writers in 1989. The original team (Kathy Speer, Terry Grossman, Mort Nathan, Barry Fanaro, Winifred Hervey Stallworth, etc.) left after Season 4 with the aptly titled "We're Outta Here" episode. The new team (Marc Sotkin, Gail Parent, Tom Whedon etc.) took over with the start of Season 5. IIRC, the only producers/writers to stay on were Richard Vaczy and Tracy Gamble but they had only joined in Season 4 anyway. Susan Harris was still an Executive Producer and wrote "Sick and Tired" but she never wrote anything again after that. Most of her episodes are in Season 1.