Every year, a number of television pilots are filmed -- "test episodes" for potential new shows. Some of them get ordered to series, and those pilot episodes often become episode #1 of the new show. Others, however, are unable to hurdle that barrier and remain unsold -- not picked up as a full television series.

Note that "unsold" does not necessarily equate to "unaired" -- many of the pilots listed here have aired on tv, either as a backdoor pilot (shown as a tv movie, or as an episode of an already-running tv show from which it was intended to spin off) or "burned off" (aired as a tv movie or a one-off episode among the summer reruns, or incorporated into one of several anthology tv series that consisted entirely of rejected pilots). Others have seen the light of day as extra features on DVDs, or straight-to-video releases, or in a few cases were even bumped up to theatrical releases.

I've started moving ones I've seen and/or have (i.e., I know they're at least marginally available) to the top of the list -- so far that's #s 1-976.

Sources: Unsold Television Pilots, Lee Goldberg. Movies Made for Television, 1964-2004 and 2005-2009, Alvin H. Marill. Encyclopedia of Television Shows, 1925-2007 and Encyclopedia of Television Pilots, 1937-2019 and Encyclopedia of Unaired Television Pilots, 1945-2018, Vincent Terrace. Various selective-subject (science fiction, animation, etc.) TV books. Various internet resources - IMDb, TCMDb, TheFutonCritic, etc. etc. etc.

(A work in progress.)

These arent movies I wont watch, and these arent movies im too excited for either. This is a list of movies I might end up watching if a) I run out of the 1,700+ movies I want to see b) Its 4 am and I somehow dont have access to anything else but that movie.

I guess if I run out of everything else to watch...

Philip Seymour Hoffman, Christopher Walken, Catherine Keener, and Mark Ivanir in A Late Quartet (2012)

Fred Astaire and Audrey Hepburn in Funny Face (1957)

Raul Julia, Norman Burton, Susan Flannery, Harvey Jason, Steven Keats, Joanne Nail, Tricia O'Neil, Nicholas Pryor, Lázaro Pérez, Michael Sarrazin, Walter R. Smith, Wally Taylor, and Linda Vaughn in The Gumball Rally (1976)

Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry, and David Schwimmer in Friends (1994)

Stock, drag, midget, funny car, cross country, if they're cars and they're racing, they're on the list.

Richard Gere and Kevin Anderson in Miles from Home (1988)

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