It could have been they were running out of ideas…but, they darn well could have come up with something better than that! But, I’m not sure they knew for sure it was the last season. John Schneider has said before that DOH was never “officially” cancelled. The network just chose not to put the show in the next season’s lineup…and never did again. Although John wrote & directed the series finale…I don’t think they knew at the time that it would end up being the finale. At least it wasn’t the alien crap, lol! 

I'm out of reactions too. But this race is sure heating up. Anything can happen. Who knows, Hoss might even show up with his orange F-1 car with the Union Jack and 01 painted on it. 

I've noticed with other tv series that they often do silly things as the series winds down. They simply run out of ideas in some cases and I suppose they just stop caring after awhile. I think someone posted that the alien idea came from James Best. Does that sound familiar? Maybe other people knew it was a bad idea but just wanted to let Jimmie have a little fun. If they knew it was the last season then they didn't have to worry about ratings. We saw a lot of silliness in season 7. Didn't Uncle Jesse jump a moving train in his F-150? Silly....but why not since the series was over anyways.  Edit: I wonder if Denver always wanted to jump his truck like that but they said no until season 7 because nobody cared at that point. 

No. They are both Cadillac Series 62s, but Grady's momma drove a 1959 model while Newtie drove a 1961.

The blue car in Return of the Ridge Raiders that Newtie has smoke machine hooked up to, is that the same car that was Sheriff Grady Byrd's momma's car in Jude Emery?