Anyone ever remember seeing this in 1987? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0928015/
That's probably about the only time you would've seen it, unless you've been able to acquire it since then, probably from a fan who taped it back then.
Anyway- this is the 1987 Saturday morning cartoon line-up preview show for NBC. And of course, at that time, ALF was a big hit for them (the sitcom first started in 1986) and by 1987 ALF received a cartoon series- "ALF: The Animated Series". (This was later followed by "ALF Tales" in 1988). So anyway, the whole theme of this special was that ALF, joined by Benji Gregory (though apparently in a role called "Kid Cameron" and not actually his famous "Brian Tanner" role from the ALF sitcom), solves the mystery of what NBC has in store for its programming on Saturday mornings in the fall of '87.
Okay- so anyway, here's where The Hardy Boys come in. Though I can't recall seeing this special offhand (and I would love to track down a copy of it for the ALF appearance)- apparently, there's a reason it would be of interest to me as a fan of The Hardy Boys as well. Danny Ponce (who you may remember as Willie Hogan on "Valerie"/"Valerie's Family"/"The Hogan Family") played the role of "Frank Hardy" in this special. I assume he was called in to help with the mystery-solving. And it seems that in this special, we also have Heidi Zeigler playing the role of "Jo Hardy". So apparently the writers decided to do a cute little play on names and give Frank a sister for this special. Anyway, I don't know how much they really play up any Hardy Boys connections or whatever- but I thought it was worth mentioning here as yet another appearance (of sorts) from The Hardys.
I don't remember and I'm surprised that Alien Productions/Lionsgate didn't bother to get the rights to it when they were releasing the DVD's of the series. Of course, considering just how many different shows this was probably advertising would probably mean that it would be a headache to try to clear up the different rights for home video release.
I LOVED Alf! But sadly I don't recall any Hardy references. I was born in 1983 so....not a whole lot of memory to go on. :)
I finally did get a chance to see this- it wasn't really a huge thing, but it is a nice reference to The Hardy Boys. It's interesting that they were able to use the actual names of the characters (and since the characters were portrayed as young detectives, I don't think it was just a coincidental thing of a character having the same name as another fictional character but not related otherwise.) I guess NBC was able to get the rights for this production- I don't know if they make any acknowledgement about The Hardy Boys being Simon & Schuster owned characters or anything. If anyone else is interested in seeing this, I have seen it pop up on Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIpdWmTMikY) in recent months. Oh yeah- I can't believe I haven't mentioned this on this thread yet- but the NBC 1987 Saturday Morning preview special is called ALF Loves A Mystery- so who more appropriate to help him solve a mystery than The Hardy Boys? (or in this case, The Hardy Boy and Girl).