Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»is well known as the home to TV shows great and small now.
From the massive "The Last of Us" production that toured through Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»this summer to "Barney's Gang," a children's show from 1958 that lasted one season, Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»has hosted all sorts of regularly scheduled programming.
It's had a huge impact on the city, from a bump in tourism by fans to thousands of jobs to a regular fundraiser for the Greater Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»Food Bank; the has raised nearly $2 million. It includes film productions as well, but shows appear to dominate.
So here are five things you probably didn't know about TV shows made in Vancouver.
1. "The X-Files" production team once painted a quarry red
"The X-Files" was one of the first big name shows to be shot in Vancouver; in part that was because the city and nearby regions can play the roll of many parts of the US (from the North Shore Mountains to the farm fields of Delta to the city's downtown).
One place Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»isn't well suited to play is the southwestern US, in particular the dusty red colours of New Mexico.
However, that's where an episode of Season 2 was set, and so the production crew had to figure out how to recreate that in Vancouver.
So they painted a quarry red.
It was a fairly large set, so it wasn't like they could only paint a few square feet. There are several shots there, including a helicopter flying over and soldiers running around.
In widescreen versions of the episode, it's actually possible in at least one shot to spot the (it's a very straight line with grey rock next to it).
2. "Smallville"'s set decoration has remained at a Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»school
"Smallville"'s early seasons explore Clark Kent's life as a high school student in middle America.
Vancouver, of course, stepped in for Kansas, with Templeton Secondary School playing the role of Smallville High.
Given the regular TV productions taking place at the school, which regularly repainted the school in Smallville High's gold and maroon, the school ended up adopting the colour scheme. Historically, they had been .
Templeton's team is still the Titans, but a Smallville Crows logo remained years after the show left (and may still be there).
3. You can go on a
Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»has been the home to several long-running sci-fi/fantasy/superhero TV shows, including the "Stargate Universe," the aforementioned "Smallville," and "Supernatural."
Given they put out 327 episodes, and almost all were shot in Vancouver, they used a lot of spots around town.
With a passionate fan base eager to see where their favourite scenes took place, a local tour company specializing in TV and movies has put together a ."
4. There was an inter-show hockey league
With so many long-running TV shows in Vancouver, a very Canadian thing happened.
A hockey league formed.
Made up of cast and crew from several different shows, it only lasted a couple of years.
According to "Stargate" star , who spoke about it on an internet show, many crews were made up of Canadians, so it was easy to find players. Once he even gave "Smallville" star Michael Rosenbaum a talking to after a rough play.
5. A character in a famous kid's TV show was named after a Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»strip club
If you were an adult in the 1990s (or earlier), you may remember the Cecil Hotel, which housed a strip club on Granville Street. The building is long gone, but the name lives on in a way.
If you were a child in the 1990s, you may remember "Reboot," the and the first CGI TV show ever.
While the vast majority of characters have names that are references to computers and the digital world, one referenced the Cecil.
That characters name was Cecil, of course. It was a waiter of sorts, flitting around a diner on a brass rail.
