TV shows that aired for too long

MASH

Frasier. Much as I loved it, the last 3 seasons were The Niles & Daphne Show.

South Park

I never felt Cheers went on too long.

SUV has.

So has Scandal.

Grey's Anatomy.

THIS IS US. After the first two episodes I had had it.

Modern Family, though this season has shown a slight improvement over the last 2 abysmal seasons.

The original Twin Peaks.

MASH

and

HOMELAND HOMELAND HOMELAND

All in the Family

Cheers was great until the end.

Heroes did fastest burn out, then longest lingering death...including a revival.

Will & Grace lasted two or three years too long in its first incarnation.

The Love Boat - 8 seasons Alice - 9 seasons One Day at a Time - 9 seasons The Jeffersons - 10 seasons Happy Days - 11 seasons Little House on the Prairie - 11 seasons My Three Sons - 12 seasons

All in the Family limped on at least two seasons too many, then poured salt in the wound with the execrable Archie Bunker's Place. Make it stop.

Three's Company did the same thing with the lame follow-up Three's a Crowd.

The '70s and '80s were the nadir of television.

Supernatural. Should have ended after season 6.

Bones didn't need that last season.

Archie Bunker's Place was just about the most depressing thing ever shown on TV.

Frasier didn't become Niles & Daphne show. In fact, they didn't know what to do with the two of them. The last 2-3 seasons they were recycling some of the stories from way before: Lana vs Claire dilemma was a rehash of Faye vs Cassandra, etc.

The Apprentice.

The Go.den Girls had a good run, but was clearly coasting during the last season. Was there also a spinoff? So sad I can't remember it

Prison Break. I didn't know what was going on towards the end.

[quote]I know there are complaints about the new season of Curb Your Enthusiasm

Well deserved. It's AWFUL!

Yes, R14. "The Golden Palace." No Bea but hey, it's okay because we've added Cheech Marin!

Pathetic.

Nip/Tuck. But the same can be said of any Ryan Murphy show.

Little House did go on too long but was only 9 seasons not 11.

Melrose Place - by the end was there any original cast member left except Heather Locklear?

CSI: Las Vegas. They tried to compensate for the overall fatigue with a ramped up gross out factor, which didn't really work.

The Simpsons is long past its sell by date, which is such a pity to see.

The Office ran out of steam after four seasons. Then went on for another three.

R20 Thomas Calabro was the only original cast member left at the end. Locklear didn't join the show until midway through the first season.

In total agreement with R18 about Ryan Murphy shows: Nip/Tuck, Glee, AHS - they were all great for the first two or three seasons, then got completely unfocused.

R22 The Office definitely suffered after Steve Carrell left, but I thought the last season was quite good and it redeemed itself.

Roseanne after about season 5 or 6. Then it spiraled once her character won the lottery.

Family Guy

The Big Bang Theory

Friends

CSI (original)

I've never seen a show tank like Heroes. The first season was mesmerizing. The 2nd season was pretty good. Then it just turned into shit. Absolute shit.

R18 The same with David Kelly shows. LA Law, Picket Fences, The Practice, Ally McBeal....they were all great for about their first five seasons. Then he left, another person was made showrunner, and they became awful.

I'm surprised nobody so far has mentioned the show that sort of defines this thread: ER.

"Supernatural" an entertaining and imaginative show that's outlived its purpose.

"Saturday Night Live." 40+ years is more than enough. Increasingly it's become a sneering partisan rant.

Once Upon A Time. Started going downhill with the Peter Pan season.

Lots of anime shows like Naruto, Inuyasha, Bleach, DBZ.

Hannity

Night Court went one, maybe two seasons too long.

Gilmore Girls needed to wrap it up in Season 5.

SVU, really?

Bewitched. Should have called it quits when the first Derwood left.

Brothers & Sisters

All of them, they all endeavor for at least six seasons and all should be cut after three.

Celebrity Apprentice: The 2016 White House Edition

"Rosanne" A good show that went on longer than it should have. The last season was a waste of time.

Dexter should have ended after the John Lithgow season.

How I Met Your Mother?

I stopped watching after season 3 but tried watching the last season to see how it would end and it sucked.

Law and order svu has gone on way too long . It is not even an esemble piece anymore . The last 3 or 4 seasons it has basically become law and order, Olivia benson.. all the recent seasons were first Olivia benson and her rapist and now Olivia and Noah.. it is horrible

Supernatural

BBT is becoming a soap opera

The Vampire Diaries

AHS

OUAT

True Blood

"Alice," "One Day at a Time," "Bewitched," "My Three Sons," "Roseanne," "Dallas," and "Dynasty."

The person who called SNL a partisan rant is a butthurt Trumpster.

And ER owns this thread.

glee .. they should of ended when they won nationals and half the cast graduated . Night court was extremely funny in the first few seasons, but definitely lost it edge towards it end . Designing women ended when delta Burke and Jean smart left. The last two seasons were abysmal . Cheers last season was horrible . And finally modern family ? How is the show on the air still? Does anyone still watch it ?

I still like how to get away with murder and riverdale, but I just don't see the end game for the shows.. I can't imagine either show having long runs .. then again desperate housewives had the mystery component and that show lasted 7 or 8 seasons

Definitely Three's Company

SNL owns this thread.

And they can do all the Alec Baldwin /Trump stuff they want now, but it still doesn't change the fact that they helped give Trump a huge boost by allowing him to host the show during his early Presidential run. A fact that some cast members are even ashamed of.

Let's see. Television. I don't have much experience. I've always said "nix" to TV, although I am doing a friend a favor with "The Nix" soon. But that will air for too short a time for audiences, I'm sure.

Too long? I've been told that something called "Damages" was terrible and last five years too long in a five-year run. And there was that hoary thing "Sarah, Frighteningly Plain and Tall and Masculine" or something, which had THREE segments.

Those two, I'm sure.

See you soon at the Emmys!

Smallville

"Dexter" for sure, man that got awful as they ran into the ground.

"Weeds" another show that was absolutely run into the ground and got awful.

Hate to say it, but Doctor Who should've ended with Matt Smith.

Seinfeld. Once Elaine cut her hair, the show was over.

George Lopez's sitcom

Same with Sara Rue's Less Than Perfect -- they were like zombie shows, that kept coming back after you thought they were dead.

Hearts Afire was like that too.

It would be easier to post "TV shows That aired the RIGHT amount of time"

And, I so welcome the move to shorter season formats, more like the British and other countries do. Doing 10 to 12 shows a season results in better quality shows, for the most part.

And, the 70s/80s were NOT the nadir of television as some cretin remarked up above. Yes, there was a lot of trash/junk but also a lot of gold as well.

Just like today...

Really, any Lucy sitcom after Viv left.

"Yes, Dear" - I'm surprised something that awful went on and on...

Mork and Mindy.

Should have been cancelled after the first episode. And I'm a fan of both Robin Williams and Pam Dawber, but man, that was a fucking horrible show.

The Vampire Diaries went on about 4 seasons too long. After Elena left the show was unbearable, especially because the writers wouldn't stop obsessing how pained everyone was that Elena wasn't there.

Once Upon a Time is in a rough shape right now. It had some ups and downs over the run, but the sixth season ended on such a high note. The soft reboot has been a trainwreck.

Nashville should never have gone on after Connie Britton left. The last half of season five was aimless and dull as dirt. Can't believe they're going ahead with season six.

Nowadays four seasons=syndication, so I understand dragging any show out that long, but really there's little reason (creatively) to keep it going. Financially, it's obvious why certain shows will be run into the ground.

Bewitched, once Dick York began to be in fewer episodes. The Dick Sargent episodes were unwatchable.

My Three Sons, once William Frawley left and certainly when they moved to California.

Lucy whatever, once Vance left.

Roseanne--the crazy final season.

MASH--the last 5 seasons.

All in the Family--last couple seasons.

Empty Nest--the entire run.

David E Kelley shows--after the first few seasons.

Glee--after the first couple seasons.

Supernatural. Plot’s long gone. Pretty remains. Pick your poison.

[quote] My Three Sons, once William Frawley left and certainly when they moved to California.

I had to look this up, to check if my eyes were deceiving me. It's correct, but did any Frawley-era episodes make it to syndication? I have never seen one.

Pretty much all the hit broadcast shows. They can continue to get better than average ratings even when quality has declined. There is also money being made in syndication and foreign markets. So there's motivation to keep it going. To save money they'll eliminate some cast members.

I still enjoy modern family its just too bad a lot of the child actors suck soo much at acting as teens, lily and Manny and the boy dunphy mainly.

I think the middle lasted two seasons too long.

Cheers was better at the end than at the beginning I cant stand the first 4/5 diane seasons soo damn boring.

Supernatural has had a VERY strong start to this current season. The show's quality has ebbed and flowed since season 6, but the highs make the lows worth it. Plus, Supernatural was the CW's second highest rated show this week (behind the The Flash), so quality or not the viewers have not abandoned it. Why cancel a hit?

The Honeymooners has only one season, isn’t that odd?

Still hate the show.

I enjoyed Frasier for it's whole run. It dipped a little when they tried to do special episodes (Niles Heart Attack, Frasier visiting his mentor, etc), but they always bounced back. The one really bad move was turning lovable Daphne into a shrewish bitch once she was married.

All In The Family and Bewitched were shows that were once great , but faltered badly in their last couple seasons.

Lassie survived the jump from his first owner to Timmy, but once Timmy left, the show lost it's charm.

Leave It To Beaver almost lost me when Jerry Mathers went from being the cutest little sitcom kid ever to a goofy looking teenager, but the show wisely shifted focus to studly Wally and devious Eddie Haskell.

Beverly Hills 90210. Shoulda ended when they graduated college.

And I agree with a lot of the other ones mentioned .

No, r73, Lassie jumped the shark when butch Jeff was replaced by sissy Timmy.

But you're right about Leave It to Beaver. Did you know Hugh Beaumont was a closet case?

The Simpsons owns this thread. That show should have been cancelled many years ago.

All of Shonda Rime's dreck shows have been on too long. I'm amazed that pieces of shit like "Grey's Anatomy (which frequently features the main cast members being shot or stabbed or maimed or killed) and "Scandal" are still on.

How is Grey's Anatomy STILL on?

The Office US should have ended when Carell left. Also, does anyone care about Empire anymore?

On the flip side, I love the British model where things like Fawlty Towers and The Office UK don't wear out their welcome, even if I wish they had more episodes. Spaced and Black Books ended early, too, though I'm not sure if they were just cancelled (Fawlty Towers and The Office UK were intentionally ended by their creators).

US Office went down after Pam and Juim's wedding, and became Zombiefied after Steve Carrell left, but like most, I enjoyed the last season.

Breaking Bad knew when to end and not drag anything out. That should be a lesson.

Most of the reality shows: Survivor, Big Brother, Real Housewives etc

Why are some of you surprised that Grey's is still on? It is frequently ABC's high-rated drama and with Modern Family's ratings on the downswing it will be the highest-rated program period. Why in the world would you cancel your top-rated show?

Television is a business, not a non-profit off-Broadway theater company. It's about making money. More money from hit shows means bigger syndication packages. Also, hit shows can help launch and/or prop up new/low-rated critical hits that are yet to find an audience.

r82 I'm not surprised that ABC hasn't cancelled it. I'm surprised that people still care about the show and it still gets consistently high ratings. I was a sophomore in high school when it first started, and now I'm nearly 30.

"Parks and Recreation." That last season was bizarre and ruined everything that went before. Gone were the office camaraderie and character-based humor, mostly replaced by a complete change of setting and time skips that turned everyone into unrecognizable overachievers who hugged each other all the time and constantly told each other "I love you."

Beverly Hills 90210 should have ended after Andrea got her first Social Security check.

"Why are some of you surprised that Grey's is still on?"

Because it sucks SO bad. Who the hell watches it? I can't imagine anybody watching it but middle aged women who swooned over "Dr. McDreamy" and "Dr. McSteamy." It's such garbage that I can't imagine why anyone would want to watch it except for females who love soap opera shit.

Dallas - can you remember any of the bevy of revolving door characters and storylines in its last 2-3 seasons? It was JR and a bunch of people who were completely pointless.

Project Runway

R86 I think McDreamy and McSteamy are dead. Really makes one wonder what people are watching for now. Most of the original cast is gone. There's nothing wrong with a show for women, but I agree this isn't good.

Little House on the Prairie

Shoot me, but I thought a lot of the final season of The Sopranos was filler.

House ran waaaay to long.

Supernatural should have ended years ago, but I still watch on occasion.

The Good Wife ran just the right amount of time.

The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Seinfeld are the perfect examples of exiting at the top of your game. Yes, the Seinfeld finale was... odd, but everything leading up to it was of just as high quality as ever.

The Walton's should have ended when the mother left. ER should have finished when Mark died. There were 4 or 5 seasons afterward that I didn't watch, but watched some of the last season to see how they'd finish it up.

Those who asked about Grey's and why it's still watched - it's a battle of wills. I started this series way back when, and I'm riding it out. I want to see how it wraps. Will Kathryn Heigl quit doing cat litter commercials long enough to do a cameo in which Shonda has her character eaten by a rabid dog? Will Cristina and Meredith become the lesbian couple that is shipped in fan fictions?

Laverne & Shirley. I mean when have of the title characters leave I mean come on. Could you imagine going to California to get a fresh start and all your friends and family follow you?

The Dick Van Dyke Show was another one that ended while it was still doing quality work.

When did Happy Days jump the shark?

West Wing. When Aaron Sorkin left they should have put it out of its misery.

How I met Your Mother should have never been on TV ever...at all. I watched 2 minutes of it once and it sucked ass. NPH sucks anyway

Criminal Minds...PLEASE. ENOUGH with this depressing disgusting shit.

Glee

How I Met Your Mother

Supergirl

The Middle

Community

Ugly Betty

2 Broke Girls

Desperate Housewives

New Girl

Jane the Virgin

Criminal Minds

The Mentalist

Ally McBeal

Two and a Half Men

The Office should have ended after Jim and Pam's wedding.

Arrested development didn't need to do a 4th season, and now they're in the process of doing a 5th season. Ugh.

Nip/Tuck was good for about 2 seasons before it turned into a mess.

" I think McDreamy and McSteamy are dead."

Oh yeah, they're dead, alright. But there are other hot men on the show for silly females to drool over. I've watched this show a few times (VERY few times); when Kevin McKidd joined the cast I was interested. He's super hot (hotter than "McDreamy" or "McSteamy") and a good actor. But he's totally wasted on this show, which is SO bad.

R66

Beat me to it on BEWiTCHED ! Dreadful once York left.

THE BEVERLY HILLBILLIES is another. After the 4th or 5th season, they should have ended it.

I started watching "Once Upon A Time" about midway in the first season and then up to the end of the last season which should have served as the series finale. I tuned it for this season's opener and wasn't thrilled, haven't watched it since.

I like watching the ghost hunting shows, but many of them quickly their thrill after a second season or so. Too many groups going to the same locations, too many vague fuzzy EVPs and blurry photos and videos, not to mention the apparent set-ups. Worst of all is probably Ghost Adventures.

The Big Bang theory

Some say Nurse Jackie went on a bit too long, and I kind of agree. Season 7 felt very desultory and the finale was unsatisfying. Season 4 was one of the best seasons of television I've ever seen, season 5 was meh, and season 6 was kind of a return to form. They could have easily wrapped up with a better season 5.

To the person who said HOMELAND. F you, HOMELAND rocks, and S6 was probably its best season yet. Here for S7 & 8.

I wonder if it would have made a difference if Buffy ended with Season 5, without the polarizing S6 and maligned S7. But its legacy remains intact either way.

Scandal, Ab Fab, and The X-Files have or did go on for FAR too long. What was the point of bringing X-Files back from the dead for a completely forgettable 10th season and likely 11th season?

Petticoat Junction -- after the pilot.

Here's a list of the longest running scripted shows in the US. Almost every one of them ran too long

60 Minutes

Happy days should of ended way before it did .. it was good 4 or 5 seasons, but then it literally and figuratively jumped the shark ... the last few seasons was like a completely diffferent show ... Richie, Ralph and potsie were gone . Any traces of the 50s were gone .the fonz character was so destroyed that it was painful to watch . Beverly Hills 90210 should of ended once college ended but defin should of ended when the last Walsh left .

Shameless. The most recent seasons were just kind of... there and a slog to get through. It started out as this hysterically funny dark comedy and over time devolved into a tedious soap about people making very bad decisions with very little humor left underneath it all.

Gunsmoke after Chester left and that doofus Festus replaced the character.

R111, I kind of agree, because it's had utterly mediocre seasons past S4 (S5 & 6) but S7 was alright and S8 looks to be promising. It's also the kind of show you don't really mind running to Season 10 or beyond, because it's a family saga and its interesting to watch the kids grow up into young adulthood.

What's My Line after the early 60s, maybe even when Fred Allen died in the mid 50s.

[quote]The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Seinfeld are the perfect examples of exiting at the top of your game. Yes, the Seinfeld finale was... odd, but everything leading up to it was of just as high quality as ever.

There were quite a few duds in Seinfeld's final season. The Dealership is probably the worst but there's a sea of mediocre episodes in the middle of the season. The once-banned Puerto Rican Day episode should have stayed MIA. And I know a lot of people love the Merv Griffin episode but even that one felt forced.

Mary Tyler Moore probably should have ended after Rhoda and Phyllis left. Or they should have introduced some characters outside the workplace for Mary to interact with. (I suppose they tried but not very hard.) Focusing strictly on the WJM characters was getting tiresome by the end.

Sue Ann Niven was a funnier character than either Rhoda or Phyllis.

Nivens, a typo^

Gunsmoke

Bonanza

Leave It to Beaver should have ended when Jerry Mathers hit puberty.

Sue Ann Niven wasn't nearly as funny as Rhoda or Phyllis.

The Andy Griffith Show should have ended when Don Knotts left.

All of the 80s primetime soaps -- Dallas, Dynasty, Knots Landing, Falcon Crest. Dallas had completely decimated its cast by the final season, and it was just Hagman, Patrick Duffy and Ken Kercheval interacting with guest stars.

Dynasty is an interesting case, tho. It should have ended after the awful Moldavian Massacre, but it limped on. Then, they hired a new showrunner for the final season who rejuvenated the series. Alexis Colby vs. Sable Colby was one of the best stories in the show's history, but by the point, people had already stopped watching/caring.

Dynasty, after booting the couple who created it.

Orphan Black probably would have been better served with four longer seasons, maybe 12 or 13 episodes instead of just 10, rather than five seasons.

There were some great moments in the fifth and final season, and Maslany, along with Maria Doyle Kennedy and the men in the cast were always good. But it kind of seemed like there was a barely-suppressed undertone of "let's just wrap this up and move on."

The Beverly Hillbillies and Petticoat Junction.

Designing Women should have packed up after Delta Burke left. It sucked after that.

Every night time soap just limped away. It was pathetic. Especially pathetic with KL which was the best of the lot.

[quote] Richie, Ralph and potsie were gone .

Actually, Potsie (Anson Williams) stayed with "Happy Days" for its entire run. He became an even more pathetic character as he grew older and had no one left to pal around with. In the last few seasons, Potsie seemed to develop a rather odd fascination with Mr. Cunningham.

Seinfeld dragged on about 5 years too long.

The MTM show hags will come after me for this one, but they're insane anyway-MTM stank after all the spin-offs.

Harper and Leachman were a lot of what made the original show so great. The only bright spot was the death of Chuckles the Clown episode.

Mister Grant!

R129: Seinfeld did not become consistently good until its third season (out of nine) and was not consistently great until its fourth. Seasons four-seven are amazing TV, but the show took its time getting there. Re-watch in order on Hulu.

I don't think anyone will hate you for saying MTM started it decline after Rhoda and Phyllis left. It really started to suck ass. Rhoda was the funniest thing on the show. Phyllis the second funniest. Then Ted. Then Sue Anne. What irritates me most is the pile of shit we got with Rhoda.

[quote]I had to look this up, to check if my eyes were deceiving me. It's correct, but did any Frawley-era episodes make it to syndication? I have never seen one.

Not in the Seventies, but Nick at Nite showed some of the early seasons. I had no idea that there was once an older brother named Mike on the show--I always thought the show began when Ernie joined as the third adopted son 9they never referred to him as adopted after the first season). And Ernie joined (and Mike left) after William Fawley died and left the show.

Fawley was much more likeable than William Demerest, who was just crotchety and unpleasant.

Dexter should have run for 5 seasons and no more. The last three seasons were incredibly bad...just awful, shameful, the writers and producers should have been shot and killed.

Maybe I missed it, but has anyone mentioned "Lost"?

It's hard to think of another show that went from 'must-watch, because all my friends are watching' to obscurity so fast. It was a DL fave, with many threads, in its first season and into the second, but then it was obviously boring the fuck out of everyone.

By the end, was anyone watching?

SVU...did it ever end? I hate when I turn on the TV and see it.

Once Upon a Time should have ended 5 seasons ago.

More

The Walking Dead

OMG! Zombies! Oh good, we're safe here! .....Oh noes! The humans are as bad as the zombies! .....We have to leave....after at least one of us gets killed....ok, now we're on the road again and....OMG! Zombies!.....Rinse, Repeat x 7 or 8 years.

I barely got through one season of House of Cards and I think it's on season 6. Good lord, how can anyone stand it?

I'm guessing some of the cast on Curb Your Enthusiasm lost all of their money gambling or needed health insurance or something. Why else would Larry bring it back after 5 years and present this pile of fly-swarmed crap? It's horrifyingly bad. "Hey everybody, let's stand around improvising, even though we ran out of ideas six years ago. Let's have Larry yell "fatwa" 500 times, because everyone knows "fatwa" stops being funny the 50,000th time Larry yells it."

Can't anyone else bitch about Dexter?

Seinfeld dragged on years too long. Criminal Minds should have closed up shop when Mandy Patinkin left.

ROSEANNE . Season six marked a real sudden decline in quality, and it never recovered for me. Roseanne Conner was this caricature of her former self, just a total monster, terrorizing her family, and what's funny about that? For me, nothing. I think it reflected fatigue on the part of the creative team and the fact that Roseanne Barr was a mental case on a power trip. Hopefully the new series recaptures some of what was good about the show before she went off the rails.

Jeopardy after Art Fleming left.

I love The Dealership, r115!

MASH, Bones, Dynasty, South Park!

Sesame Street

I have to agree with a lot of others - The Simpsons and Supernatural have going way past the "milking it" phase to the crap they are now - leave on a high note people! Supernatural should have ended at season 5.

Roseanne's last season was a middle finger to the audience.

Quite a few of these shows would have worked better as mini-seriies (Prison Break) or as 3-4 season shows (Desperate Housewives, Lost, HIMYM).

Meet the Press.

COPS. Been on since 1989. 28 years too long.

151 replies and no mention of NCIS? Has been terrible for years.

Moonlighting should have ended after 3 seasons.

Glee would have been better as a one season cult favorite.

All of them

Seinfeld should have ended a year earlier than it did. The last season sucked along with the finale.

The last season of "Seinfeld" up to the final was pretty great. The only missteps were the India wedding episode and the Puerto Rican parade one.

The last 2 years of Seinfeld were just coasting; they had run out of ideas and were only milking the popularity of the show for money.

I remember as a kid spending pretty much the entire Saturday evening watching CBS: All in the Family started at 8, the Mary Tyler Moore Show at 8:30, the Bob Newhart Show at 9, some other sitcom at 9:30, then the hourlong Carol Burnett Show at 10. Three hours of solid entertainment.

We would always discuss at school the next Monday morning whatever the episode of All in the Family was about. I think it was the first "water cooler show" due to its huge popuarity. It was a cultural phenomenon and Archie Bunker became a famous character.

I remember not liking Mary's new apartment when she moved on MTM. That might have been when the show started to slide downhill a little. But I watched it all the way to the final episode.

Very rarely shows don't suck after season 3-4 , that would be 50episodes thereabout. Sitcoms have a longer shelf life tho.

Season 11 of 7th Heaven was unwatchable.

Seems like it takes a whole season for a show to hit its stride. Then after the hiatus, they come back for season 2 and they "do it right." Season 2 is often the best for many series.

Mad Men arguably went one season too long.

Supernatural, it should have stop ten years ago, after s2 or 3. Apocalypse and Angels ruined the show.

R160, are you saying Seasons 1-10 WERE watchable?

I thought for sure I would see more mentions of TBBT. They are all shrill and annoying at this point.

Grey's is solid, comfort TV. I don't know why anyone is surprised people still watch it. Daytime soaps have been on for decades - there is no difference.

Teen Wolf should've ended after 3A.

Beverly Hills 90210 definitely didn't need 10 seasons. The cast was over it by season 5.

Heroes i stopped watching after season 2. I feel like the show went downhill pretty quickly and i'm sure the writers strike didn't help.

Prison Break would have been better as a miniseries.

The Brits handle this so much better than Americans do, and now, for the first time, streaming services and cable are really making the major broadcast networks re-think their models.

LOST was ruined because it was an ABC show. The creators were burdened with too many episodes and too many seasons, and as a result, the whole enterprise went from being a must-see to a must-avoid. I can't even remember when I stopped, but it became unwatchable.

As do all Ryan Murphy shows. NIP/TUCK's early seasons are sensational. My husband and I did see the series through via Netflix, just to say we did, but the show got more and more absurd and certain characters totally stopped making sense. I heard the actors were miserable by show's end and there was lots of conflict on set, and with those scripts, it's no surprise. GLEE also jumped the shark after the third season or so. SCREAM QUEENS after the first season. AHS too.

WEEDS turned into a dog the minute the show left suburbia. DEXTER also went on far too long and never reached the heights it achieved in the John Lithgow season. NURSE JACKIE actually maintained most of its integrity till the end.

PRISON BREAK broke when the series moved to South America. I watched one or two episodes of that and then stopped the misery.

And WALKING DEAD is going to try to run forever. Still watching it, but not sure for how much longer.

Sometimes shows can get better near the end than they were after slumping in the middle. This seems to be more true of dramas with ensemble casts than comedies.

I would argue that the last two seasons of The West Wing were better than the couple of seasons that came before. I remember thinking the same thing about Cagney and Lacey, which actually seemed to get better and more interesting with each passing season.

And almost everyone who was a fan of China Beach will tell you that the short final season was the best work from everyone involved in a truly great series.

Having said that, none of them could have kept it up much longer

Leaving Gloria is exactly what Mike would have done. His whole life was spent trying to be around those who were intellectually superior to him and punishing those around him that he felt were his intellectually inferiors. As soon as he got tenured he would have thought Gloria a complete embarrassment. He would have dumped her for a TA in an instant. He could have still felt superior to a TA but not be embarrassed by her.

Joining a commune is something he most definitely wouldn't have done. He's too argumentative and too much physical labor.

Although it's the most posted show in the history of DL - I'm the only person who admits to watching Real Housewives Of Beverly Hills (odd that) away from the actual threads - but it's absurd how it has overrun its course. Stupid. It was great fun in its day.

& of course, The View. Disaster.

Anything with a Kardashian.

I remember the last season of Knots Landing and Melrose Place. The plot lines got so bad it just couldn't be writers running out of ideas. I honestly think in many cases, not just these shows, contracts are up, they see the last seasons ratings go down and they let the fans down easy by purposely making these seasons shitty. There is no way these shows get so bad over night.

The Waltons

The Lawrence Welk Show

Carol Burnett

Alice

Hee Haw

CSI whatever

Gunsmoke

Petticoat Junction

The Dome should have been a mini-series. Season 1 rocked, than midway through Season 2, it fell apart and never recovered.

The Fonzie Show.

Supernatural. It should have ended in season three, with Dean in hell permanently.

Wrong thread, r170.

Law and order svu started to go downhill when hargitay when on maternity leave .. her temp replacement was horrible. Then when she returned, the chemistry was never really the same ..the show got downright bad when they let go of Diane Neal . The show was practically unwatchable the season where chris meloni left . The next season with pino and giddish was actually pretty good..the next season when they hired Raul Esparza, the show was as good as it was in earlier seasons .. but then they had Olivia almost raped, munch and cragen left, and they destroyed Danny Pino's character , the show had been horrible ever since .. it is basically the Olivia benson show with a few other characters that she interacts with from time to time ..

Square Pegs

Caroline In The City.

I think they made a mistake not killing Brody off in season 1 of Homeland. And fuck whoever thought it was a good idea to put so much focus on Dana.

South Park went past its expiration date years ago. In its heyday it was sly, edgy and very, very topical. It's devolved into a really stupid homage to video games and other brightly colored flashiness designed to appeal exclusively to middle school students and special ed kids who are amused by gaudy moving objects. South Park is now as mindlessly stupid as any run-of-the-mill Saturday morning cartoon shows.

Arrow

The Flash

Legends of Tomorrow (never should have aired at all!)

Supergirl (see above)

Friends

Everybody Loves Raymond

King of Queens

Home Improvement

Last Man Standing

Two and a Half Men

How I Met Your Mother

Big Bang Theory

"151 replies and no mention of NCIS? Has been terrible for years."

I think you actually have to watch a show to decide if the quality has changed.

This board isn't exactly their demographic.

Exactly, r185 - NCIS was DOA for most people on this board.

R184 Supergirl?? That show has only had 2 seasons.

I've never known anyone in real life who watches NCIS.

The Simpsons owns this thread.

Days of our Lives, General Hospital, Young and Restless, Bold and Beautiful

Seinfeld does not hold up. Hate Julia doofus and tubby jason. Jerry used to fill out his jeans nicely. Loved delicious Puddy, would suck his dick and lick his ass. Hated the weird music. Hated the cheap sets. A smart ass show that thoughf it was all that, jyst like todays blackish.

The Big Bang Theory.

Supernatural. I can't believe they're on season 13 right now! Stopped watching in the seventh or the eighth, I can't even remember anymore.

R193 Neither can i. But it's apparently their highest rated show on the CW.

Both 30 Rock and Parks & Rec had a lackluster final season. Neither show knew how to end things.

I feel the same way about Parenthood, I enjoyed all of the seasons except for the last one. And the final scene - the baseball game I thought would never end.

Despise the big bang theory. Does Sheldon get banged by Johnny? They leave this deck on and take 2 broke girls off, CBS is unwatchable.

Nah r194. "Supernatural" does well for them (which is why they keep renewing it), but "The Flash" is easily CW's highest rated show.

Square Pegs

The Honeymooners

Bridget Loves Bernie

The Girl With Something Extra

He and She

Turn On

Now that SATC3 is off, maybe SJP will do a Square Pegs update

SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE

R198, nicely done.

But seriously I can't agree with Homeland being on too long just because of valid criticisms like

[quote]I think they made a mistake not killing Brody off in season 1 of Homeland. And fuck whoever thought it was a good idea to put so much focus on Dana.

I agree with a lot of that, but in the years since Brody and Dana are gone, Homeland is still a great series, changing up in unexpected ways from season to season and always with Danes being great.

I have one to add. Orphan Black. God, this show dragged on and on. A 2-3 season story at best.

Square Pegs

South Park...

Gunsmoke

The current reality show we're living ... porn stars, blackmail, nuclear war... So many clifhangers. How long before we're canceled?