How Many Seasons For A TV Show?

[Guest Incredible Iron]

There are some TV shows that were running for too long already. I'm thinking of the Arrow and the Walking Dead. How many seasons do you think is enough for a TV show?

[ShadowEdge 48]

The Walking Dead started out amazing, but the show writers definitely lost their way at some point. I'm not exactly sure when the show jumped the shark, but it needs put out of its misery. I think The Big Bang Theory is another one that has went in too many directions and needed to end ages ago. I don't watch it anymore, but I believe this is the last season.

 

I don't think shows need an artificial limit on how long they should run. It's more about when they lose direction or the story and characters have come to an honest conclusion, yet they continue trying to drag it out.

[Guest HighlyLogical]

I agree with @ShadowEdge that a show should end when it loses its direction. I think that when a group of people come together to bring a show to life, there is a certain energy there, and over time that energy can be lost. Over time they still put a lot of energy into getting the show on the air, it's just that the energy is different, so the show is different. One of my pet peeves about shows is how "extra" they become when they have been on maybe longer than they should be. The characters are extra loud, everyone is over the top. You can compare the new loud shows to the older shows, on the older shows it seems like everyone is much more subdued and calm.

 

Another thing I dislike is how some shows change the personality of a character to the point where the character no longer even resembles who they were at the outset. The character "Ross" on "Friends" is a perfect example of this. When "Friends" first started, Ross was this shy, serious, intelligent paleontologist, but very quickly his character was turned into someone else that I, for one, didn't find particularly appealing. I guess the writers were trying to make Ross funny, but once his character changed, the show lost a lot of its appeal, in my opinion.

Edited October 13, 2018 by HighlyLogical

[Guest Revenger]

I don't think shows need an artificial limit on how long they should run. It's more about when they lose direction or the story and characters have come to an honest conclusion, yet they continue trying to drag it out.

 

I agree with this. There shouldn't be an exact number of seasons for a TV show because it will lose its flexibility to tell the story. WWE is the longest running TV show in the entire TV history, and people of all ages still watch it.

[Guest Incredible Iron]

Another thing I dislike is how some shows change the personality of a character to the point where the character no longer even resembles who they were at the outset.

 

We may differ on this point because the characters need to evolve as the show goes on. We can agree though that the characters should retain their original traits from the start of the show to the current season. The problem sometimes is that the characters will have a different personality as the show progresses.

[Guest HighlyLogical]

We may differ on this point because the characters need to evolve as the show goes on. We can agree though that the characters should retain their original traits from the start of the show to the current season. The problem sometimes is that the characters will have a different personality as the show progresses.

I don't think we differ on this point because I agree with you that characters need to grow as the show goes on, but like you made reference to, not when the characters lose their original traits. I agree with you that the problem is when characters start having a different personality. I'm all for growth when it makes sense. In the Ross character's particular case he went from being a highly intelligent, shy man to almost a full-on bumbling idiot. It's like, really? They had him acting more like a circus clown than a paleontologist. Like I said, maybe they were trying to make him funnier, that's what it seemed like to me, but they missed the mark, in my opinion.

 

If I married a man who was a serious, almost brooding, intellectual scientist, then more than likely that means that's the kind of man I like. He's a "type". If, after two years of marriage, he starts acting goofy, being a clown, being silly, then that marriage is not going to last because that is definitely not what I signed up for. If I buy a Coke, I want it to taste like Coke, they can grow the brand with diet Coke, and zero carb Coke, or whatever else they come out with, but by and large it still tastes like Coke, even though there has been growth. However, if I buy a coke and it tastes like lemonade, that would bug me. I love lemonade, don't get me wrong, but not when I'm craving a coke.

 

There's a soap opera I watch, and I have several favorite characters on that show. One of my favorites used to be an intelligent, savvy businesswoman. Over the years they turned her into a kleptomaniac, and a baby thief! I could deal with those traits, even though they were far out. It was like, what happened?! But what really threw me for a loop is when they started writing her as a character who didn't know her arse from her elbow. It was so ridiculous.

Thankfully the writers have recently, within the past year or so, written her character back to the woman she used to be... somewhat. She's not running around stealing babies anymore, and acts much more grounded and centered.

[Guest Incredible Iron]

I like your Coke analogy. I think the writers are doing that to make the show into something new, but hurting their fan base in the end. I like the twists in the story, but not with the character's traits that we've grown to like.