Television Shows That Stay Around Way Too Long

[BAYLOR]

Happy Days 1974 to 84. In early seasons it was fun show but it stayed tooling. In fact the expression Tv Show Jumping the Shark came from Happy Days.

 

[Donal DeLay]

How I Met Your Mother - It was always Ted and Robin's story, but that final season was really 2 episodes at most. It didn't need to be 22 episodes long, but they stretched it out until the very end to make that reveal.

Community. I can't even watch it any more.

I loved this show for the first 2-3 seasons, but season 4 was SOOOO bad. I thought season 5 was a decent recovery but it's pretty clear the moment has sort of passed and the magic is gone (along with Troy).

Problem with Community is Dan Harmon was kicked off the show for season 4, and he WAS the show. Instead, they gave a well received, popular show to a couple of writers that ran a CW series no one heard of that ran for one season before being cancelled. When the network figured out their mistake, they brought him back for season 5, but it felt like they kept him on a short leash. It felt like a restrained version of seasons 1-3. I'm hoping, now that it's on Yahoo, he'll be given creative control and it'll be funny once again.

Removing Harmon as showrunner for season 4 was just a stupid decision by NBC. That's like finding someone who owned a coffee shop that closed after a year to be CEO of Chipotle.

Dexter. I really enjoyed the show then it went off the rails. The final season was crap. The final episode was worse than crap.
Grey's Anatomy is revisiting the same storylines. I wanted to give up on it last year. Now that Christina is gone it's not nearly as interesting.

Dexter. Dear Crom. I've never been so pissed off at a series finale than that. Pretty sure the writers just wanted to throw fans off because everyone knew it HAD to end in one of two ways. But, that? ugh.

Grey's Anatomy. I don't know why I watch this show. I honestly don't know. It's so awful. Every single character is a petulant child that makes the worst decisions imaginable. Choices no rational adult would ever make. They're all selfish and insuffereable.

 

[BAYLOR]

The Simpsons.

 

[BAYLOR]

The X-Files - I loved the first three seasons but after that it was only the occasional episode that gripped me. Same for Buffy - loved the first three seasons, then just occasional episodes. I still haven't seen the ends of Battlestar Galactica or Smallville because I ran out of steam on them much earlier, and I gave up on Supernatural after season 6 or 7 (can't remember which - which says it all, really!).

The series was less then successful in the feature film department.

 

[Cli-Fi]

I am about to give up on both Hawaii Five-0 and NCIS: LA. I gave up on all the other NCIS' awhile back, but LA was the funnest out of all of them. Now that Hetty is gone from the show and likely won't return with two new managers, the dynamic feels off. Hawaii Five-0 same thing with Chin and Kono, both highly missed, last fun episode was a mess.

 

[BAYLOR]

I am about to give up on both Hawaii Five-0 and NCIS: LA. I gave up on all the other NCIS' awhile back, but LA was the funnest out of all of them. Now that Hetty is gone from the show and likely won't return with two new managers, the dynamic feels off. Hawaii Five-0 same thing with Chin and Kono, both highly missed, last fun episode was a mess.

Both shows are pretty mediocre.

 

[Cli-Fi]

Both shows are pretty mediocre.

I never minded that, but now they are worse.

 

[Danny Creasy]

Revolution (NBC) was beginning to wear on me; its two seasons would have been a proper run. Unfortunately, the producers planned a third season. NBC cancelled it. With no concluding episode, they left us hanging. Not good.

 

[Edward M. Grant]

Revolution (NBC) was beginning to wear on me

Yeah, they took an interesting premise, and quickly threw it away, soon becoming another 'get captured by the bad guys and escape of the week' show. I don't think we even finished watching the second season.

 

[BAYLOR]

Yeah, they took an interesting premise, and quickly threw it away, soon becoming another 'get captured by the bad guys and escape of the week' show. I don't think we even finished watching the second season.

That one went downhill fast.

 

[AlexH]

I agree Springs and exactly so Alc. Both Father Ted and Fawlty Towers are priceless classics. The difference is that Fawlty Towers was ended by 'choice' whilst Father Ted was by tragedy. I think it was the right decision to end Fawlty Towers when they did so it didn't have time to fail. It's interesting to speculate whether, but for Dermot Morgan's untimely end, they would have ended up milking Father Ted into exhaustion. As it is it will remain one of the greats of comedy.

I might be wrong, but I think that was the final series of Father Ted anyway. Originally, they had Ted jumping to his death, but after Dermot Morgan died (the day after filming wrapped up) they changed the ending to the Ted montage.

Dermot Morgan apparently had heart pains on the last day of filming. One of the actors kept fluffing his lines, which meant Dermot Morgan had to repeatedly do the crazy dance for the scene. I think the actor said his mess-ups could have contributed to Dermot Morgan's heart-attack.

So sad, but what a legacy. I think Father Ted is perfect at three series. Series Graham Linehan is involved on don't tend to go on for too long.

Back on topic, off the top of my head, I can't think of any TV programmes that stayed around so long I got bored of them.

 

[Danny Creasy]

Since the OP was not genre specific:

Westerns: Bonanza, Gunsmoke, The Virginian, The Rifleman
Detective shows: Hawaii Five-0, NCIS, Criminal Minds, Barnaby Jones, Mannix
Comedy: The Cosby Show, All In the Family (and its spinoffs), Friends, Seinfeld, Modern Family, The Simpsons

 

[Marvin]

Too soon:
Firefly - obviously
About right:
Misfits - although the cast did pretty completely change
Stranger Things - potentially, if they stick to the 4 season plan. Planning it - that could be the key. Don't think the money men like that idea!
Too long:
Arrow - gave up on that after the whole 'what happened on the island' was pretty much resolved.
Walking dead - Its on the cusp right now, unless something changes soon...

 

[Narkalui]

Yeah, they took an interesting premise, and quickly threw it away, soon becoming another 'get captured by the bad guys and escape of the week' show. I don't think we even finished watching the second season.

I only watched the first episode of Revolution. I hated it because all I saw was a shameless piece of anti gun control propaganda

 

[Danny Creasy]

I only watched the first episode of Revolution. I hated it because all I saw was a shameless piece of anti gun control propaganda

And bows and arrows and short swords?

 

[Narkalui]

No, it was the fact that the BADDIES were restricting ownership of fire arms and that’s what made them BAD

 

[Khuratokh]

I only watched the first episode of Revolution. I hated it because all I saw was a shameless piece of anti gun control propaganda

The entire premise, for me. Electricity ceases to work = barbaric feudal world.

Because before electricity became a thing, we all lived in caves, apparently.

Sure it would be rough the first few years and our society as we know it now would collapse, but haven't the writers ever heard of steam power?.

 

[SilentRoamer]

The entire premise, for me. Electricity ceases to work = barbaric feudal world.

Because before electricity became a thing, we all lived in caves, apparently.

Sure it would be rough the first few years and our society as we know it now would collapse, but haven't the writers ever heard of steam power?.

It's apples and oranges though. In pre-electric times it wasn't really possible due to limiting factors to over-populate certain geographical regions to the extent that they are today.

The reliance on electric technology wasn't in place, today's average Joe would be hard pressed to carry out the necessities for survival. I think a worldwide loss of electric would have completely devastating consequences in some places of the world whilst having almost no effect in others.

I liked the premise of the show, the execution was terrible. The sword fights equally so.

 

[Edward M. Grant]

No, it was the fact that the BADDIES were restricting ownership of fire arms and that’s what made them BAD

I honestly don't remember much about the show, but, from what I do remember, the bad guys were, you know, the bad guys, and they wanted power over the rest of the survivors. Which they acquired in part by being the only ones with guns.

One of the big problems with the show was that they started with that as part of an interesting premise, then, a few episodes later, everyone seemed to be running around with guns.

 

[Hyde]

First post - Cant resist chipping in

'Weeds ' far too long-

'V' with Morena Baccarin, too short