7 years is a sweet spot with American TV. If they don’t wrap it up after 7 season it just becomes shit. X-Files should have ended at 7. Stargate SG-1 at 7. In fact a lot of them were written for a good closing at 7 years but studios just have the need for enshitification for that ad money.
Think of the legendary good shows that knew when to end at 7 years. Or 5 years.
I want a new firefly show with the original cast and I want it to be about everything that happened between the finale and the start of the movie. No de-aging. Everyone’s inexplicably older in this flashback than they were in the movie.
I think That 70s Show was 8 seasons long if I’m remembering correctly and you’re right, season 8 was absolutely terrible. It had been declining already by then, but atleast if they ended with season 7, they would’ve ended in a better spot.
Honestly season 8 felt like a spinoff written by someone else.
I don’t think it’s fair to expect a show to remain at a single high level of quality over its entire run, but yeah, there’s a point when it’s just a drag on the better seasons’ legacy and (especially in the days of linear TV only) depriving audiences of a new show that might be better and is unlikely to be worse than what’s left to come.
I totally agree, I just wish more studios would agree to give shows the graceful ending they deserve.
I feel like from a writing perspective, it would also help to know how long your show is going to be so you can fit in everything you want appropriately.
Game of Thrones I think is one of the few exceptions to this rule. It still had plenty of story left to tell and the primary reason the 8th season was a bomb was because the showrunners were busy trying to wrap it up too quickly so they could go work on Star Wars instead. I think they could have taken the exact same half baked story ending that they had, stretched it out into ten seasons, and people would have complained a lot less. Would have been nice to have a better ending written but if they gave the one that they had the appropriate room to breathe, it would have been fine. Not great, but fine.
But wrapping that all up so quickly and suddenly is what put the nails in the coffin, in my opinion.
i dint mind 8-10 it was a nice change from the goauld for like the past 7 years which turned them into a joke, clearly the age was getting on for sg1 though. sci-fi should at least last 7 years, and not like all this 8 episode bs that streams are pushing, not enough time to flesh out content.
sga , sgu dint last long enough, and there was so much more content left in those shows, by evidence of interviews after it ended. Wier in season 5, ghost in the machine alluded to “advanced races hidden from the wraith in the pegasus galaxy” as foreshadowing. and sgu had the ancient-level planet builder aliens.
7 years is a sweet spot with American TV. If they don’t wrap it up after 7 season it just becomes shit. X-Files should have ended at 7. Stargate SG-1 at 7. In fact a lot of them were written for a good closing at 7 years but studios just have the need for enshitification for that ad money.
Think of the legendary good shows that knew when to end at 7 years. Or 5 years.
6 seasons and a movie
Firefly only got half a season and then a movie 2 years later!
Threshold got half season and no movie.
Showbiz executives do stupid things.
I want a new firefly show with the original cast and I want it to be about everything that happened between the finale and the start of the movie. No de-aging. Everyone’s inexplicably older in this flashback than they were in the movie.
Except Wash
No spoilers! The events of the movie haven’t happened yet
Simpsons needed 8, so we get the conclusion of who shot Mr. Burns. But that’s still damn close.
“Behind the laughter” (s11 finale) is a fine stopping point.
That one too, yes.
Huh STNG - seven seasons.
Voyager too
DS9 too
I think That 70s Show was 8 seasons long if I’m remembering correctly and you’re right, season 8 was absolutely terrible. It had been declining already by then, but atleast if they ended with season 7, they would’ve ended in a better spot.
Honestly season 8 felt like a spinoff written by someone else.
I don’t think it’s fair to expect a show to remain at a single high level of quality over its entire run, but yeah, there’s a point when it’s just a drag on the better seasons’ legacy and (especially in the days of linear TV only) depriving audiences of a new show that might be better and is unlikely to be worse than what’s left to come.
I totally agree, I just wish more studios would agree to give shows the graceful ending they deserve.
I feel like from a writing perspective, it would also help to know how long your show is going to be so you can fit in everything you want appropriately.
Games of Thrones should have cut off at 7.
Game of Thrones I think is one of the few exceptions to this rule. It still had plenty of story left to tell and the primary reason the 8th season was a bomb was because the showrunners were busy trying to wrap it up too quickly so they could go work on Star Wars instead. I think they could have taken the exact same half baked story ending that they had, stretched it out into ten seasons, and people would have complained a lot less. Would have been nice to have a better ending written but if they gave the one that they had the appropriate room to breathe, it would have been fine. Not great, but fine.
But wrapping that all up so quickly and suddenly is what put the nails in the coffin, in my opinion.
i dint mind 8-10 it was a nice change from the goauld for like the past 7 years which turned them into a joke, clearly the age was getting on for sg1 though. sci-fi should at least last 7 years, and not like all this 8 episode bs that streams are pushing, not enough time to flesh out content.
sga , sgu dint last long enough, and there was so much more content left in those shows, by evidence of interviews after it ended. Wier in season 5, ghost in the machine alluded to “advanced races hidden from the wraith in the pegasus galaxy” as foreshadowing. and sgu had the ancient-level planet builder aliens.