When a once-beloved TV show starts showing its age and viewers start clicking to something
else, the show has two choices: bow out gracefully or change everything about itself in an attempt
to win back the fickle masses.
Typically, the latter approach fails miserably, but that hasn't stopped many shows from trying.
When a show's most popular characters start
to leave, that's usually a sign of the end.
"I mean, to have to look at this all day and not be able to touch it?
I can't even do that!"
But That '70s Show chose to weather the departure of Ashton Kutcher and Topher Grace and keep
on keeping on — with a brand new friend: Randy, played by Josh Meyers.
"I'm Randy, I've got big muscles, I'm good looking!
You're an ass!"
As the Washington Post pointed out, there was just nothing interesting about Randy.
Poor Randy wasn't even featured in the series finale, in favor of cameo appearances from
both Kutcher and Grace.
But for once, the show got it right: if you're gonna say goodbye, do it with the people you've
known and loved the longest.
"My God!
If my closet were like this I never would have come out of it."
Some shows try to save themselves with new characters or wacky plot twists.
According to the New York Post, Will & Grace was starting to fall apart by Season 6.
To cover for this, the show trotted out guest star after B-list guest star.
Will & Grace limped on for a couple more seasons before finally getting axed in 2006.
Amazingly, over ten years later, it was revived for two more seasons in 2017.
"Wait a minute, wait a minute.
What about Stan?
Is he still alive?
Am I still rich?
Answer the last one first."
Like That '70s Show, Two And A Half Men attempted
to survive losing its main characters, and ultimately failed miserably.
"Wanna know a sure-fire hangover cure?
Never stop drinking."
After Charlie Sheen called it quits, he was replaced by Ashton Kutcher.
But that's nothing compared to how they handled the departure of Angus Jones, who played the
half-man, Jake.
In the Season 11 premiere, we were introduced to Jenny:
"And you are?"
"Your niece."
"Your niece?
That's a pretty name, is that Dutch?"
"No, I'm Jenny.
I'm your brother Charlie's daughter."
And, as TV Guide put it, "the apple definitely doesn't fall far from the tree."
Charlie was a debauched alcoholic who slept with beautiful women.
And Jenny, was a debauched alcoholic who slept with beautiful women.
Sadly, Two and a Half Men went bye-bye, even obliterating a Charlie Sheen stand-in during
the finale.
Hey, if you're going to go out, go out swinging.
Just because a show jokingly admits to jumping
the shark doesn't mean it hasn't.
Case in point: The X-Files, in which an episode actually titled "Jump the Shark" proceeded
to do just that.
"Let's just say this case has a… distinct smell to it.
A certain paranormal bouquet."
The cracks were starting to show in X-Files by Season 9 in 2002.
It had lost David Duchovny, except for a handful of appearances, and had no real hope of recovering.
So, according to Salon, it did something truly unexpected: The Lone Gunmen, the show's popular
trio of conspiracy theorists and hackers, appeared for the first time since their spinoff
show, also called The Lone Gunmen, got canceled.
Fox celebrated their return by promptly killing them off, during an attempt to foil a bioterrorist's
plot.
This attention-grabbing move didn't help, and X-Files' ninth season became its last
until 2016, when it was revived for a six-episode tenth season.
"This is actually evidence of a parallel universe."
"Wait, what?"
For seven seasons, Roseanne was a super-realistic
smash hit portrayal of a typical middle-class, blue-collar family.
"She's really something."
"She thinks she knows everything."
"Well, I do."
Then came Season 8, when the show dropped out of the Top 10 for the first time since
it debuted, according to Uproxx.
With that ratings freefall (and Roseanne's fear of losing fame, according to New York
Magazine), came plot changes.
At the end of Season 8, John Goodman's character, Dan, has a heart attack.
That's pretty left-field, but it at least made sense.
But with Season 9, sensibility went right out the window.
Dan recovered from his heart attack, and the family won $108 million in the lottery.
This begat a season filled with wacky adventures.
But this departure proved unpopular with viewers, and the show ended on the laziest plot twist
ever: Season 9 was fictional.
Dan actually died of his heart attack, so Roseanne, the character, coped by writing
a book and inventing a bunch of weird stuff.
Fans will catch up with the Conner clan, including Dan, once again for 2018's Season 10 revival.
[Laughter]
Mork and Mindy was a huge success for its first couple seasons, but the old "wacky alien
doesn't fully get Earth" gimmick wore thin after a while.
According to io9, by the time Season 3 had wrapped, ABC was contemplating ending the
show outright.
They would only allow the series to continue if everything changed.
And so, Mork and Mindy got married and conceived a child.
But Mork got pregnant, not Mindy.
Also, he laid an egg that hatched Jonathan Winters as the pair's baby-man, with the explanation
being that Mork's race ages backward.
This visually amusing stunt worked well enough to get the show through a fourth season, but
after a year of old-baby shenanigans, ABC pulled the plug.
"I don't know how much value I have this universe, but I do know that I made a few people happier
than they would have been without me.
As long as I know that, I'm as rich as I ever need to be."
Cousin Oliver syndrome refers to anytime a
TV show tries to gain back lost viewers by adding a cute kid to the roster.
This rarely works and, in the case of The Brady Bunch's addition of Cousin Oliver, it
resulted in the show's rapid demise.
"Oh gee, I'm sorry I was just tryna help."
You can say the same thing for a less talked-about example of Cousin Oliver syndrome: Olivia
from The Cosby Show.
By Season 6, The Cosby Show was beginning to show its age.
Many of the show's children had long grown up, leaving it lacking youth and cuteness.
And so Olivia, Denise's 4-year-old stepdaughter, suddenly joined the fray.
"If you stop crying, I'll give you some ice cream."
"Vanilla?"
The show tried to extend its life by bowling people over with precociousness, but The Cosby
Show ended after Season 8.
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