Shows you LIKED that lasted too long.

[FordSVT]

I don't recall seeing this topic recently, so in contrast to the thread about good shows that got cancelled too early, what is your favourite show or a show that you think was great that also happened to last too long? I don't mean shows that started with a good premise then went to crap right away, I'm looking for a bit more long term consistency.

I'll throw The Simpsons out there right away because I'm positive someone would mention it in the first three replies.

I nominate Everybody Loves Raymond. After about season five, it was "I Can't Stand Raymond". It was a fun and relatively smart sitcom at first, but grew very repetitive after a while. Yes, we know: women are smart, men are dumb and cranky. The glut of other shows like King of Queens that ripped it off probably didn't help. For some reason, more critical acclaim was heaped on it the longer it existed.

I also think TNG was pretty borderline, and would probably get a nod if they had bothered with an eighth season. Seven was spotty enough as is, the major saving grace being the excellent finale.

 

[Kryton]

Happy Days? I'm not exactly sure WHEN it was, but there was a point where it just wasn't worth the trouble to watch anymore.

 

[ialfan]

Family Guy - Has been pretty much crap since mid-season five.

Degrassi: The Next Generation - Has been crap since mid-season six. Should have ended after Season five when it was near the top of it's game.

 

[Orac Zen]

ER.

Like The Simpsons, should have ended at least five or six years ago.

 

[Aragorn]

Coach.

 

[Gary Mitchell]

Moonlighting lasted at least one season too long. They just weren't able to keep up the quality. The writer's strike and then Cybill Sheperd's pregnancy led to too many filler shows with Bert Viola and Agnes DiPesto. I thought the last season was pretty unmemorable.

 

[Goliath]

Homicide: Life on the Street lasted one season too long. The final season was far inferior to the ones that came before: the quality of writing just wasn't there, and neither was Pembleton. And besides featuring too many pretty new faces playing unmemorable new detectives, the final season made a hash out of Bayliss. It showed occasional flashes of its former brilliance, but mostly, it was pretty disappointing.

 

[Aragorn]

I want to say NYPD Blue, but that's not really right as it finished strong but had a rough middle -- mainly due to a coked-out writer who would deliver scripts at the last second or after filming had already begun. The uniqueness and rawness of the first few seasons had clearly become old hat by the end of the series, but the show had always been about the characters anyway more so than the cases.

 

[Atlas]

I still think that X-Files went on a bit too long. I was a big fan of the show, but once they started replacing the main characters, I lost interest very quickly. It probably could have ended after 7 years.

 

[alpha_leonis]

I feel almost sacreligious for saying so, but ...

M*A*S*H.

The bloody thing lasted 3 or 4 times longer than the war it was supposed to chronicle. What's more, only two or three of the main characters lasted all the way through the entire series.

 

[sidious618]

Stargate.

 

[cardinal biggles]

I want to say NYPD Blue, but that's not really right as it finished strong but had a rough middle -- mainly due to a coked-out writer who would deliver scripts at the last second or after filming had already begun. The uniqueness and rawness of the first few seasons had clearly become old hat by the end of the series, but the show had always been about the characters anyway more so than the cases.

Not that they didn't try to push the envelope in little ways here and there in the latter years (e.g. Charlotte Ross' full frontal nudity in a 10th season episode, and ABC deciding they could use the word "bullshit" once an episode during seasons 10 and 11).

But yeah, the way the show almost collapsed after Milch's exit... I guess it just shows that Milch was still a better writer strung out on booze and smack than a room full of sober guys. They did manage to pull it together for the final season, but the Milch years were the strongest.

I feel almost sacreligious for saying so, but ...

M*A*S*H.

The bloody thing lasted 3 or 4 times longer than the war it was supposed to chronicle. What's more, only two or three of the main characters lasted all the way through the entire series.

The later seasons have a low rewatchability factor for me. I guess having everyone yell at each other and all the serious episodes (which are only slightly less subtle than when classic Trek tried to do an overt "message" episode) wears thin. If I'm channel surfing and catch a rerun, I'll be more likely to stick around if it's an episode with Trapper, Frank, and Henry.

 

[TemporalFlux]

I really hate to say it, but I think Sliders is a fit for this category. As much as I fought for its life, I think in hindsight that Sliders should have ended after season two.

 

[Jax]

SG-1 - Only because the Ori storyline got cut short so it kinds of ruin the whole run and with changes it would of been better for a 4 season spinoff.

X-Files - Last two seasons were bad

 

[JNG]

I'll support the X-Files and Sliders answers. A common answer heard for this question is Seinfeld, but I enjoyed the final season of that show and would have been sorry if it had never existed.

 

[Brikar99]

I really hate to say it, but I think Sliders is a fit for this category. As much as I fought for its life, I think in hindsight that Sliders should have ended after season two.

I'll go for that, in the show's current form. But if the quality of the first two seasons had been maintained, I'd easily have taken that show as long as it would go.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

The X-Files, but it didn't really matter since I watched it on DVD and only watched the good episodes. There's no such thing as a show lasting too long, really. The only problem is when they get so wobbly in quality it's not worth watching them on a regular basis.

 

[Aragorn]

I felt like Doggett breathed new life into X-Files for season eight. The problem with season nine was trying to explain why Scully is around but Mulder isn't. If they had let them both go -- maybe come back and do guest spots here and there, including the finale -- the storytelling could've been stronger if they had focused on Doggett and Reyes.

 

[Hermiod]

Definitely agreed on The X-Files.

 

[wamdue]

Buffy went on too long, im not saying S6 & S7 were all a mistake) but had they combined the two seasons into one, looking back at it now, it might have worked better.

Smallville, unless it ends this season, or does something dramaticly different next season, will have gone on too long.