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Old 02-05-2019, 09:20 PM
 
384 posts, read 268,496 times
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This seems to be commonplace in today's TV world. Back 20-30 years ago, the only clues a show was ending was a week or two before the last episode when they'd flight spots advertising for the series finale. Often back then, the finales took the form of an hour special or two hour movie. Is it known more in advance when a series will not be renewed today than in years' past? Is this why they have these "The Final Season" promos like they're currently running for shows like The Big Bang Theory?
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Old 02-05-2019, 10:13 PM
 
Location: San Antonio, Tx
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That's the internet age for ya. In the past renewals/cancellations were done and casts were notified and that was it. Now when these things happen people automatically tweet whats going on.
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Old 02-07-2019, 11:58 PM
 
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Very true, back then the only clue that a show was facing cancellation was when it was moved from its traditional night and timeslot to Saturday nights or another off-peak time. It was also common back then to place a show was "on hiatus". That happened with the late 80s/early 90s ABC sitcom "Perfect Strangers". It was put on hold for nearly a year and a half before the series finale aired in August 1993. (though it was filmed almost a year prior). Same with Mr. Belvedere. The final episode aired in the summer of 1990 though it had been off the primetime schedule for well over a year. I recall the end for that series was promoted as a "lost episode". Other shows like Kate and Allie, Webster, Highway to Heaven, and Magnum PI fell victim to the 1988 television writers' strike, which coincidentally delayed the debuts of Roseanne, Murphy Brown, and Coach that autumn.
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Old 02-10-2019, 02:50 PM
 
Location: North America
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Quote:
Originally Posted by droc31 View Post
This seems to be commonplace in today's TV world. Back 20-30 years ago, the only clues a show was ending was a week or two before the last episode when they'd flight spots advertising for the series finale. Often back then, the finales took the form of an hour special or two hour movie. Is it known more in advance when a series will not be renewed today than in years' past? Is this why they have these "The Final Season" promos like they're currently running for shows like The Big Bang Theory?
A significant change is in the writing. In the past, more episodes of series were self-contained. In fact, almost all of them were. Look at the last few episodes preceding the respective finales of series like MASH, Cheers, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, many others. Those episodes for the most part could be randomly inserted anywhere into the series run and not present any continuity issues (save for cast changes). Now, story-arcs of varying lengths are the rule. So a series that is ending often will have a story-arc during the final season that is intended to conclude the series. Also, many series now are made toward a specific end, so the ending is simply the conclusion of an every-ongoing series-long arc.

These changes have resulted in endings that a presaged in the writing and thus in the marketing.
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