Quote:
Originally Posted by droc31
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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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.