These Shows Have Really Lost It...

[WolfCypher]

Nothing good lasts forever, although with some TV shows, they'll either overstay their welcome or end with a horrible death. What are some past or current TV shows that were absolute favorites of yours, but are currently, or during their run, terrible and unwatchable for you?

King of the Hill was for the longest my favorite non-cable animated show on television. I loved the slow pacing of the show, and the great, never over-the-top humor. Very few shows can progress at a snails pace and keep you entertained like this show. It felt as real as a so-called "Simpsons clone" could be. The characters were all great! Dale was clearly my favorite, with Mihn and Khan being close seconds, and Peggy's high self-esteem and constant misinformation always had me rolling! But the past handful of years have been horrible. The show rarely utilizes al the characters anymore, using the likes of Bill, Dale, and Boomhauer more as props than characters, Joseph's role has been limited to random brief cameos, Peggy and Bobby usually get no farther than the lesser B-side plot of the episode when all these characters would frequently be the focus of their own episodes, and quite frankly, the show isn't funny. But the slow pacing is still there.

Mad TV always had one thing over SNL for years...risque, non-PC jokes.This sketch show took major risks, and the results were always funny. I still have fond memories of some of my favorite sketches. There was one year where they had the perfect cast and the right writers. And it seemed like every season afterwards a pivital cast member and/or an important writer would either leave or get fired. Eventually we got the newer cast members and a cast of writers as terrible as the Family Guy guys...I swear to God I couldn't understand why people still loved this show. I was not surprised at all when I heard of the show's rating drops, and eventually the cancellation came. A great show with many great years that got butchered at its final years.

South Park was at its best when their episodes were spontaneous and random. They used to do episodes about a man making love to chickens to force illiterate people to learn to read, and episodes where a South American rainforest would try to kill the cast. Now the writers are content with just doing an episode on whatever is current on the 5 o'clock news. Let's say a celebrity is outed as a homosexual tomorrow. You can believe there will be an unfunny episode on that. Or if a new movie hits world record sales in theaters...yep, SP will spoof that, in a failed attempt at humor. If Barrack Obama were to have an affair, I'm pretty sure in a week's time SP will be all over it. Did we REALLY need that Dead Celebrities episode so soon after their deaths? Plus, of course, it was not funny. It seemed the episodes were at their highest point when they were original. Even when we do get the (now very rare) "random plot" I just don't see any effort in the show trying to be good. I can't bring myself to sit through nother new episode cause I know there will be no laughter coming from me.

 

[Mace Dolex]

I don't know whether it's the creators of South Park's intent on spoofing current pop culture referrences because most of those jokes won't make sense 10 years from now.

 

[Milu]

I believe Mad TV was at its best during the time Will Sasso, Aeries Spears, Nicole Sullivan, and Debra Wilson were on. When they started to leave, the show gradually went down the toilet in terms of quality.

Frank Caliendo was a saving grace with his impressions, but he left not even before the show was cancelled, didn't he?

 

[Darthkush]

Great idea for a thread. Surprised there's not more posts on it.

mine:

(Cancelled already stuff)

Alias-Talk about a show that started very strong, ending on a whimper. Amazing setup during the first season that(potentially) could've been done for the whole run of the series....but wasn't. Season 2 was even stronger because it took that premise and gave us something that we thought wouldn't happen until the final season. VERY good stuff. Season 3, while not the best, was still a good season as the new wife for Vaughn was a great actress and created great tension. Even Sloane being somewhat of a good guy was slightly interesting in season 3(slightly). Then season 4 came and things went to hell. Sydney's sister Nadia wasn't a bad idea but season 4 had a lot of nonsensical, boring, plots that had no effect on the characters whatsoever. Another problem was that the show's brilliant villains for the first 2 seasons(the triumverte of Arvin Sloane, Irena Derevtko, and Sark) were all reduced to guest spots(Derevtko. thought that's more about an actress/salary conflict than anything else), Sark(Guest villain), or the worst of all, turning a bad guy good...unconvincingly(Sloane). And things kept getting worse. Vaughn as it turned out...wasn't really VAughn(or something) and then he dies...but not really. And Sloane and Irina want to turn everybody into vampires or something. The show just kept taking wrong turns at the end and didn't know what it wanted to be anymore. There were some bright spots(Amy Acker did decent guest work and Djimoun Hounsou was a good enough villain who coul've been better with a better script here and there) but after season 3 it was constantly downhill.


Still on but need to be cancelled:

Heroes-I didn't even feel like going into Heroes. I've seen the "why" for this one on a jillion other sites. Unlike a lot of other fans, I don't think Samuel and his plans are some grand return to form for this series. It's simply out of steam. It's had like 6 plot twists and fake deaths too many for you to take any event seriously. It needs to go. It's not unwatchable(yet) but it's getting harder and harder to sit through.

The Simpsons-First 8 seasons are solid gold, season 9-10 are good(not great), and 11-12 are good enough. Then it's like a non-stop train of crap with the occasional kernal of fun. I'm not gonna say I've never seen a good episode after season 12 but...i don't remember them. I can think of maybe 2 off the top of my head(the one where Moe fell in love with a little person and the recent "Princess Penelope" episode) that I thought were worthy of, I don't know, maybe season 11 quality. They're just completely out of good ideas in my book. I thought the Simpsons movie was good for what it was but the whole thing felt like an extreme effort to make it not as crappy as the past several seasons. The only reason it was as good as it was is because they brought back every "Good" writer from the old seasons to make it worthwhile. It should've been the series finale. But instead we're treated to just more of the same every year. It needs to end. It shouldn't go on forever.

Smallville-judging by the comments I see on other sites and this one, I maybe in a minority on this one but I think the show needs to end. Or evolve and be something else. But seeing Tom Welling in his, what, mid-30's STILL not as Superman is ridiculous. It's almost like the producers know this but to keep us watching they're throwing crazy nerd crap at us to keep us watching. "Hey nerds, you guys want to see Hawkman and Dr. Fate and Zatanna, etc. in live action? BAM! THERE YA GO! now keep on a watching". The guy playing Green Arrow is a bad actor and Erica Durance as Lois Lane is merely passable. Yes, she's pretty but her delivery ain't great. Allison Mack comes off like she's just here for the check at this point. I sense no passion behind her work anymore. I miss the Luthors. I really do. Michael Rosenbaum was amazing as Lex and the show is simply lacking without him for me. I'm not saying he needs to be on every episode but he's definitely missed. And that b.s. stunt double they used for him during season 8 was just stupid. Why kill him off without even using the real actor? Garbage. Don't even get me started on Clark facing his near entire rogue's gallery before even wearing the cape(including Zod...TWICE somehow). Smallville isn't terrible but it's way past it's prime. Unless it fully embraces itself as a Superman: the series or something, it just feels like it's been on too long for no reason other than easy money for CW.

Nip/Tuck: One of my favorite shows of the moment is really dying a slow death right now. I loved the first two seasons of the show and have been really fond of the entire run really until the recent(final 9 episodes) started airing this month. Sean starts poking Kimber because....why? I mean i know why but...WHY? This is what they've come up for the final arc of the entire show? THAT'S IT? I'm not saying they need to base the whole thing on the whole Christian/Sean/Julia triangle because honestly that's been done to death(and it ended up utterly consuming Dawson's Creek from it's third season to it's finale so I know it can f**k up a show badly) but I'd like more closure for every other weird character/incident on the show. What we're getting just feels like some random subplot stretched out for several episodes. Still an handful more to prove me wrong but i'm not liking the past few episodes.

Family Guy: Is just out of steam. It's become formulaic to the extreme. I saw an episode that aired a few weeks back where Peter and Lois broke up because Peter had amnesia or something and it just felt like i'd seen this episode 4x already and...it was new! While American Dad isn't the second coming, it is at least TRYING(did anybody see that episode before Christmas where the rapture came and Stan became a bounty hunter for God and Francine became God's wife? It was funny, it was different and it TRIED. I will never understand why people seem to hate American Dad as much as they do. I think it's the only Seth Mcfarlane show that gives a damn).

The Cleveland Show: I'm losing my patience with it. It's just not very funny. I thought the Thanksgiving episode was brilliant(which is why i've given it another chance) but i'm not sure how much longer I can hold on.

I watch a LOT of tv(mostly on my DVR) so I could do this all day if I didn't work or have a girlfriend lol.

 

[Mace Dolex]

The Simpsons - should have been cancelled years ago when it was still in it's prime, now with over 450 episodes it's kind of hard to make a top-10 favorites list.

The Cleveland Show - it's ok at times but still hasn't reached the level of Family Guy greatness, the only reason it's on is because of it's choice timeslot.

 

[chaseter]

King of the Hill is off the air but the thread creator talks like it is still going???

 

[wiegeabo]

This is hard because I stop watching shows when I no longer like them. So it's hard to talk about how they've fallen apart because I've stopped watching. And there are plenty of shows that I wish would go off the air, but since I don't watch them, it's not really fair for me to call them out.


Quick word on Smallville:
Tom Welling might be 32 or 33, but Clark is 24ish (he was a high school freshman first season). Even in the comics Clark didn't become Superman until he was 25. And I think Erica is a dead-on Lois. Smallville's problem isn't Clark not wearing the cape, it's that it fell apart in seasons 5-7 with weak storylines. It started becoming solid again the last two years (other than the laskluster finale to the Doomsday story). I know the producers all those years ago originally said we'd never see Tom in the tights, but that was when they thought it would only run about 5 seasons. Then they said it'd be the last shot we'd see, and I wouldn't mind if that's how the show, or at least season 9, ended. But, unless it does become a Superman show, season 10 better be the last.


CSI: Miami
This still rates on my guilty pleasure-o-meter. And Horatio Caine is equal parts awesome and ridiculous. But this show is the weakest of the trio. It tries to be overly dramatic, and tends to be very over, or under, acted. And all the computer and lab stuff is so over the top it's nearly cringe worthy at times. Oddly enough, at one time, it was the number one US show outside of the US. And while I don't mind it going on, I won't miss it if it's gone.

Saturday Night Live
When was the last time this show was really good? Other than the occasional skit or breakout star, it's probably at least been a decade since SNL was truly funny. And likely longer than that.

Monk (already off)
This is a weird one. I pretty much stopped watching Monk for a couple of seasons because it became very repetitive, and it felt like the writers got lazy. The show became more about Monk's phobias and OCD's than how he solved mysteries despite his quirks. Basically, it felt like the mysteries became the B plot, while Monk's quirks became the A plot, instead of the other way around. And the mysteries became rather lame. Admittedly, I did watch the last season, and was rather happy with it. The show stepped it up a notch. And by the last episode, I was sort of hoping it wasn't going off the air. But I'm glad it did because it was a very satisfying ending.

Nip/Tuck
Gotta agree here. I watched the first season and loved it. The second season was alright. But I was done with it after that. And from what I've seen, it's just become more ridiculous each year.

 

[Darthkush]

This is hard because I stop watching shows when I no longer like them. So it's hard to talk about how they've fallen apart because I've stopped watching. And there are plenty of shows that I wish would go off the air, but since I don't watch them, it's not really fair for me to call them out.


Quick word on Smallville:
Tom Welling might be 32 or 33, but Clark is 24ish (he was a high school freshman first season). Even in the comics Clark didn't become Superman until he was 25. And I think Erica is a dead-on Lois. Smallville's problem isn't Clark not wearing the cape, it's that it fell apart in seasons 5-7 with weak storylines. It started becoming solid again the last two years (other than the laskluster finale to the Doomsday story). I know the producers all those years ago originally said we'd never see Tom in the tights, but that was when they thought it would only run about 5 seasons. Then they said it'd be the last shot we'd see, and I wouldn't mind if that's how the show, or at least season 9, ended. But, unless it does become a Superman show, season 10 better be the last.


CSI: Miami
This still rates on my guilty pleasure-o-meter. And Horatio Caine is equal parts awesome and ridiculous. But this show is the weakest of the trio. It tries to be overly dramatic, and tends to be very over, or under, acted. And all the computer and lab stuff is so over the top it's nearly cringe worthy at times. Oddly enough, at one time, it was the number one US show outside of the US. And while I don't mind it going on, I won't miss it if it's gone.

Saturday Night Live
When was the last time this show was really good? Other than the occasional skit or breakout star, it's probably at least been a decade since SNL was truly funny. And likely longer than that.

Monk (already off)
This is a weird one. I pretty much stopped watching Monk for a couple of seasons because it became very repetitive, and it felt like the writers got lazy. The show became more about Monk's phobias and OCD's than how he solved mysteries despite his quirks. Basically, it felt like the mysteries became the B plot, while Monk's quirks became the A plot, instead of the other way around. And the mysteries became rather lame. Admittedly, I did watch the last season, and was rather happy with it. The show stepped it up a notch. And by the last episode, I was sort of hoping it wasn't going off the air. But I'm glad it did because it was a very satisfying ending.

Nip/Tuck
Gotta agree here. I watched the first season and loved it. The second season was alright. But I was done with it after that. And from what I've seen, it's just become more ridiculous each year.

Heh. It's funny. My fave seasons of smallville are 5-7. I don't think anything can be worse than seasons 3-4(especially 4). I thought it was silly for Lex to marry Lana but I thought it was written and performed well.

I'm glad someone finally brought up SNL. Agree that it's been about a decade since SNL has been good. Madtv was worse though. Season 1 was fantastic but after the mediocre seasons 2-3 it just turned to absolute garbage.

 

[wiegeabo]

I watched MadTV for several years. When the original cast started moving on, the quality went way down. I probably stuck with it for a year or two too long.