Padding Your Show Until You Come Up With New Ideas

Take "Lost" for example. Season 3 was divided into two halves, with a long hiatus in the middle. The first half, especially, felt padded. Once the show landed in the realm of the Others, it began treading water like crazy. It seemed like every time you looked at the screen, Sawyer (Josh Holloway)and/or Kate (Evangeline Lilly) were gripping the bars of an abandoned zoo where they were held prisoner by the Others, while Jack (Matthew Fox) was pacing back and forth behind a glass walled cell. No doubt the writers were desperately trying to re-rail the show, which eventually led them to kill off one of the more popular characters (Mr. Eko). Jack's questions only yielded cryptic answers from Others leaders Ben (Michael Emerson) and Juliet (Elizabeth Mitchell), though eventually something happened: Sawyer and Kate made their escape; the second half of the season then showed some improvement, with Desmond (Henry Ian Cusick) coming to be one of the most interesting characters (the ping pong match in episode 10 over Sawyer's nicknames was especially funny and self-referential). Promisingly, ABC recently announced that "Lost" would air three more seasons of 16 episodes each, which should make for a tighter show. Producer Damon Lindelof admitted to one news outlet that it's "like we've been running a marathon and we actually know where the finish line is for the first time."

Sometimes a show's downturn comes from a lack of quality content: "American Idol" is a victim of this. The talent contest is in a vulnerable position. It relies on finding both interesting (if odd) people and legitimately good singers. That many of its contestants have gone on to great popularity -- even those kicked off the show -- is testimony to AI's perceptiveness. But the presence, in its sixth season, of that walking Bad Hair Day, Sanjaya, is an ill harbinger: a sign that maybe America is running out of talented amateur singers and that, maybe, audiences are finally wearying of AI's hollow pizzazz and long, drawn out competitions (also suggested by the campaign to vote Sanjaya up to the top slot and spearheaded by Howard Stern and others). The show remains a ratings demon, but there are grumblings among fans about its decline.

"24" started out quite strong in its sixth "day" (Read: season), raising the disaster bar by allowing a nuclear bomb to go off in Los Angeles. But as the season progressed, it became a victim of too much information. Subplots were piled upon secondary characters, many of whom vanished either for "hours" (Read: episodes) or forever. Soon, "24" got bogged down in an intricate series of power plays within an executive branch-in-hiding. Powers Booth, as the vice president, engaged the president in a repetitious dance of power jockeying, while Jayne Atkinson's National Security Advisor and Peter MacNicol's Chief of Staff also vied for the president's ear over long, unproductive hours. Fortunately, as the season grows to a close, "24" has upped the action, though it remains to be seen what stakes the creators can raise for the next "day."

Another show killer is the changing of the guard. The recently
canceled "Gilmore Girls" is an example of this. Amy Sherman-Palladino created this program for the WB, the network that evolved into the CW, which just canceled it after a seventh season. However, Sherman-Palladino left the show in early 2006. Other shows have survived the loss of a creator, but "Gilmore Girls," which fans felt was already going downhill, got bogged down in the new regime's uninspired marriage of Lorelai Gilmore (Lauren Graham) to the elusive father of her daughter, Rory (Alexis Bledel). The show grew a little colder and the repartee between mother and daughter, the heart of the "Gilmore Girls," was compromised by the fact that they had to communicate mostly via phone, since Rory was now at Yale.

Take "Law & Order: Criminal Intent," the spinoff now completing its sixth season. (NBC announced the show would air first on sister network USA next season, and then on NBC -- which is the opposite of the current relationship.) Sometime between the fourth and fifth season, either NBC, or the show's official creator, Dick Wolf, decided that the program needed some first aid. (Apparently, lead Vincent D'Onofrio needed an easier workload.) To that end, Wolf hauled out of mothballs Mr. Big himself -- the enormously popular character, Mike Logan -- played by the enormously popular Chris Noth. In 1995, the original "Law & Order" wrote Logan out of the series because Noth had some disputes with the staff. But by adding Noth and his succession of partners (first Annabella Sciorra, then Julianne Nicholson), Wolf radically changed the nature of the show -- from a very clever modernization of the Sherlock Holmes template (with those marvelous pre-credit teasers) back to the traditional L&O crime stories. These days, L&O: CI rips its stories from the headlines, just like its progenitor.

Finally, the worst sin a show can commit is forgetting why people liked it. That's the crisis of "Veronica Mars." Arguably the show with the most heartbreaking decline, "Veronica Mars" started out as a kind of Nancy Drew meets "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," yet one that revolved around the charming and surprisingly clever interplay between Veronica and her dad. From the get-go of its third season, you knew, from its new credit sequence and new version of The Dandy Warhols theme song, that "Veronica Mars" was lost. In addition, the short story-arcs -- designed to lure in viewers either perplexed or put off by season-long stories -- eradicated the multilayered intricacy of Veronica's social world and the politics of her city, Neptune. And the retooling of the cult favorite brought on the worst case scenario of them all ... The CW decided against renewing "Veronica Mars" for a fourth season. .

All those are very good reasons. I think the biggest one is when the network steps in and doesn't leave well enough alone. :mad:

Another show killer is the changing of the guard. The recently
canceled "Gilmore Girls" is an example of this. Amy Sherman-Palladino created this program for the WB, the network that evolved into the CW, which just canceled it after a seventh season. However, Sherman-Palladino left the show in early 2006. Other shows have survived the loss of a creator, but "Gilmore Girls," which fans felt was already going downhill, got bogged down in the new regime's uninspired marriage of Lorelai Gilmore (Lauren Graham) to the elusive father of her daughter, Rory (Alexis Bledel). The show grew a little colder and the repartee between mother and daughter, the heart of the "Gilmore Girls," was compromised by the fact that they had to communicate mostly via phone, since Rory was now at Yale.

Very true about Gilmore Girls. :(

It may be one of my top favorite shows,but I believe One Tree Hill should've had its series finale next week where both Haley & Karen have their baby.Actually I believe Haley will go into Labor during graduation

The info on "Lost" forgot to mention HAVING TOO LONG A HIATUS! This occurred with Prison Break and frankly, I lost interest. I was into Lost the first time around, as was my boyfriend. I was into Prison Break. These two shows both lost me as a viewer with their long hiatus'. Like I said before, I sure do miss a "new season" that began in September and stayed on til at least March with no interruptions! A season used to have at least 20 episodes. Not anymore.

really interesting reasons you have cited on here

1) PADDING YOUR SHOW UNTIL YOU COME UP WITH NEW IDEAS
2) LACK OF QUALITY CONTENT
3) TOO MUCH INFO
4) CHANGING OF THE GUARD
5) DESPERATION FOR RATINGS
6) FORGETTING WHY PEOPLE LIKED IT

but adding to your list are: absurd storylines, cast changes to the extent to which it affects the impact of the show, when it becomes less serious or funnier- depending on whether it is a drama or a sitcom, getting rid of settings and locations and characters which made it worth watching in the first place

Throughout the first 8 episodes of Lost's third season, I thought the producers had pretty much lost their way. Pointless episodes and a story arc that centered around who Kate would choose to shack with had me thinking the show was about to jump the shark. A long break cost them a lot of viewers, but all this was offset by what I thought was a truly well-done series of episodes at the end of the season, culminating with the season finale. What I'm wondering is, will the show survive a layoff of 8 months? I don't really think Lost has "lost" it yet, but a lot of questions remain as to whether the show can hold on another 3 years.