TMC
12-12-2019, 05:39 AM
That season was of course, the first post-Brenda/Shannen Doherty year. To put things into perspective, Season 4 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beverly_Hills,_90210_(season_4)#Ratings) averaged about 21.1 million viewers. Season 5 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beverly_Hills,_90210_(season_5)#Ratings) on the other hand, averaged about 14.7 million. It's naturally easy to suggest that the absence of Brenda (the second lead character after Brandon) was in no small part the reason for viewership dropping.
One theory that I've come across is that by late 1994 on through 1995, America was going through a cultural change. We were pretty much moving away from wanting to be materialistic (which was big part of the appeal in the first season or two) to being about grunge, being a hipster from Seattle, and alt. rock. When you get right down to it, 90210 was very much an '80s show in its attitude. In a effect, they basically took all those '80s movies about the spoiled rich kids having fun or the small town kid moving to paradise, and made a TV show out of it.
Another argument is that their college life was less interesting than their high school life, especially when you consider their target audience were teens, young adults. It didn't much help when the rest of the Walshes (including Brandon) left, considering that the show was initially about them being fishes out of water after moving from Minnesota to Beverly Hills. And it was around this time that the show pretty much becames a total soap opera like its sister show, Melrose Place.
One theory that I've come across is that by late 1994 on through 1995, America was going through a cultural change. We were pretty much moving away from wanting to be materialistic (which was big part of the appeal in the first season or two) to being about grunge, being a hipster from Seattle, and alt. rock. When you get right down to it, 90210 was very much an '80s show in its attitude. In a effect, they basically took all those '80s movies about the spoiled rich kids having fun or the small town kid moving to paradise, and made a TV show out of it.
Another argument is that their college life was less interesting than their high school life, especially when you consider their target audience were teens, young adults. It didn't much help when the rest of the Walshes (including Brandon) left, considering that the show was initially about them being fishes out of water after moving from Minnesota to Beverly Hills. And it was around this time that the show pretty much becames a total soap opera like its sister show, Melrose Place.