I've heard the suggestion that Kirk Cameron (https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/archive/index.php/t-13812.html) was more or less, the primary reason why Growing Pains ended (https://www.quora.com/Did-Growing-Pains-end-in-1992-after-seven-seasons-due-to-Kirk-Cameron-becoming-too-difficult-to-work-with) after seven seasons in 1992. I think that everybody by now knows, that after he became a Born-Again Christian, he became incredibly difficult and uncompressing/uncooperative on set (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Trivia/GrowingPains).

He got his on-screen girlfriend Julie McCollough (https://screenrant.com/biggest-feuds-actors-behind-the-scenes-ruined-tv-shows/) fired (https://www.fame10.com/entertainment/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-growing-pains/) because she was featured in Playboy, despite not even appearing topless at all. He (http://www.gossiprocks.com/forum/latest-gossip/kirk-cameron-tells-women-their-role-focus-home-family-joy-page4-241281.html) also got (https://www.pajiba.com/seriously_random_lists/mindhole-blowers-20-facts-about-kirk-cameron-that-might-give-you-seaver-fever.php) Matthew Perry (https://growing-pains.fandom.com/wiki/Sandy) fired (https://www.nickiswift.com/77659/whatever-happened-kirk-cameron/) for being an "Agent of Satan".

He apparently even tried to pull the same stunt with the show's executive producers because he didn't agree to what he considered a vulgar joke. Since the executives refused to change the joke, Kirk tried to go over their heads and directly contacted (http://flipthemoviescript.com/the-things-kirk-cameron-pulled-on-the-growing-pains-show/) then-CEO of ABC Bob Iger in order to force their hand, even calling (https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:wXl71KAH7sAJ:https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/os-xpm-2001-08-19-0108150404-story.html+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us) the executive producers "Pornographers".

Ultimately, having to deal with his unreasonable demands and his forcing out other actors for not going his way, the executive producers decided (http://popcultureaddictlifeguide.blogspot.com/2014/01/kirk-camerons-growing-pain.html) that enough was enough. If you notice, in the last season, Dan Wilcox (https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:CbOAn6xOposJ:https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-04-25-ca-920-story.html+&cd=19&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us) is listed as the executive producer instead of Mike Sullivan, Steve Marshall, and Dan Guntzelman.

Yeah I think he definitely had a role in tanking the show since he wanted Mike to be more honest and moral. The whole show is based on Mike being a bad boy, it's why girls in my class went nuts for him!

The other problem though, by 1991 80s sitcoms were starting to look really lame and cheesy compared to edgier 90s shows/humor.

Yeah. Kirk Cameron WAS and IS an "unprintable".

Yeah I think he definitely had a role in tanking the show since he wanted Mike to be more honest and moral. The whole show is based on Mike being a bad boy, it's why girls in my class went nuts for him!

The other problem though, by 1991 80s sitcoms were starting to look really lame and cheesy compared to edgier 90s shows/humor.

I recently read this Nicki Swift article (https://www.nickiswift.com/354048/jeremy-miller-why-the-growing-pains-star-never-made-it-big/) about why Jeremy Miller didn't do more high profile acting work besides Growing Pains and it stated that GP was in many ways, the definitive '80s family sitcom. It utilized that familiar formula of the era, which mixed equal parts corniness, sarcasm, and treacly sentimentality. Tastes however, naturally change over time and when GP went off the air in 1992, it was regarded as past its prime and really passé.

I don't think Growing Pains could have continued for much longer. Kirk Cameron had already established a bad reputation with his on-set antics, and Tracey Gold was recovering from anorexia. They liely couldn't base the show around just Ben and Chrissy.

I don't think Growing Pains could have continued for much longer. Kirk Cameron had already established a bad reputation with his on-set antics, and Tracey Gold was recovering from anorexia. They liely couldn't base the show around just Ben and Chrissy.

Yeah it's strange how they all ended around the same time (Growing Pains, Cosby Show, Who's the boss...), but I guess that was a sign of the times!

It seems like family sitcoms died out after that unless they were something like Family Matters, where you had whacky antics like Urkel Robots by season 3. Any family sitcom at the time was either something outrageous (Married with children) or something over the top wholesome (7th Heaven, etc.)

It wasn't until Everybody Loves Raymond where there was a really HUGE family sitcom taking off. Even then, after a few episodes it wasn't like those 80s sitcoms with a static setup/delivery/payoff setup.

It always seemed like they wanted to do the opposite of what an 80s sitcom would do with the ending. Like when Ray rips up his superbowl tickets after his wife complains they aren't spending any time together. In an 80s sitcom she would cherish how much he loves her, but instead she gets angry because "Now I"ll always be known as the evil wife who stopped you from going to the SuperBowl"

Step by Step was a good family comedy without being syrupy or raunchy.

Step by Step was a good family comedy without being syrupy or raunchy.

True, but it wasn't an "across the board" hit like Growing Pains, Cosby Show, Who's the boss etc.

I watched it every Friday as a kid/teen, but even my older brothers rolled their eyes at it and thought it was lame. My parents wouldn't even have a show like that on their radar.

True, but it wasn't an "across the board" hit like Growing Pains, Cosby Show, Who's the boss etc.

I watched it every Friday as a kid/teen, but even my older brothers rolled their eyes at it and thought it was lame. My parents wouldn't even have a show like that on their radar.

What's ironic is that Step by Step was produced by Miller-Boyett, who were likely the biggest purveyors of syrupy family comedies of the the era. They did produce Full House after-all.

Yeah I think he definitely had a role in tanking the show since he wanted Mike to be more honest and moral. The whole show is based on Mike being a bad boy, it's why girls in my class went nuts for him!

The other problem though, by 1991 80s sitcoms were starting to look really lame and cheesy compared to edgier 90s shows/humor.

I always felt that the arrivals of Married...with Children (https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/16cdae/til_that_married_withchildren_was_a_reactionary/), Roseanne (https://omigods.com/late-80s-tv-shows), and The Simpsons (https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/showthread.php?t=408535) (which came out in 1987, '88, and '89 (https://www.nytimes.com/1995/12/03/arts/television-dysfunction-wears-out-its-welcome.html) respectively) were the beginning of the end (https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/showthread.php?t=408535) of of the '80s style sitcom. If you want to use a music analogy, you could argue that they were like Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and the ensuing grudge movement out of Seattle. And shows (https://www.nytimes.com/1997/05/05/business/wave-goodbye-to-the-bundys-blue-collar-champions-of-the-fox-network.html) like Growing Pains, Family Ties (https://jacksonupperco.com/2021/12/29/the-ten-best-family-ties-episodes-of-season-seven/), The Cosby Show (http://www.thetvratingsguide.com/2017/07/1991-92-sitcom-scorecard-mid-80s.html), etc. were that era (https://www.jstor.org/stable/41602146) of television's equivalent to hair metal bands.

Kirk Cameron being let go if there had been a 1993 season would have been the right move given his nutty behavior, but Ashley Johnson (Christine/Chrissy) was only 9 and would be the only female main cast member left other than Kerns as Gold was having a battle with anorexia and would be gone too. That is a lot of pressure to put on a little lady like Ashley!

Kirk Cameron being let go if there had been a 1993 season would have been the right move given his nutty behavior, but Ashley Johnson (Christine/Chrissy) was only 9 and would be the only female main cast member left other than Kerns as Gold was having a battle with anorexia and would be gone too. That is a lot of pressure to put on a little lady like Ashley!

Also rather than let her be a unique character, they instead thought "why don't we mix orphan Annie with Michele from Full House?" and it just didn't work. That's not a dig at Ashley herself, she was great in What Women Want, but the writing/direction for her character was just soooo bad.

Also rather than let her be a unique character, they instead thought "why don't we mix orphan Annie with Michele from Full House?" and it just didn't work. That's not a dig at Ashley herself, she was great in What Women Want, but the writing/direction for her character was just soooo bad.

Granted, I haven't had a chance or gotten around to see (https://web.archive.org/web/20140402220152/http://forums.televisionwithoutpity.com/topic/2851490-growing-pains/?view=getnewpost) Growing Pains (https://web.archive.org/web/20061031124412/http://www.jumptheshark.com/g/growingpains.htm) too much lately, since it doesn't seem to come on TV too much anymore. But from what I can remember and recall, Ashley Johnson as Chrissy Seaver was another one of those "child stars" from back in the day who were precocious to the point of being irritating and had an arsenal of rehearsed "cute" lines to dish out at appropriate times. It wasn't just her but also for example (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CousinOliver), the Olsen twins on Full House (https://web.archive.org/web/20140411163647/http://forums.televisionwithoutpity.com/topic/1823519-full-house/page-30#entry1522454), Andrew Keaton on Family Ties, Sam in the later seasons of Diff'rent Strokes, and Raven-Symone on The Cosby Show.

Also rather than let her be a unique character, they instead thought "why don't we mix orphan Annie with Michele from Full House?" and it just didn't work. That's not a dig at Ashley herself, she was great in What Women Want, but the writing/direction for her character was just soooo bad.

It was like they were trying to make her into Shirley Temple.

Yet another thread bashing Kirk Cameron. :horse: Again, it is a lie his haters made up about him getting Julie fired, that was solely the producers' decision. :rolleyes: And no, Growing Pains had run its course after 7 seasons just like Family Ties had run its course after 7 seasons. I don't see you starting a could Family Ties have continued without Michael J. Fox thread, just another excuse to bash a Christian actor you hate. :rolleyes:

People bash him for his hurtful, cruel and nutty behaviour which has little to do with the real Jesus.

Growing Pains hadn’t “run its Course” as there were full plans in 1992 to let Cameron go and start a sort of “Taggart” in that the title is still Growing Pains but it would be rebuilt around Luke, Ben and Chrissy.

Yeah right, there wouldn't have been plans to continue the show. ABC knew this would be the last season when they moved it to Saturdays along with the final season of Who's the Boss? Jeremy Miller's acting had gotten a lot worse in later seasons and Chrissy was never a good actress, a show centered around them would have been a disaster. And Leo wouldn't have wanted to continue with becoming a movie star. Growing Pains had run its course, exact number of seasons Family Ties got.

I don't think another season would have been feasible simply because the math doesn't work out to support it. Ratings had started to slip in the latter seasons, In season 5 (1989-1990), the series placed #21 for the season and netted 15.4 million viewers on average; by season 7 (1991-1992) it had slipped to #75 for the season and netted only 8.7 million viewers. On top of that, ABC likely would have had to renegotiate some of the cast contracts to somehow compensate for Kirk's newly aggressive/domineering behavior and to make up for Tracey Gold's likely continued absences to treat her health issues.

Plus by 1993-1994, there was a noticeable shift in the tone and format of many sitcoms, which moved away from the "Growing Pains" family friendly formula and towards the more edgy sitcoms like "Living Single" which debuted on Fox that season, or sophisticated sitcoms like "Frasier" that debuted on NBC that season. And by Fall of 1994, sitcoms like "Friends" would come to dominate the TV landscape; leaving "family friendly" sitcoms regulated to a smaller piece of the TV landscape, most notably on ABC's TGIF block of friday programming.

I don't think another season would have been feasible simply because the math doesn't work out to support it. Ratings had started to slip in the latter seasons, In season 5 (1989-1990), the series placed #21 for the season and netted 15.4 million viewers on average; by season 7 (1991-1992) it had slipped to #75 for the season and netted only 8.7 million viewers. On top of that, ABC likely would have had to renegotiate some of the cast contracts to somehow compensate for Kirk's newly aggressive/domineering behavior and to make up for Tracey Gold's likely continued absences to treat her health issues.

Plus by 1993-1994, there was a noticeable shift in the tone and format of many sitcoms, which moved away from the "Growing Pains" family friendly formula and towards the more edgy sitcoms like "Living Single" which debuted on Fox that season, or sophisticated sitcoms like "Frasier" that debuted on NBC that season. And by Fall of 1994, sitcoms like "Friends" would come to dominate the TV landscape; leaving "family friendly" sitcoms regulated to a smaller piece of the TV landscape, most notably on ABC's TGIF block of friday programming.

Yeah, I just don't see how the could have continued the show when it had already dropped to #75.

The decision to cancel only came in the mid season break. At the beginning of the season, the production office was still hoping to salvage the show and rebuild it around DiCaprio. I never said it would work but it a fact they wished to try.

Yet another thread bashing Kirk Cameron. :horse: Again, it is a lie his haters made up about him getting Julie fired, that was solely the producers' decision. :rolleyes: And no, Growing Pains had run its course after 7 seasons just like Family Ties had run its course after 7 seasons. I don't see you starting a could Family Ties have continued without Michael J. Fox thread, just another excuse to bash a Christian actor you hate. :rolleyes:

Michael J. Fox by most accounts, was a team player (even during the height of his notoriety with Back to the Future) unlike Kirk Cameron (https://www.looper.com/390042/the-actor-whose-career-tanked-after-growing-pains-ended/) in the later years of Growing Pains. In other words, there aren't too many stories (https://www.usmagazine.com/entertainment/pictures/biggest-costar-feuds-and-fights-ever-w207187/growing-pains-julie-mccullough-vs-kirk-cameron-w207200/) surrounding MJF being uncooperative (https://www.pajiba.com/seriously_random_lists/mindhole-blowers-20-facts-about-kirk-cameron-that-might-give-you-seaver-fever.php) and only in it for himself during the production of Family Ties, when compared to Kirk (https://www.nickiswift.com/77659/whatever-happened-kirk-cameron/) and Growing Pains.

Yeah, I just don't see how the could have continued the show when it had already dropped to #75.

Well, we also have to keep in mind that ABC (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/ScrewedByTheNetwork/AmericanBroadcastingCorporationLiveActionShows) moved the show (http://www.tvtango.com/series/growing_pains_1985) from its long time Tuesday night slot to Saturday nights. While Saturday nights weren't exactly considered an all out death slot (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FridayNightDeathSlot) like today (https://www.today.com/popculture/network-tv-abandons-saturday-night-wbna9720316), it was still a tremendous fall from grace. Really, the last big Saturday night prime-time network show that I can think of, was The Golden Girls (https://www.nytimes.com/1985/09/14/arts/from-nbc-two-new-saturday-nights-sitcoms.html), which incidentally, also went off the air in the same season.

I don't think another season would have been feasible simply because the math doesn't work out to support it. Ratings had started to slip in the latter seasons, In season 5 (1989-1990), the series placed #21 for the season and netted 15.4 million viewers on average; by season 7 (1991-1992) it had slipped to #75 for the season and netted only 8.7 million viewers. On top of that, ABC likely would have had to renegotiate some of the cast contracts to somehow compensate for Kirk's newly aggressive/domineering behavior and to make up for Tracey Gold's likely continued absences to treat her health issues.

Plus by 1993-1994, there was a noticeable shift in the tone and format of many sitcoms, which moved away from the "Growing Pains" family friendly formula and towards the more edgy sitcoms like "Living Single" which debuted on Fox that season, or sophisticated sitcoms like "Frasier" that debuted on NBC that season. And by Fall of 1994, sitcoms like "Friends" would come to dominate the TV landscape; leaving "family friendly" sitcoms regulated to a smaller piece of the TV landscape, most notably on ABC's TGIF block of friday programming.

I've said numerous times that the shift may have started when sitcoms like Married...with Children, Roseanne, and The Simpsons came on the scene by the end of the '80s. Even though they were also domestic sitcoms/shows about nuclear families, they were decidedly more biting, gritty, cynical, and dysfunctional than the saccharine type of shows (e.g. The Cosby Show, Growing Pains, Family Ties, Full House, etc.) that we were getting up until that point.

Shows like Growing Pains by the the time that it went off the air in 1992, felt like an anachronism from a past life and time period. Heck, even ABC's own Dinosaurs, which came on the scene about a year before Growing Pains ended was a family show that had more of an edge and something important that it wanted to say without coming across as ham-fisted or overly preachy.

In my eyes why ABC decided to end Growing Pains in 1992 was simply because it was time for the show to end and Growing Pains had run it's course. But if Growing Pains had ran for a few more seasons instead of ending in 1992 the show would've gotten a new improved storyline and how I would've chose to end it would've been an episode that featured Mike graduating college and when he returns home he brings a special surprise and makes a special surprise announcement that he and his girlfriend from college are getting married and they all congratulate him and his girlfriend on their wedding. Then the finale would've ended with Mike and his now wife starting a new life in their new home and we would see Maggie Seaver working as a newscaster for the news and as for Jason Seaver he would've retired from being a doctor and Ben would've followed in his dad's footsteps and became a doctor as well. And Chrissy would've been a bright sassy teenager and Carol would be studying to become a journalist and work around the world. And that's how Growing Pains should've ended if it had more episodes. But why I think ABC made the Growing Pains movies was they were thinking of a possible reboot of the show but it never happened. But Alan Thicke was already making a huge success as a game show Comeback Kid with the shows Pictionary and The All New Three's A Crowd for GSN. But I wouldn't be surprised if a Growing Pains reboot appears in the future with all new actors and a new storyline
Bestie

I "love" that whoever did this "Season 8" title sequence included the clip where Tracey Gold, braless in a low cut top accidentally starts her b-reasts jiggling and clutches herself in embarressment!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlW7ky2g-EY