Season 4 was the last good season. After that, it started to go downhill. The Season 5 premiere was so bland and was not a good continuation from Season 4. It never recovered past the premiere, and in fact, declined even more as time progressed. The jokes and quality were no longer in tact. It was like they had to rely on cue cards every second and the deliverance was so off. In the earlier seasons, they put more effort into the show and it was about quality, not quantity. In the latter seasons, there were jokes everywhere, whether they were good or bad, which defeated the purpose of some episodes. It was like watching Married With Children. Which I think is one key reason why there was so much discontinuity and inconsistencies. I know the writers changed dozens of times over the course of the show, but that’s no excuse for what happened to the show. They could’ve at least played on the show’s history and taken better care of it. Compare the dog years joke told by Dorothy in the first season compared to Rose, Sophia, and Blanche making fun of Dorothy asking Blanche to go out with her date instead in the seventh season. No thought put into the other one. Also, the character development went south and really made the girls out to be something they just weren’t. Dorothy got more over the top, Rose got more dumb, Blanche got more slutty, and Sophia got more cantankerous and trouble making.

Dorothy got more over the top, Rose got more dumb, Blanche got more slutty, and Sophia got more cantankerous and trouble making.


That is a common pattern in many tv shows, the longer a series goes on, it starts becoming self-satire and the characters become exaggerated versions of what they started out as.... Look what happened to Chrissy in 3's Company, really Jack and Janet as well....

I think an exception would be Vera in Alice...Vera seemed to get a little smarter

Watching the Golden Girls in real time, I never noticed or cared about the change. I suppose I was the frog slowly boiling in the water. Looking back, I agree with the OP that the last few seasons were not great. The writers went for cheap laughs and the show turned into Cheers where every line had canned audience laughter. As it was already mentioned, this happens in sitcoms that last past 5 years all the time. After season 4 Sophia changed from the frail but witty mom to the attack dog that just was there to start trouble.

Even Bea Arthur said the show had started to strain by the end- that it wasn't as hysterical as it had been. Which is true. The jokes because predictable, and were not clever as they were in early seasons. The show was still fun, though not like it had been. Good points, The LittleF.

You could also see Estelle Getty's health was starting to get the best of her in seasons 6 and 7, and then even mores in Golden Palace and, thereafter, Empty Nest.

That is a common pattern in many tv shows, the longer a series goes on, it starts becoming self-satire and the characters become exaggerated versions of what they started out as.... Look what happened to Chrissy in 3's Company, really Jack and Janet as well....

Yeah, that's a great point. Many shows have this happen: the writers make these "shortcuts", and soon the characters becomes stereotypes, caricatures of their original selves, growing more ridiculous every season. This happened, as well, on the later seasons of Friends (Ross and Monica), The Facts of Life (Blair), Roseanne (Jackie), and many, many other shows.


I think an exception would be Vera in Alice...Vera seemed to get a little smarter

Huh! It's been years since I saw Alice, but you could be right. In which case, that would be a very rare instance!

Great observations everyone. That is exactly it. The characters become extreme caricatures of their former self. They make them robots and the parts that made them funny and unique take over and their soul is lost. As others pointed out, this happens on many sitcoms. Also, after 4 seasons of any show the writers run out of good ideas. Even the best sitcom of all time IMHO All in the Family was not great after season 4. Archie too became this caricature of himself with lines always going for cheap laughs.

Great observations everyone. That is exactly it. The characters become extreme caricatures of their former self. They make them robots and the parts that made them funny and unique take over and their soul is lost. As others pointed out, this happens on many sitcoms. Also, after 4 seasons of any show the writers run out of good ideas. Even the best sitcom of all time IMHO All in the Family was not great after season 4. Archie too became this caricature of himself with lines always going for cheap laughs.

Yeah, I thought of more examples, too: Chrissy on Three's Company (she didn't start off completely unintelligent... more like naive), Mallory on Family Ties.