From Chris Mann's book Come and Knock on Our Door: A Hers and Hers and His Guide to Three's Company:
George Sunga, who coproduced the spin-off with Joseph Staretski and Martin Rips, has his own theory. "The reason why Three's a Crowd failed was not because of the actors involved, because they were wonderful. Mary Cadorette was a beauty. Robert Mandan was a great character actor. And John Ritter, of course, was spectacular. The reason it failed was America wanted Jack and Janet to get together. If it's going to happen, these two should be the ones.

and

West says he knew there would be hurt feelings. "Joyce was very upset, as was Priscilla. And Joyce felt - and perhaps rightly so - that if Jack moved in with anybody it should have been with Janet. As it turns out, she might have been right.

With that being said, most Three's Company fans appear to agree that the finale was a bit underwhelming and rushed (https://www.looper.com/843770/the-threes-company-finale-still-bothers-fans-to-this-day/). Within the final four episodes, both Janet and Jack meet someone, and marriage is proposed. Janet accepts while Jack's proposal is rejected in favor of living together. The latter spins Three's Company off into Three's A Crowd (which ultimately flopped).

Yes they def should have!!

No

Why not buddy??

No

From Chris Mann's book Come and Knock on Our Door: A Hers and Hers and His Guide to Three's Company:


and



With that being said, most Three's Company fans appear to agree that the finale was a bit underwhelming and rushed (https://www.looper.com/843770/the-threes-company-finale-still-bothers-fans-to-this-day/). Within the final four episodes, both Janet and Jack meet someone, and marriage is proposed. Janet accepts while Jack's proposal is rejected in favor of living together. The latter spins Three's Company off into Three's A Crowd (which ultimately flopped).

There's a lot to unpack here so let's have at it:

A good place to start would be leaving Three's a Crowd on the side and dealing with it at the end of the Three's Company discussion. The perfect ending to Three's Company would have been the marriage of Jack and Janet, it's what the audience wanted. It's the classic search for an answer that's right under your nose. Remember the old song, Save the Best for Last by Vanessa Williams or Why Not Me by The Judds, or The Search Is Over by Survivor, classic story telling, the audience would have eaten it up.

Now let's bring Three's a Crowd into the mix. The follow-up series has to be about something, has to have a hook. If the new series premise was Jack and Janet married we have the last season of I Dream of Jeannie problem, The Rhoda problem, "and they all lived happily ever after" has occurred. You can't have Robert Mandan running around being mad at his over 30 daughter finally getting married to someone she's known for 8 years, the premise wouldn't make any sense.

When Three's a Crowd was originally pitched it was to have featured the Larry character as the lead but the network passed. The key problem Three's a Crowd had was the poor casting of the female lead, Mary Cadorette. That role was going to be critical to the success of the series, a much more dynamic actress was needed, but like everything else in the Three's Company universe John got his way and that doomed the series.

There's a lot to unpack here so let's have at it:

A good place to start would be leaving Three's a Crowd on the side and dealing with it at the end of the Three's Company discussion. The perfect ending to Three's Company would have been the marriage of Jack and Janet, it's what the audience wanted. It's the classic search for an answer that's right under your nose. Remember the old song, Save the Best for Last by Vanessa Williams or Why Not Me by The Judds, or The Search Is Over by Survivor, classic story telling, the audience would have eaten it up.

Now let's bring Three's a Crowd into the mix. The follow-up series has to be about something, has to have a hook. If the new series premise was Jack and Janet married we have the last season of I Dream of Jeannie problem, The Rhoda problem, "and they all lived happily ever after" has occurred. You can't have Robert Mandan running around being mad at his over 30 daughter finally getting married to someone she's known for 8 years, the premise wouldn't make any sense.

When Three's a Crowd was originally pitched it was to have featured the Larry character as the lead but the network passed. The key problem Three's a Crowd had was the poor casting of the female lead, Mary Cadorette. That role was going to be critical to the success of the series, a much more dynamic actress was needed, but like everything else in the Three's Company universe John got his way and that doomed the series.

Back when Larry was going to be the main character, what was his situation going to be like? Who were the supporting characters going to be?

They never acted like a couple on the show only in the opening credits from seasons 4 to 8. So it would have been hard for me to see them married

Back when Larry was going to be the main character, what was his situation going to be like? Who were the supporting characters going to be?

I don't think it ever got to the point where casting was discussed. The network was not interested in developing a series with Richard Kline as the lead actor.

It would almost be like seeing a brother and sister get married..... I can't explain why really

It would almost be like seeing a brother and sister get married..... I can't explain why really
I voted NO, the chemistry with Jack and Janet was never viewed as romantic but a more brotherly sister relationship, even the season 6 episode when Jack and Janet try the computer date mix-up they never once notioned with the idea of hooking up because they respected each other.
Now let's bring Three's a Crowd into the mix. The follow-up series has to be about something, has to have a hook. If the new series premise was Jack and Janet married we have the last season of I Dream of Jeannie problem, The Rhoda problem, "and they all lived happily ever after" has occurred. You can't have Robert Mandan running around being mad at his over 30 daughter finally getting married to someone she's known for 8 years, the premise wouldn't make any sense.
John Ritter on THS even pointed that out that the father conflict wouldn't work with Janet's father because we'd already seen him twice in the series 'Janet's Secret' and 'Hearing Is Believing' and accepted Janet sharing the apartment with Jack.

It's odd that I have no memory of ever seeing the final episodes of Three's Company until later years. So while I remember Three's a Crowd replacing the series, I wasn't aware back then that Janet got married.

It's odd that I have no memory of ever seeing the final episodes of Three's Company until later years. So while I remember Three's a Crowd replacing the series, I wasn't aware back then that Janet got married.

Probably because it was overshadowed by the transition to TAC

It's odd that I have no memory of ever seeing the final episodes of Three's Company until later years. So while I remember Three's a Crowd replacing the series, I wasn't aware back then that Janet got married.
I was 8 years old but I remember it exactly because we recorded it that night all of us gathered to watch it in the living room and my dad had bought blank VHS tapes to record Three's A Crowd the following week.

The TV Guide for that week of TC's finale had a two-page spread what I remember vividly is the ridiculous copy and paste of a promotional shot of Janet's head atop a random woman wearing a wedding gown.

LOL - TV Guide must have been fighting a deadline to try to obtain a photo of Joyce DeWitt wearing Janet's actual wedding clothes... Or maybe they had a thought that showing her with a traditional gown got the point across better...?

Publishing a weekly magazine in the pre-Digital era had to be tough when the subject matter sometimes was very much what was happening that week.

I was having trouble in college when this stuff went down, so I'm a decade older than you.

This is probably a bit of an unpopular opinion but Joyce DeWitt's absence may have been one key reason why Three's A Crowd flopped. On Three's Company, Janet was the glue that held the show together. She was in essence, the sane one amongst all the crazies. And Joyce in that regard, played the role perfectly. This can explain why Three's Company was able to survive as well as it did without Suzanne Somers.

I voted NO, the chemistry with Jack and Janet was never viewed as romantic but a more brotherly sister relationship, even the season 6 episode when Jack and Janet try the computer date mix-up they never once notioned with the idea of hooking up because they respected each other.

John Ritter on THS even pointed that out that the father conflict wouldn't work with Janet's father because we'd already seen him twice in the series 'Janet's Secret' and 'Hearing Is Believing' and accepted Janet sharing the apartment with Jack.

If anything I could see Jack and Terri being the closest to a married couple, if Jack had to be paired with one of the roommates

If anything I could see Jack and Terri being the closest to a married couple, if Jack had to be paired with one of the roommates

Why do you think that Jack and Terri were anything like a couple?

The kids in 201 twitter account (Three's Company) recently posted some of their tweets that were drafted but in the end they didn't post. In them they talked about the Janet/Jack scenario of ending up together.

https://twitter.com/thekidsin201/status/1594011800772689925?s=20&t=RgTqEaCMg6dQnO3D4MDxxw

The kids in 201 twitter account (Three's Company) recently posted some of their tweets that were drafted but in the end they didn't post. In them they talked about the Janet/Jack scenario of ending up together.

https://twitter.com/thekidsin201/status/1594011800772689925?s=20&t=RgTqEaCMg6dQnO3D4MDxxw

:crazy:

In a recent Q&A , Joyce DeWitt alludes to the fact that Janet and Jack should have gotten together in the end. However, the Producers did not want this. Joyce DeWitt Q&A (MVFR 2023) on YT. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ruhc-o3gq3c)

I dont think it would have worked. The banter between roommates is what made the show work. If they are married you lose all the sexual innuendo and misunderstandings. Other shows like The Nanny, Who's The Boss and A-men lose interest once the cast characters get together. The best example is Angie. It was a top rated show. Once they got married in the second season, the ratings tanked. No one wants to see the married couple. There are much better scripts of them separate.

No. I prefer them as strictly friends.

In a recent Q&A , Joyce DeWitt alludes to the fact that Janet and Jack should have gotten together in the end. However, the Producers did not want this. Joyce DeWitt Q&A (MVFR 2023) on YT. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ruhc-o3gq3c)


Joyce needs to let go all of that hate and anger she has towards the producers of the show. That was over 40 years ago. It can't be healthy for her. And I'll say this again, no Janet and Jack shouldn't have ended up together. He was not attracted to her or in love with her in that special romantic way. It was more of a brother older sister vibe. He would have been henpecked for the rest of his life.

I dont think it would have worked. The banter between roommates is what made the show work. If they are married you lose all the sexual innuendo and misunderstandings. Other shows like The Nanny, Who's The Boss and A-men lose interest once the cast characters get together. The best example is Angie. It was a top rated show. Once they got married in the second season, the ratings tanked. No one wants to see the married couple. There are much better scripts of them separate.


"Bones" would be the exception to the rule. The main characters got married , had kids and continued to have successful ratings for years to come afterwards.

And on "La Femme Nakita" with Peta Wilson the leads slept with each early on and the show still maintained it's number one status for cable at that time. "La Femme Nakita" was unlike any show ever on TV in that it wasn't afraid to do things with it's leads that no other show would even think of doing. It was a tour de force.

Come to think of it, I wonder if they couldn't pair Janet with Jack the end the show off, they could've as "compromise" of sorts, have Janet marry Jack's brother Lee (https://threescompany.fandom.com/wiki/Lee_Tripper). Phillip (https://threescompany.fandom.com/wiki/Phillip_Dawson), the guy that Janet actually did married, has often been criticized for being an extremely bland (https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ZCV7PjOZkagJ:https://twitter.com/thekidsin201/status/1286653836392902657%3Flang%3Den+&cd=15&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us), an vanilla character (https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/showthread.php?t=95210). And of course, it just didn't sit well that Janet would just go off an marry some guy that she to the viewers' eyes, didn't know too long (https://web.archive.org/web/20140406110252/http://forums.televisionwithoutpity.com/topic/3111823-threes-company/page-9#entry14152209).

Come to think of it, I wonder if they couldn't pair Janet with Jack the end the show off, they could've as "compromise" of sorts, have Janet marry Jack's brother Lee (https://threescompany.fandom.com/wiki/Lee_Tripper). Phillip (https://threescompany.fandom.com/wiki/Phillip_Dawson), the guy that Janet actually did married, has often been criticized for being an extremely bland (https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ZCV7PjOZkagJ:https://twitter.com/thekidsin201/status/1286653836392902657%3Flang%3Den+&cd=15&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us), an vanilla character (https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards/showthread.php?t=95210). And of course, it just didn't sit well that Janet would just go off an marry some guy that she to the viewers' eyes, didn't know too long (https://web.archive.org/web/20140406110252/http://forums.televisionwithoutpity.com/topic/3111823-threes-company/page-9#entry14152209).


I think it would have been a little too far-fetched to have Janet marry Jack's brother Lee. Lee was only seen on one episode and was never mentioned before or after. That would have been kind of hard to swallow.

No. I prefer them as strictly friends.

I wonder if having Jack ultimately become romantic partners with any one of his female roommates would've gone against the show's premise, which was that people of the opposite sex could live together without turning into romantic partners.

I think thats what it was trying to show even though that isnt reality....... Usually when a boy moves in with a girl,etc they like each other :)

I think it would have been a little too far-fetched to have Janet marry Jack's brother Lee. Lee was only seen on one episode and was never mentioned before or after. That would have been kind of hard to swallow.

Well, keep in mind that on the British version (https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Series/ManAboutTheHouse) of Three's Company, Man About the House (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0640629/), that show (https://threescompany.fandom.com/wiki/Man_About_the_House)'s Janet equivalent (Chrissy) does in fact marry the brother of that show's equivalent to Jack (Robin) in its finale (https://www.comedy.co.uk/tv/man_about_the_house/episodes/6/7/). So there's at least, some precedent behind that idea that I suggested.

Once and for all...But what can we do buddy?

All we can do is type about things :D

I dont think it would have worked. The banter between roommates is what made the show work. If they are married you lose all the sexual innuendo and misunderstandings. Other shows like The Nanny, Who's The Boss and A-men lose interest once the cast characters get together. The best example is Angie. It was a top rated show. Once they got married in the second season, the ratings tanked. No one wants to see the married couple. There are much better scripts of them separate.

Also, you can argue (https://www.reddit.com/r/threescompany/comments/1iavc8n/comment/mfg2pq8/) that having Jack hook up with Janet or Terri at the end of the series would've betrayed and gone against the whole premise or social messaging (for that time) that the show was trying to demonstrate. That being that men and women could be friends without ultimately hooking up romantically.

Also, you can argue (https://www.reddit.com/r/threescompany/comments/1iavc8n/comment/mfg2pq8/) that having Jack hook up with Janet or Terri at the end of the series would've betrayed and gone against the whole premise or social messaging (for that time) that the show was trying to demonstrate. That being that men and women could be friends without ultimately hooking up romantically.

Good point. I agree.