When I was dead wrong about the Fall TV season

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Yeah, when I whiff, I REALLY whiff.

Case in point: This article entiltled “Did NBC miss the boat on a new sitcom revolution?” Well yes, yes they did, I still contend. Sitcoms are out there and people are watching them… except on NBC which plain old doesn’t have any. But that’s not where I stepped in it.

Which one had John Stamos again?

I talked about a trend in the ’15 season that I actually liked. It seemed, at least for a moment, that TV programmers were once again considering people of my generation while making programming decisions. To be truthful, I feel like broadcast TV gave up on people my age when they canceled Married… With Children. But for just one moment in time, it seemed all would be well. I saw shows like Grandfathered, Grinder, Life in Pieces, and The Muppets and was ready to declare that the old folks had finally won!

Except of course they didn’t.

Didn’t last long

Although Grandfathered and Grinder were well reviewed, both of them were canceled before airing a full season. Ratings were just too low, they all said. Not enough viewers. The same is true with The Muppets, an evergreen property that will probably be rebooted ten more times in my life and I’ll watch all of them.

Life in Pieces fared better, lasting four full seasons on CBS. But then, the oldsters were only one part of this sitcom which told four short stories, all about a family of people named Short. (Get it?) The other three stories were about millennials or generation Z. That was enough to sustain viewership, at least for a short while.

Must be hard to be a TV executive

I don’t envy the prime-time broadcast TV exec. Not only do they have to contend with cable shows that fill themselves with as much profanity and nudity as they want, but they’re in direct competition with their own shows from the past! Hulu, HBO Max, Peacock, Prime, and a host of other services are chock full of award-winning content from the past. Stuff I liked watching the first time, and the tenth. Stuff that has a special place in my heart already, and it’s available 24/7. How can a TV executive compete with that?

Which isn’t to say I’ve forgiven them for canceling the shows I’ve reviewed on this blog that I actually liked. Come on folks! I do get tired of watching reruns of Coupling every so often and I’d like to see a new spin on the genre!

About the Author

Stuart Sweet
Stuart Sweet is the editor-in-chief of The Solid Signal Blog and a "master plumber" at Signal Group, LLC. He is the author of over 10,000 articles and longform tutorials including many posted here. Reach him by clicking on "Contact the Editor" at the bottom of this page.