What Show Should Have Only Had One Season?

[Desdichado]

The term in this context is segue, not Segway, by the way. Also, per se, not per say. Yours in pedantry, Bruce

And for single season wish lists: Mac Headroom.

Irregardless of the averse affect that their vocabulary has on the cannon of the English language, I ascent to their use because we understood you're intent.

 

[Swanosaurus]

Now, don't get me wrong, I loved Millennium, and can watch any amount of Lance Henriksen, but I felt like it kind of "made its point" in S1, and it was not very surprising that the audience rapidly declined in S2/3 (also whilst S3 was good, S2 was meh).

Millenium had this really weird change in tone - it got way more supernatural in season 2, only to become more mundane again in season 3. I think overall, I'd agree that season 1 st andvery effective as it is, and it feels slightly cheapened by season 2. Still, I do like both season 2 and season 3.

 

[payn]

So an interesting segway on this thread are shows with horrible endings. Not meh endings, not "eh not my favorite", but "this show is now ash in my mouth" kind of endings.

Its an interesting question of if you had a great 1st season and the next several seasons were solid, but then the ending was god aweful, would it have been worth cutting out all of those other seasons just to have a 1 and done without the bad ending?

Im sure I can think of a few, but I can honestly say i've not picked a number of series up becasue of how much ash folks spit after their poorly received endings.

 

[Dausuul]

We often lament that some show we loved got concelled to early. But what television show went on too long? What show, in your opinion, should have ended after a single season?

The obvious low hanging fruit is Heroes. It was really great (until that "final battle." But after S1, it went downhill fast.

I would also say true Detective. The first season wasn't the only "good" season (both S3 and S4 were good) but that first season was so phenomenal they should have just stopped there.

What do you think? What television/streaming show should have gone out on a high note after S1?

Agreed on "Heroes."

I can't think of other examples of "one-season shows" offhand, but I will say that "Supernatural" was a five-season show. "Swan Song" needs only a few tweaks to be a perfect conclusion to the story. As far as I'm concerned, everything after that is fanfic with unusually high production values.

 

[Reynard]

Now that I have seen

Spoiler

S2 E2

the answer is definitely

Spoiler

The Last of Us.

 

[billd91]

Now that I have seen

Spoiler

S2 E2

the answer is definitely

Spoiler

The Last of Us.

That one's going to be a lot like the Red Wedding episode of Game of Thrones. If you know the source material, you knew it was coming. But if you didn't... ouch.

 

[payn]

Now that I have seen

Spoiler

S2 E2

the answer is definitely

Spoiler

The Last of Us.

I was gonna get started tonight...

 

[Willie the Duck]

Thus far, we've focused almost exclusively on highly recognizable network (+HBO and now streaming) shows that were a big deal at the time. Also*, we're generally going with shows people think started off as very good shows. What if we open the discussion up to, say, non-HBO cable tv shows and first run syndication** shows and such; as well as shows that only ever started at 'okay?' I'm thinking things like Stargate SG-1 or The Magicians or Time Trax. Not them specifically, since I can't remember what their 1st seasons were like compared to later ones, but those kind of shows.
*possibly with the exceptions of WoT, RoP, and HotD; YMMV
**other than ST:TNG

First vote would be Andromeda. The idea was not bad -- Roddenberry had been fleshing out the Dylan Hunt/fallen 'federation' storyline over the course of a number of series pitches, actually bringing that to fruition was not a ridiculous notion. Nor was casting Kevin Sorbo, who at the time was just 'the guy from Hercules' (another smarmy hero in charge who would be overconfident if not for being just-that-good). And the first season was... fine. Nothing to write home about, and mostly episodic stuff that resolved the plot of the week and got us used to the characters. However, not far and away obviously worse than the first seasons of similar shows that went on to end up being great (like Deep Space Nine or Babylon 5), and honestly better than season 1 ST:TNG. It was only after Robert Wolfe left that it became obvious that they didn't know where to take it and that Sorbo had no range.

Another one is Beastmaster. This one started out aiming even lower -- it was trying to replicate the model/ride the wave of Hercules/Xena with camp and action and exposed flesh. And it was perfectly fine at that model. My wife tells me that Daniel Goddard is very easy on the eyes, and I find the season one baddy (King Zad) a wonderful scenery-chewing performance. Then, like fellow syndicated show Earth: Final Conflict*, it ran into casting issues. People couldn't fit the next season into their schedule or whatever, and so the cast (and story) had to be re-written with every season.
*which doesn't match the thread premise, as I think seasons 1-3 are all of similar quality

There was a third example I had that isn't coming to me right now. If I think of it, I will post it as well.

Firefly.
I love it but....

I'd agree with Firefly, but for a completely different reason: I want to see the rest of season one that was never filmed! I'd really like to have multiple seasons, but at this point I'd be happy if they had been allowed to make one full season.

I want the rest of season one I have in my head to be real. What we've heard about the plans for the second half of season one are not particularly great. Regardless, I am with darjr on no more than one season. The premise of being one step ahead of the law, one behind the next paycheck does not lend itself to a long series.

I also watched all of Supernatural in it's first run. I will stand up for the later season being highly worth while. There are highs and lows, some seasons are absolutely better than others, and even the so-called best seasons have some major rough spots. But overall it's great.

One of the big things about Supernatural is that it only works if you enjoy the filler.

This reminds me of how a friend who still watches talks about The Simpsons. By the time the show had ironed out the rough spots, it also was past what people think of as the golden days; and* there's no clear point where it truly 'got bad,' so much as vacillated in quality and in how much of it was filler ever since.
*supposedly, I stopped watching some time in the early 90s.

So an interesting segway on this thread are shows with horrible endings. Not meh endings, not "eh not my favorite", but "this show is now ash in my mouth" kind of endings.

Its an interesting question of if you had a great 1st season and the next several seasons were solid, but then the ending was god aweful, would it have been worth cutting out all of those other seasons just to have a 1 and done without the bad ending?

I am a strong proponent of the notion that a strong final episode is not the most important thing for a show to have (better than a bad one of course, just not very important). A great capstone does not make everything leading up to it retroactively better, and a single bad episode at the end does not retroactively spoil what came before either. Game of Thrones and bad last two seasons or something like that is a different matter, although even then I think it is only because people were so invested in where things were going that it has made the previous 6 seasons unwatchable to so many.

None quite that bad spring to mind (they may later), but what about shows that managed a perfectly good ending, but then got renewed and pretty much wasted them. I remember Elementary wrapping up really well in season 6, but then getting a seventh season.

Uncancelled shows are another beast as well. They are even better for this, since you can just pretend they didn't happen and still get your closure.

 

[Twiggly the Gnome]

This reminds me of how a friend who still watches talks about The Simpsons. By the time the show had ironed out the rough spots, it also was past what people think of as the golden days; and* there's no clear point where it truly 'got bad,' so much as vacillated in quality and in how much of it was filler ever since.
*supposedly, I stopped watching some time in the early 90s.

I lost interest sometime after it became clear they were shifting from Bart to Homer as the main character.

 

[Gradine]

It occurs to me that there's a third, more sinister way to approach this particular prompt: a show that became a cultural phenomenon in part due to its longevity, but you wish it hadn't and had just failed and gotten cancelled after only one season.

I've got a lot of entries here, some of them spicier than others, but my top nominee would be Entourage