Anyone else give up on series really quickly?

You mean other than network execs?


Maybe you're experiencing what scientists call "intelligence." It's common among people who shun network television. Unfortunately, there are very few cures for this condition, other than heavy marijuana or beer consumption.

I have 109 channels, and I watch about six hours of television a week.

Welcome to my little circle of hell.

There are some shows i've stopped watching--they're the same over and over with different characters.. Like 24, now it's just gotten ridiculous...guess they ran out of original ideas..

It also depends on what you choose to watch. The West Wing did it for me until the very end. And the Sopranoes is amazing. You have mentioned two series that are meant to be more escapist. I like Grey's Anatomy, but I like it because of the silly soap opera quality (though the Denny Duckett storyline was brilliant, partially for the writing, but I think mostly for the actor playing him), and Everybody Loves Raymond is a classic sitcom that plays to familiarity. I can't remember when a fourth wall sitcom genuinely surprised me. What about something like Entourage as a comedy instead?

Yes there is a lot of crap on tv, but there is some really good stuff as well. You need to weed your way through tv land to find it, but it is really worthwhile in the end. Also remember that even the best of shows vary in quality episode to episode. Don't just give up on something right off, give it a chance.

If it's something I'm invested in, like a great series going down the drain, then I'm slow to give up on it. I've wasted a lot of time watching a series go down the drain instead of stopping when I should have.

But it takes a lot of effort to get me invested in something in the first place. I only watch a handful of shows and couldn't imagine picking up something new.

I gave up on Desperate Housewives early in the second season. I thought it was brillant the first season but the second went downhill pretty damned quickly.

I've all but given up on American Idol...WTF is going on this year?

I gave up on Lost pretty quickly. They lost it for me around the middle of the first series. I just started to find the constant flashbacks more than a little annoying, and nothing was happening.

A British series called The Green Green Grass, a spin off of the great sitcom Anly Fools and Horses. I thought that since it would be written by the guys that did Only Fools, then it will be funny as hell!

Oh, how wrong I was!

One word for it, S**t.

After a couple years I gave up on All In The Family, and I'm probably the only person over 30 who never saw the last episode of M*A*S*H.

benbradley said:

After a couple years I gave up on All In The Family, and I'm probably the only person over 30 who never saw the last episode of M*A*S*H.

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That could be true. Last episode of M*A*S*H still holds the record for most-viewed hour of television of all time.

Liar!

Hawkeye goes crazy! Mulcahy goes deaf!

I wept!

Kiester said:

A British series called The Green Green Grass, a spin off of the great sitcom Anly Fools and Horses. I thought that since it would be written by the guys that did Only Fools, then it will be funny as hell!

Oh, how wrong I was!

One word for it, S**t.

Click to expand...

I loved Only fools and Horses and thought the spin off would be as funny as the original. But, alas, it was utter tripe - couldn't get through the first episode before I had to turn off the tele.

I didn't see the last episode of M*A*S*H either.

Most of the tv shows now, to me, are predictable, except American Idol. I completely gave up on that show after Sanjaya kept staying and tolerable people were getting voted off. Maybe next season will be better. But, I still like House and Criminal Minds, even though I know the patient will always be cured and they will always get the bad guy.
My favorites channels are still Travel and Discovery.

czjaba said:

I didn't see the last episode of M*A*S*H either.

Most of the tv shows now, to me, are predictable, except American Idol. I completely gave up on that show after Sanjaya kept staying and tolerable people were getting voted off. Maybe next season will be better. But, I still like House and Criminal Minds, even though I know the patient will always be cured and they will always get the bad guy.
My favorites channels are still Travel and Discovery.

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House has killed two patients this season. Early in the season, they simply weren't able to save her.

Two weeks ago, they made a mistake. And killed someone. Major subplot as they work out those ramifications.

I have a number of friends in the TV business and I will generally try to watch their shows out of loyalty (that actually accounts for most of the TV I watch nowadays). Otherwise, there haven't been too many shows that I've given up on.

The ones that I have given up on are typically serials that I missed an episode or two of and never felt the need to catch up with (24 fits that category). Basically, if I'm ever into a show, I'm usually in for the long haul, but I think that's more of a comment on how difficult I am to please in the first place. I don't suffer foolish TV for very long.

Check out Friday Night Lights (when it comes back; they don't seem to be running it in repeats since the season ended). Really top-notch, and it's getting better and better every episode.

I'm pretty jaded about most other stuff on tv right now, and I'm not a tv-basher generally. Some of the best shows on recent tv (Battlestar Galactica, West Wing in the Sorkin days, Buffy, etc.) were truly extraordinary. But lately, nothing much has caught my fancy. It's not so much a matter of liking it and drifting off, but just not liking the new shows, practically from the first scene. And a lot of the tv schedule seems to be filled with old shows that are just past their sell-by date (L&O, ER and CSI, particularly).

JD, who feels like a really old geezer, thinking about the good old days of MASH and Barney Miller and Dark Shadows and ... um, oh, yeah, The Monkees. Well, so they weren't all that good.

I find comedy tends to get predicatble after a couple of series. The Peep Show is still brilliant, but I was so sure it was gonna lose it I only watched cos my friend made me.
Gave up on 'Shameless', though. i just kind of expected it to be anaemic without Fiona and Steve. (Oh, sorry, both are British shows BTW).

I love Hugh Laurie - but House kept pressing the reset button. It felt like there wasn't a throughline, that nothing was in danger of actually changing, not for longer than a three to six episode arc - how I would love for them to actually throw House in jail (or kill off Chase and Cameron to focus on Foreman, who's the only interesting duckling - but that's a personal preference) for a while, or have Wilson stay crashed at House's place.

I gave up on Heroes after five or six episodes. It was very pretty but not much more than that.