“Jump The Shark” Part 1
The ATVN Programming Department is busy putting the final touches on our new spring broadcasting lineup–set to debut in a few weeks.
In the meantime and in honor of the 45th anniversary of television’s first official “Jump the Shark” moment, we here at the Showplace are going to do something a little different this week and will be starting our countdown of the top five “shark jumping” moments of all time!
Wait…you’re not familiar with the television term “jump the shark?” OK, here’s a brief history…
In 1977 the show Happy Days, a perennial Top 5 Nielson show for its four previous years, came up with the wildest plotline in the show’s history to that point–in which the program’s most popular character, The Fonz, would jump over a shark on water skis.
The idea of the small town Wisconsin cast of characters suddenly traveling to the west coast culminating in an event that was clearly created just for a rating spectacular caused loyal fans (and many of the show’s cast and crew members) to surmise that the writers had either lost their minds or were so desperate to create an event that would bring in viewers that they took this drastic course of action.
The result was a catchphrase that was made up for television fans and critics that has been used to describe a hit show taking a drastic change in plotlines just to create a rating grabber–only to have the ploy backfire and lead to the eventual cancellation of the show.
(Ironically, the term attributed to this show is a bit of a misnomer. Happy Days went on to have several more successful years ratings-wise and, arguably, had several other “shark jumping” type of storylines throughout the show’s final six years before falling ratings led to the eventual program’s demise).
Today we are going to start the ultimate collection of the top five “jump the shark” events in TV history that eventually led that same show down a path towards oblivion.
Keep in mind, these are not the five wildest plotlines ever created, nor are we citing shows that employed a ratings-grabbing event, only to have the show sustain or even increase its television shares after the event took place. We are strictly adhering to the requirement that the show’s ratings would never return to the same levels after such a stunt was created/written into the show’s canon.
The teen mystery show was a hit with the key 18-49 demographic when it launched on the scene in 2010, following the success of several novels written by Sara Shephard. The television show centers around four high school girls whose clique falls apart after the disappearance of their leader. One year later, the estranged friends are reunited as they begin receiving messages from a mysterious figure named “A” who threatens to expose their deepest secrets.
The program consistently attracted between 2.5 to 3.7-million viewers for its first four years while its audience became perpetually puzzled at the identity of the mysterious “A,” whose actions were becoming more and more devious.
During season five, ABC Family was anxious for a big ratings event to coincide with its recent relaunching as the “Freeform Network” and billed an episode in which “A’s” identity would finally be revealed.
It was…but the network had ordered two additional seasons of the show–one that just resolved its central mystery.
The result was that another “A,” (called “Uber A”) was created to keep the mystery going. Needless to say, storylines pretty much spiraled in several different directions through the remainder of the program’s run. Along with it went viewership totals that dropped steadily through the show’s final two years.
#4: House, MD
British Actor Hugh Laurie played the titular character to the hilt and reinvented the way many medical dramas had been previously produced. Though brilliant but flawed, Laurie’s character would solve medical mysteries with an arrogance rarely seen among the genre’s doctors, but was becoming increasingly dependent on drugs himself. This story built for four solid years with the risks and the tensions building throughout each season.
Then, in season five, following two dramatic episodes in which fellow main character, Dr. Wilson, loses his love–partially due to House’s drug dependence, the flawed Dr. House finally checks himself into a state hospital.
After a five-year buildup to this key point of recognition and responsibility the show really set the stage for some great possible storylines involving this multiple award winning actor dealing with this serious topic, while also potentially opening up a fascinating abundance of stories involving Laurie’s character interacting with other patients going through their own medical mysteries while dealing with their own dependencies.
Instead, the culminating episode, which felt more like an after-school special, featured House joking around with another drug dependent patient–nearly resulting in the latter’s loss of life, to which House suddenly realizes abusing drugs are bad, and then he returns to his regular hospital, and resumes his old job, as if nothing had ever happened.
The show finished in the Nielson’s Top 10 throughout seasons two, three and four and attracted between 17.5-20 million viewers each week up until that point. Following House’s about-face in the season five opener, the show’s viewership quickly dropped to less than half the viewers it had sustained through its first four seasons and was never ranked higher than 42nd in its final year.
Show Producer/Film Director Bryan Singer said that the official reason the show did not return was a dramatic increase in the cost of each House episode, making it unprofitable for parent company Universal to continue the show. However, the badly bungled season five anti-climax leading to the dramatic ratings plunge and massive viewership slide in the program’s final year-and-a-half suggests otherwise.
Our list continues…next week!
The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Astound Broadband or any other agency, organization, employer or company.
