This week FOX announced that one of their comedy shows, Brooklyn Nine-Nine has been canceled. This came as a shock to me and many others, as just last week many trustworthy websites such as SpoilerTV and TV Series Finale, showed that the show was straying away from possible cancelation. Obviously, these predictions are never 100% accurate, but the fact that they made the jump from probably being canceled to most likely to be renewed clearly says something.
As I sat there in shock about this news, I recalled other shows that have been canceled in the last year and the ones that keep getting renewed. Mind you, many of the shows that continue to be renewed I used to watch at some point but I stopped watching because of multiple reasons.
The writing got worse with each season.
I refuse to trust shows that have more than six seasons because it is at that point that the writing goes downhill. Obviously, not every episode is going to sit well with everyone, whether it be plot reasons or it just wasn’t as exciting as the others. When a whole season is bad, that’s a problem. For example, season six of the CW’s Supernatural, I still pretend it doesn’t exist. They had the best five seasons and the ending absolutely broke my heart…And then they brought Sam back from the dead and it was downhill from there. After that, they’ve had good episodes but not good seasons overall. They continue to queerbait their most popular ship, Destiel (Dean and Castiel), but won’t go as far as to make it happen. I used to love this show, but it 14 seasons of practically the same plot just doesn’t seem worth. People don’t want reboots of old shows or more seasons of a dead show.
Problematic
This ranges from the episodes themselves to the characters. Riverdale had a 16-year-old high school student pole dancing in front of a bunch of grown men. Now I know that the actress isn’t 16 but if she’s playing one, then there are certain things that don’t apply. Roseanne is allowed to have episodes about the main protagonist being a Trump supporter and an upcoming episode where they fear that their Muslim neighbors are making a bomb, but Black-ish was not allowed to air an episode about football player Colin Kaepernick kneeling during the National Anthem and police brutality in general. Cannot forget about how suicide was used as a revenge plot on Netflix’s 13 Reasons Why.
Little Representation
The biggest thing I saw today when the news about Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s cancelation broke out was everyone mentioning how the show made them feel represented. Whether it was a black man who showed emotions, a gay black man with a leadership position, a bisexual latina woman, and women in positions of power, the show included as many as they could. They talked about important topics such as coming out, police brutality, racism, and mocked transphobia, all while still keeping the show light and humorous. The shows that continue to be renewed have little to no representation at all. Riverdale completely ignored the fact that Jughead is asexual, which is already barely represented in most shows and other shows either have the same white gay man or they continue to queerbait for views. Shows like Senses 8 and The Get Down should have never been canceled because people felt represented and shown. Trust me, we are well aware that straight white people exist.
It seems that despite society evolving and essentially becoming more aware that there are different people in a very large world, the entertainment industry has yet to catch up and show out. We don’t want to stay in the past by bringing back shows that ended years ago or drag along shows that have been around for more than 10 years. It’s okay to move on and what new and better-represented content.
