The Cliffhanger

We have reached the part of the entertainment year known as "May Sweeps". This is the time in which the networks try to get as many people as possible watching their shows in order to convince advertisers to buy ads time on their networks. What this translates to for the viewers is the shows that air are (for better or worse) as good as they are ever going to be.

Some shows rise to the challenge and play something that will be talked about all summer. Others do not. Still others employ the time tested device of the "Cliffhanger". The Cliffhanger works most of the time that it is used, drawing in viewers who then wait all summer for the resolution. This post is NOT about those.

I would like to talk about the Cliffhangers that failed. The 2 part episodes in which the second part is never seen. I can remember many shows in which I personally sat in rapt awe watching the events unfold before me, when with only moments left in the hour a bomb goes off and the main character was standing RIGHT THERE. I would go to the water cooler the next day to discuss what I saw only to learn that pretty much every other TV in the world was watching something else.

Most recently this happened on "No Ordinary Family". A quirky scifi show about a family of super heroes. The episode ended with the bad guy about to destroy the heroes. Less than a week later the series was cancelled.

As fans we can complain all we want and it almost never matters. (The most notable exception was the series "Jericho" which ended with a cliffhanger but outraged fans convinced the network to make an additional 6 episodes to finish the story) Most of the time the complaints fall on deaf ears. The shows are cancelled for good reasons. They are not making enough money. We like to think of TV as free entertainment, but there is a reason the stars are rich. It is a business and a big one at that. So as long as the Cliffhanger keeps drawing in viewers, writers will keep making them. And as long as there are Cliffhangers there will be shows that are cancelled without airing the second half.

So for that reason the scariest words to see in a show you love in May is:

To Be Continued