Back in ninth grade English class, my teacher Mrs. Stocks-Glover drew a triangular plot diagram on the chalkboard. The linguistic geometry lesson had one fundamental point—all great stories have a beginning, a climax and an end. That last bit—the end—is something that TV series seem to screw up on a regular basis.
But thankfully, Matthew Weiner, creator of AMC's ""Mad Men,"" seems to get it. Weiner announced at a press appearance last week that his series would air its sixth and final season in 2012. That means that the divorce-causing, agency-shaking shitstorm that was the Season 3 finale is posted as the ""Climax"" part of the ""Mad Men"" plot diagram on a white board in Weiner's office, and presumably he has the rest of the plot sketched out and ready to go. Mrs. Stocks-Glover would be proud.
That also means that by the end of the series, we'll have seen the global uprising of 1968 (prepare for even more pot-smoking hippies—maybe Peggy will become a flower child) and the beginning of the 1970s.
But what if we wanted to see the Draper kids as angsty teens rocking out the ‘70s, or Don taking on the go-getting young execs of the 1980s? Isn't throwing down an end date to a television shows effectively a preemptive cancellation?
Far from it—making a TV series finite makes for television that can employ better pace for the plot, richer character development and, most importantly, a complete story arc with a (usually) satisfying conclusion.
The most notable example of this face is my oft-mentioned obsession, ABC's ""Lost."" When the series began, many viewers were uncertain of how long the series could continue with revelations of hatches, Others and Hurley birds. In fact, the writers thought the same thing—remember when Kate and Sawyer were locked in the cages for what felt like an entire season? That was the writers stalling, afraid of showing all their cards without any idea of how much space their mystery would ultimately have to fill.
At this time, producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse negotiated something with ABC that was unheard of for a popular network show at the time—an end date that would give ""Lost"" a total of six seasons that are finally drawing to a close in just a few weeks. The end date allowed ""Lost"" writers to parcel out mystery and plot in delicious bites over the last three years, slowly building to the time-traveling, alternate-dimension hopping show we all know and love.
Need more proof? Look at all the great shows that suffer an excruciating downward spiral from excellence to mediocrity to wretchedness when the writers refuse to throw in the towel. Case in point: ""Scrubs,"" which slowly cut off every aspect of the ""young doctors making it"" until it was just about every fucking character suddenly having a baby. In fact, ""How I Met Your Mother"" is starting to show the same signs of plot-stalling and watered-down premises—perhaps setting a timetable for revealing that mother is in order.
The ""Mad Men"" end date has yet to be made official by AMC, but I for one hope it sticks. TV producers and writers should be allowed to craft complete experiences, and not be forced to prolong the life of a series just to keep people watching until they are forced to turn away in disgust (I'm looking at you, ""Heroes""). Three exquisite seasons of Sterling-Cooper-Draper-Pryce will be much better than 10 mediocre ones.
Mark has a theory that Season 3 is the turning point for all TV shows, and if by Season 5 no end is in sight, the show is almost always doomed to a decline in quality. Send your inevitable counter-examples to mriechers@wisc.edu. ""The Simpsons"" does not count.
