Some nice, smooth, consistent quality. Better Call Saul was in my opinion pretty consistent. Single season anime is almost always consistent, like My Dress-Up Darling or Terror in Resonance.

Not dragging on longer than the series needs to seems to be a key point.

  • D61 [any]@hexbear.net
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    2 months ago

    The Expanse seemed to be pretty even throughout its six season run. Maybe the only real “ding” is the fourth season where most of Jame’s crew is on a planet.

    Firefly. I’m not sure if there was enough gas in that show’s tank to have kept it on this list or if the plug getting pulled at 14 episodes did it a favor for us fan’s collective opinion of it.

    Though I’d imagine that “space opera” is easier to keep the story/plot quality pretty even as writers can always just switch to a different set of characters to avoid having to deal with writing their way out of plot corners.

    • Nakoichi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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      2 months ago

      The Expanse was good but it’s a damn shame it didn’t get three more seasons to cover the final book trilogy. It omitted some of the most amazing setpiece points.

      spoiler

      Specifically Bobby fighting the capital ship in just her power armor then riding the nuke to kill it Dr. Strangelove style

      • D61 [any]@hexbear.net
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        2 months ago
        spoiler

        Oh yeah, there’d be some pretty good space fight set pieces. But trying to visually conceptualize all the Proto-molecule Builders and “Whatever the fuck extra dimensional critters they pissed off” probably would have been too difficult to do in a way to make everybody happy.

        Also, what was it… like a 30 year time jump for the last chunk of books? That would have been a miserable thing to put all the main cast through for another 3~5 seasons.

        • Nakoichi [they/them]@hexbear.net
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          2 months ago

          It was a 10 year time jump so here’s hoping we get a reboot in a few years and also it was cancelled because the guy that played Alex the pilot turned out to be a sex pest.

          Nevermind you’re right it was a 30 year time jump I just accepted it as the sort of future tech they had could explain away the fact Holden and friends would all be old and decrepit by that time in universe.

    • Tabitha ☢️[she/her]@hexbear.net
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      2 months ago

      Though I’d imagine that “space opera” is easier to keep the story/plot quality pretty even as writers can always just switch to a different set of characters to avoid having to deal with writing their way out of plot corners.

      outside of shows that are intentionally anthologies, that sounds to me like OP’s fear of shows not only dragging on longer than they need to, but also endlessly dragging the viewer nowhere forever.

      • D61 [any]@hexbear.net
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        2 months ago

        Yeah… I’ve definitely grown to enjoy shows that know they have to end and know what that ending is going to be instead of just dragging the corpses of all the characters through eternity.

        I get wanting to watch a show forever, getting attached to characters and their antics (looking at you Red Dwarf) but its okay to let the characters and their stories fade into the sunset as it were.

    • joaomarrom [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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      2 months ago

      The Expanse seemed to be pretty even throughout its six season run. Maybe the only real “ding” is the fourth season where most of Jame’s crew is on a planet.

      True, and the same applies to the book that was adapted into that particular season. Cibola Burn is by far the weakest book, but then it’s followed by Nemesis Games, which is by far the best one. I do think, however, that The Expanse starts off very slow, and it only picks up the pace after the Donnager, three or four episodes in.

      • D61 [any]@hexbear.net
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        2 months ago

        Would have been a bigger ding if they kept the sex pest around, no?

        Also, I’m fine separating the plot stuff from the actor’s who are being shitty human beings.

        • BelieveRevolt [he/him]@hexbear.net
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          2 months ago

          Yeah, at least they did the right thing there, but for me personally seeing that guy is a stain on the series, even though the allegations came out later. I can’t really watch anything that had Kevin Spacey in it either.

          • D61 [any]@hexbear.net
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            2 months ago

            Oh yeah… it definitely negatively colored a lot of the “touching scenes” that this character has throughout the series.

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    2 months ago

    Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency. It’s perfect from start to finish, but it ended after the 2nd season because it was cancelled 💀 so might not count.

    • BelieveRevolt [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      2 months ago

      I feel the same way about GLOW, the way Netflix cancelled the last season after they’d already started making it is one of the reasons I won’t give them money anymore.

      • novibe@lemmy.ml
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        2 months ago

        Honestly fuck Netflix so much… literal embodiment of how capitalism is a scourge on everything that makes human life worth it.

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        2 months ago

        It does and it’s so good! I love basically everything Elijah Woods has done tbh, and he is awesome in this.

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    2 months ago

    I thought She-Ra and the Princesses of Power stayed good right through the end.

    Almost every episode of TNG is good, and the few bad ones were concentrated toward the beginning, not the end.

    I answered Stargate as an overall TV franchise to the opposite question earlier, but SG-1 and Atlantis taken as individual series both stay good, although SG-1 is basically a different also good series in its last three seasons.

    Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann rules all the way through, before and after the timeskip.

    • SoylentSnake [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.net
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      2 months ago

      fr. if anything should’ve had one more season (or at least a couple more eps in season 3), a few arcs/characters felt like they didn’t get a proper sendoff and a few threads left dangling that shouldn’t have been.

      • FunkyStuff [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        2 months ago

        There’s some interesting stuff halfway through S2 too, like when the Fireman appears out of nowhere. But the majority of it is just a waste of time. Worth getting through so you can watch S3 though, which is consistently good throughout.

        Also worth noting that Twin Peaks S1 and S2 are meant to be parodies of the contemporary soap operas, while S3 is a deconstruction of modern Prestige TV shows like Breaking Bad. So the camp comes with the territory.

        • ImmortanStalin@lemmygrad.ml
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          2 months ago

          For anyone catching this new to Twin Peaks, also watch the prequel movie 'Fire Walk With Me" AFTER watching the first two seasons, but before season 3. The content warning would pretty much include everything.

  • Chump [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    2 months ago

    I thought The Wire was basically perfect all the way through, though a lot of people didn’t like the final season so much

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    Scavengers Reign is an exceptional work of art that I think not enough people have seen! I can’t recommend it enough

    Edit: also, The Terror is another show that very few people seem to have watched, and it’s unbelievably good. It was supposed to be just a limited series, but they tacked on a second season and tried to turn it into an anthology show. Ignore that aspect, think of it as a miniseries and it’s one of the best horror shows I’ve ever seen.

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    2 months ago

    Steven Universe

    Avatar

    Bojack Horseman

    Venture Bros.

    Party Down

    Silicon Valley

    Star Trek TOS, TNG and DS9 are inconsistent, but trend toward better.

    Community is often derided for a falloff in quality halfway through, but I actually think it’s quite funny all the way

    Scrubs if you stop at it’s intended series finale episode. The studio execs forced them to keep going with a cast change, but you can just stop watching at that point.

    • QuillcrestFalconer [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      2 months ago

      Community is often derided for a falloff in quality halfway through, but I actually think it’s quite funny all the way

      Me too. Don’t they like change writers in season 4 or something and then in the first episode the writers decided to make it a sitcom as a joke, I was horrified at first but when I realised it was a joke it was hilarious

      • LENINSGHOSTFACEKILLA [he/him]@hexbear.net
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        2 months ago

        iirc, the showrunner, Dan Harmon, had some allegations against him and they ditched him. I’m unsure of the reality of the situation or what the allegations even were, but he came back for the last season.

        • AmericaDeserved711 [any]@hexbear.net
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          2 months ago

          that’s not the case, he was accused of (and admitted to) sexual misconduct years after Community ended

          he was fired from season 4 due to “creative differences” but returned for seasons 5 and 6