It’s safe to say that TV franchises that started off amazing- or at the very least decent- have declined tremendously in popularity and some have even ended with practically none of their original traction. But why have they? Why do TV franchises decline so greatly in popularity?
Well let’s start with an example- a strong one at that- of a franchise that did more than a lot wrong. Marvel’s Cinematic Universe was once very popular and always gained an insanely huge audience at theaters whenever a new movie dropped. They’re also the main reason superheroes got so popular in the first place. Sure comics were around and sure they were other types of superhero TV before the MCU, but many iconic superheroes would not be as iconic as they are today if not for the MCU. So what happened? What happened to the MCU?
After “Avengers: Endgame” everything went downhill for the MCU. Which may seem like an ironic joke as Endgame is the highest grossing superhero movie of all time. But it isn’t. After Endgame the MCU prioritized quantity over quality, completely oversaturating the fourth phase of the cinematic universe having seven movies and shows and while most of these shows and movies weren’t bad, they were nothing compared to the previous installments in the MCU. And while the writers and directors for The MCU now seem to be trying to make their phases less compact with so many shows and movies, that doesn’t change the irreversible damage caused by their fourth phase, which goes to show how doing too much can actually be a bad thing and shows even further that it can also ruin a completely good thing.
Another TV franchise that declined in popularity is “The Walking Dead” franchise. The TV started off strong but dragged on for way too much. Though that doesn’t sound like a big deal due to the fact that many TV shows drag on and on for a bit too long, TWD’s situation is a bit different.
The Walking Dead has about six TV show spinoffs and their original show has eleven seasons. They made the same mistake MCU writers did and oversaturated their universe while not keeping the writing consistent in quality, which is the main thing TV franchises do wrong which causes them to lose their popularity.
Though there are TV franchises with a lot of shows and movies that are still popular. The prime example of a franchise like this is Star Wars. Even though some installments in the series aren’t as good as others and some are straight up bad, a majority of Star Wars shows and movies are good, so for the most part they’re consistent in quality so even though they have twelve movies and thirteen shows it doesn’t feel like it’s as long of a watch as the MCU is due to how the quality doesn’t often decline.
What most TV franchises do is add too many installments into their cinematic universe and not keep the quality good and consistent, which in turn causes them to lose popularity and hype. The best way for a TV franchise to stay popular is to do the opposite of what I just said most franchises. Just keep a consistent writing quality and you’ll be fine.
