Jumping the Shark

Jumping the shark is a phrase used in television used to describe when a show has gone too far and pushed the boundaries of what is acceptable and believable in its given world. The phrase came from a Happy Daze episode where the writers had Fonzie literally jump over a shark. Since then the phrase has become sort of an industry term as a manner of critique. So what other jumping the shark moments have we seen in television history? Surely there are plenty but here are the ones that stuck out the most to me.

Riverdale: Faking Juggie’s Death

Now we have already established that Riverdale as a whole is just one big jumping the shark moment for the entirety of the television industry however they did have what I believe is a real turning point in the series that just kind of gave the writers permission to do whatever they wanted regardless of how much sense it did or didn’t make. That point is when Jughead, with the help of his friends, faked his own death. Now these kids are still in high school so in a show that was already pushing the boundaries this still seemed to be a bit much. Of course that plot point was followed by much bigger jumping the shark moments, but Jughead faking his death was a license for these bigger, and weirder moments to take place.

Supernatural: So many different options

So I loved Supernatural for a lot longer than most I think. I think up to season 7 the show was genuinely good, I really loved the leviathan storyline after that however is when I think the decrease in quality was super noticeable. Now up through season 10 was at the very least still interesting. However as seasons 11-15 happened there were just too many stakes that were raised and too much going on to actually enjoy. Now everyone has their own jumping the shark moment for Supernatural but mine truly was the very idea that God had a sister. Of all the things that I had seen on that show by this point, demons and angels, metatron, cain and abel the most unnecessary out of left field moment for me was God having a sister. There was really no recovering from that and it just got worse from there.

Vampire Diaries: Kai is a witch and a vampire who can heal himself from werewolf bites….

Look I have many many gripes with this, the biggest of which being that the writers room had no idea what they were doing. If you have a show with witches and vampires and werewolves you would think that the BARE MINIMUM thing to do is have the basic rules of the world written out so that no matter who comes through the writers room your show makes sense. But no clearly no one did that so Kai gets bitten and then magicks himself out of dying even though we have already established that 1)There is only 1 single cure for a werewolf bite AND 2) that you can not be both a vampire and a witch. That whole storyline was poorly written garbage that shit all over the established lore of the already basically plagiarized show.

Overall most shows have at least one of these moments when they go on for longer than originally planned. The sweet spot for 1 hour drama’s seems to be 5 seasons, very rarely are they good after this point. If a show is not planned out from beginning to end before it starts filming then at some point someone is going to have to make some shit up and that almost never ends well.