In Defense of the Sprawl: An Ode to Long-Running TV Shows

By Sana Belaluddin, Edited by Alexis Lopez and Vrinda Das

There’s a quote by author Heidi Priebe that goes, “To love someone long-term is to attend a thousand funerals of the person they used to be.” The same is true, I’ve found, of television. I often return to this quote when watching Community’s frustrating later seasons. The six-season sitcom follows a group of ‘zany oddballs’ who form a makeshift family as students at Greendale Community College. Greendale brings together misfits from all walks of life, conveniently demonstrated by the members of the central study group: manipulative ex-lawyer Jeff Winger (Joel McHale), socially oblivious cinephile Abed Nadir (Danny Pudi), overachieving former addict Annie Edison (Alison Brie), misguided activist Britta Perry (Gillian Jacobs), recent divorcee Shirley Bennet (Yvette Nicole Brown), kindhearted jock Troy Barnes (Donald Glover), and abrasive retiree Pierce Hawthorne (Chevy Chase). Community became known for its high-concept riffs on pop culture formats ranging from the Western to stop-motion animation. But the majority of their episodes, whether modeled after Law and Order or The Civil War, tend to follow the same structure: a character makes a mistake that leads to conflict within the group, they learn their lesson, and everyone hugs and makes up. Even when episodes diverge from this formula, they maintain the idealistic outlook behind it. For four seasons, the show’s message is one of optimism—these friends are made better by each other. This message is embodied by the show’s lead, Jeff Winger, whose cold heart is softened by his newfound community. While Jeff enters Greendale as a selfish con artist who only cares about himself, he gradually learns to use his skills of manipulation to help the people he loves. 

But the last two seasons of Community are a bit more somber. After graduating at the end of season four, Jeff tries to restart his law practice with a new moral code. He quickly finds that morals don’t get you very far outside Greendale, as his business fails disastrously. He’s now stuck at Greendale and thoroughly depressed about it. He starts drinking more frequently; when a glass of scotch is taken from his hand in the season five premiere, he remarks despondently, “That was it. That was all I had” (“Repilot” 00:02:22). He struggles to accept his new existence as “a middle-aged community college teacher,” and expresses fears that all of his friends will leave him behind (“G.I. Jeff” 00:13:56). This change in Jeff reflects a broader transformation in the tone of the show itself. There are no more tidy resolutions, no more palatable lessons learned. Seasons five and six are even visually distinct from the previous four. Where the earlier seasons are characterized by a vibrant color palette, the last two feature desaturated colors, cooler tones, and dimmer lighting.

Even the show’s quirky adventures take on a darker tone. A season five episode modeled after David Fincher’s mystery thrillers, for instance, ends on an ambiguous note that leaves viewers with more questions than answers. In “Basic Intergluteal Numismatics,” Annie and Jeff team up to catch a bandit who’s been terrorizing the school by dropping quarters down unsuspecting students’ pants. On a deeper level, the episode centers around Annie and Jeff’s long-standing will-they-won’t-they romance, as the dean of the school suggests that they like to solve mysteries together in order to avoid acting on their feelings for each other. The episode is evocative of season two’s “Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design,” which also saw Annie and Jeff partner up to solve a mystery. In that episode, which pays homage to the conspiracy thriller genre, Jeff tries to get credit for a fake class and discovers his made-up professor actually exists. Annie persuades Jeff to unravel the mystery, leading to a comedic climax in which four different conspiracies are revealed in quick succession. Like “Basic Intergluteal Numismatics,” this episode also teases the unresolved tension in Jeff and Annie’s relationship, but it ultimately ends with the two of them on the same team, united in their plan to teach the dean a lesson for conspiring with too many people. Even while borrowing from labyrinthine conspiracy thrillers, the episode delivers a satisfying ending in which all loose ends are tied up (almost laughably so). Unlike “Conspiracy Theories,” however, “Basic Intergluteal Numismatics” leaves everything unresolved. Jeff and Annie never catch their culprit, nor do they meaningfully address their relationship. 

In perhaps the show’s most disturbing episode, Jeff finds himself in a warped version of the ‘80s cartoon G.I. Joe. He experiences brief flashes of the ‘real’ world, including the beeping of a heart monitor and his friends tearfully calling out for him to wake up. Eventually, we learn that this cartoon is a strange fever dream of Jeff’s, who overdosed on a fifth of scotch and some youth pills after an existential crisis about aging. When ‘cartoon’ Britta asks if he was trying to commit suicide, Jeff insists he wasn’t, but he also demonstrates a reluctance to rejoin the world of the living. “I chose this,” he says, referring to the G. I. Joe dream world (“G.I. Jeff” 00:14:17). Jeff may not have actively tried to kill himself, but for at least a moment, he chose death over life. And yet, the show never really reckons with those darker implications. The episode ends with a classic Community group hug, but it rings hollow. Jeff’s brush with death is never mentioned again, and his frequent drinking becomes just another quirky character trait. When Frankie (Paget Brewster), a consultant introduced in season six to fix up the school, suggests he’s a “functional alcoholic,” it’s played off as a joke (“Basic Email Security” 00:14:05). 

“G.I. Jeff” highlights the dark undercurrent that runs through Community’s two final seasons. Greendale, once a refuge, has become a prison. The initial charm of Greendale was that it was a place for lost souls to temporarily figure out their lives; the longer the characters stay there, the more depressing their inability to make it in the real world becomes. While the show used to argue that the study group pushes each other to become better people, it now frames their bond as toxic. In the season six episode “Wedding Videography,” Jeff remarks that the group is strong because their “flaws feed into each other” (00:07:01). Frankie observes that this could also be called “codependence” (“Wedding Videography” 00:07:05). She’s proven right when the group shows up to a classmate’s wedding drunk and proceeds to take over the entire event. Shot in a mockumentary style, the episode seems to suggest that these selfish, unlikable people are what the study group would truly look like to an outside observer. Instead of helping each other to become better people, the group now enables each other’s most obnoxious behaviors. In another season six episode, the gang bands together in classic Community fashion to ensure a racist comedian gets to perform at Greendale. Reflecting on their actions at the end of the episode, the group’s former enemy turned friend Chang (Ken Jeong) asks, “What’s the lesson here? I always wanna make sure I know what the lesson is” (“Basic Email Security” 00:24:12). His remark pokes fun at the formula that once governed the show, in which the characters usually walked away having learned a lesson. As the group throws around nonsensical buzzwords like “Government is terrorism” and “Tarry not, for terrorism terrifies,” it becomes clear that there is no lesson this time. The structure of the earlier seasons has fallen apart. Community has essentially started to parody itself, abandoning its optimistic worldview for hardened cynicism.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with any of this. It’s just not Community. At least, it’s not the Community that fans grew to love for the first four seasons. I can understand why this would alienate some people. Viewers want consistency. They don’t want to watch their beloved show morph into something they don’t recognize. A common complaint about long-running TV shows is that they “overstayed their welcome,” suggesting that there’s an inevitable decline in quality that comes with lengthy series (Khan). Consider the reactions to the recent ending of Succession. The news that the gripping HBO drama would be ending with season four was met with the usual dismay from viewers sad to see it go. But many also praised creator Jesse Armstrong’s decision to end the show on a strong note. Tom Nicholson argued in Esquire that the news was a “relief” because “most great TV programmes go on slightly too long.” Stuart Heritage made a similar argument in favor of shorter shows in the Guardian: “No bad seasons. No listless wheel spinning. No crazy new characters being introduced after seven years to cover for the sudden loss of a cast member. Just good, succinct storytelling.” I can see where he’s coming from. I remember raging about how Grey’s Anatomy became unbearably melodramatic around season ten. In its early seasons, the medical drama balanced its heavier storylines with a healthy dose of comedy. Ten years on, however, it seemed to run out of jokes. Half of the original characters had either been killed off or banished. Those that remained had been through an almost comical amount of trauma—plane crashes, mass shootings, near drownings, you name it. Grey’s became a different beast, trading in its catchy pop rock soundtrack for soulful stripped-down covers. I hated it. It’s tough to watch a TV show you love lose what made you love it in the first place. Many would rather the show just die a merciful death before that happens–I used to be in that camp. 

And then the pandemic happened. I was a freshman in college at the time, sent home over spring break for who knows how long. As we all slowly began to grasp the reality of the situation, I struggled to adjust to the new normal. I had to let go of whatever ideal college experience I had imagined for myself. I said goodbye to the apartment in the university village I was planning to live in next year. I drifted from my closest friends, and eventually had a falling out with them that left me completely isolated. When my school finally reopened for in-person instruction, I was hit with another change: my mom got sick. It turned out she had an autoimmune disease that affected her mobility. She was unable to walk without assistance, and she would likely need to be on medication to manage it for the foreseeable future. 

Over the past few years, I’ve seen my life transform into something I didn’t recognize over and over again. It's made me appreciate TV shows that transform themselves over the course of their lives. There’s something comforting about seeing a show reinvent itself, especially after being forced to do so myself.  

Take Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which found itself in a similar predicament as Community in its penultimate season. The sixth season of the supernatural teen drama following young vampire slayer Buffy Summers (Sarah Michelle Gellar) was hated by many fans for its darker tone and subject matter. Buffy, having died and been resurrected, struggles to adjust to being alive again. Throughout the season, she is depressed and suicidal. She admits that she wishes her friends never brought her back to life because she had finally found peace in death. It’s not a stretch to read seasons five and six of Community as a kind of death and rebirth. The season five premiere is even called “Repilot,” functioning as a soft reboot. Both Community and Buffy find 

themselves reckoning with what happens when stories outlive their natural ending. These shows are faced with an existential question: how do we go on now? 

It’s worth pointing out that the changes in the later seasons of Community reflected behind-the-scenes events. Creator Dan Harmon was fired after season three and rehired after the widely panned fourth season. At the same time, the show was “hemorrhaging” key cast members, as Abed puts it in the finale (“Emotional Consequences” 00:04:27). Chevy Chase, Yvette Nicole Brown, and Donald Glover all left at various points in season five. NBC canceled the show after that season, and it moved to Yahoo for its sixth and final season (Adalian). Network switch-ups also influenced Buffy in season six; the series moved from the WB to UPN over budget issues (“Sold!”). TV, more than any other medium, is marred by the fingerprints of real life. Actors get pregnant, showrunners leave, global pandemics strike—and TV shows must adapt. The nature of television makes it nearly impossible for any show to remain perfect, to serve the ideals of story above all else. 

Of course, the ugly economic reality of TV is that story often isn’t the main priority. As Brian Phillips points out, “[TV shows are] designed to keep growing, to keep inventing new stuff until they reach the outer limits of profitability or their creators’ patience.” Networks are happy to run successful shows for as long as they keep making money, and I’m sure even the most idealistic creatives appreciate having a steady job. So shows find ways to prolong themselves past their natural ending. “The carousel never stops turning,” as Meredith Grey’s (Ellen Pompeo) mother tells her in an early episode of Grey’s Anatomy, “You can’t get off” (“Bring the Pain” 00:38:12). What she meant as a metaphor for life becomes an even better metaphor for Grey’s itself, and indeed television in general. The characters aren’t allowed to move on, as long as the show keeps running. The community college students can’t graduate; the vampire slayer can’t die a hero’s death. Meredith Grey can never get off the damn carousel. Movies are clean, complete, finished products. TV sprawls. It evolves. It adapts to its environment. In the case of Community, Grey’s, and Buffy, their transformations each seem to signal that the show could not continue on as it had. It has to become something new. 

The model of the long-running TV show is now a thing of the past. In the age of streaming, TV shows have shorter and shorter runs. A Ringer article found that the average length of a TV season in 2017 was nine episodes, a sharp decline from the once-standard 22 (Lindbergh). Streaming shows have shorter overall lifespans as well, with most shows only lasting about three seasons (Herman). Under this new model, an entire series can now be condensed into the length of one season of Grey’s. Many would argue this is a good thing—less ‘filler,’ less room to meander. But television’s ability to evolve over time is one of its most unique and narratively rich features. I don’t think we should be willing to write it off so easily. 

I get that we’re all tired of living in a capitalist hellscape where the needs of story are always subservient to those of profit, but I also think it’s possible, with a little imagination, to see the economic realities of the old television model as a feature and not a bug. Sure, there are some shows that I’m happy to see wrapped up in a tight three seasons that have been planned out from the start. But I think there’s value in the sprawl. 

In season twelve of Grey’s Anatomy, long after I had written it off, the show put out one of my all-time favorite episodes,“The Sound of Silence.” In this episode, Meredith is brutally attacked by a patient who’s in a fugue state. She temporarily loses her hearing and has to have her jaw wired shut. We spend much of the episode locked in Meredith’s perspective, unable to hear or speak, forced to observe her friends and family from afar as she slowly recovers from her injuries. It’s a moving episode even as a standalone, but it’s also a poignant encapsulation of the trauma and grief of the previous two seasons of Grey’s. In season eleven, Meredith’s husband, Derek (Patrick Demsey), dies. He was the latest in a long line of series regulars who departed the show, but arguably had the most impactful exit. Meredith and Derek’s romance had been a part of the show’s DNA since the pilot. It was hard to imagine how the show could survive this loss. Is Grey’s still Grey’s without Derek? Or without Cristina (Sandra Oh), Meredith’s best friend who left at the end of season ten (of 20). Or any of the other major characters who left? How many limbs could the show lose before it was too far gone to save?

Grey’s didn’t figure it out immediately. Much of what follows Cristina’s and Derek’s departures is frustrating and uneven. But in “The Sound of Silence,” they hit the nail on the head by connecting Meredith’s physical trauma from the attack to her unprocessed grief for Derek. After many long weeks of recovery Meredith grows frustrated. She lashes out at her friends physically since she can’t do so verbally. Finally, Meredith’s mentor and father figure Richard perceptively concludes that her anger is not just a reaction to the attack but rather a manifestation of her grief for Derek. He tells her that forgiveness is the first step to healing, coaxing her “to forgive Derek for dying too soon. To forgive [herself] for hating him for dying too soon” (“The Sound of Silence” 00:34:17). After her talk with Richard, Meredith agrees to meet her attacker, who has no memory of the event. When she reaches a hand out to forgive him, we understand that she’s healing a lot more than her immediate wounds. It’s a brilliant episode. And it never would have existed if the show had ended at its peak. 

Loss is inevitable in any long-running TV show. But with loss comes the potential for reinvention. It is only after Buffy sinks into the depths of despair that she can (literally) crawl out of them towards the light, as she does in the season six finale. And while Jeff’s arc in the later seasons of Community is dark and unsettling at times, it’s also an honest portrayal of grief—the kind of grief that comes not after a loss, but after a major life change. I’ve become well acquainted with this type of grief over the past few years, and I’ve come to appreciate television’s unique capacity for telling stories about grief. The best TV shows are those that don’t fight against the external circumstances dictating their evolution, but rather use them to craft resonant stories. This process is often messy, and there will inevitably be some episodes or even whole seasons that miss the mark. But I can’t help but admire a storytelling medium that reflects the messiness of real life.

Viewers may want to see a story unfold the way it’s been planned out from beginning to end, but life doesn’t follow a set plan. Our stories should reflect that. I don’t watch Grey’s anymore, but I’m kind of glad it’s still chugging along, on its fifth or sixth or twelfth life by now. While I once begged ABC to put me and Meredith Grey out of our misery and just end the show already, I now appreciate (from afar) its refusal to die. It’s a reminder of the lesson that Jeff and Buffy have to learn in their final seasons: life is worth living, even if it doesn’t look the way you thought it would.

Works Cited

Adalian, Josef. “Community Moving to Yahoo for Sixth Season.” Vulture, Vox Media, June 30, 2014, www.vulture.com/2014/06/community-moving-to-yahoo-for-sixth-season.html.

“Basic Email Security.” Community, created by Dan Harmon, season 6, episode 6, Yahoo! Screen, 2015.

“Bring the Pain.” Grey’s Anatomy, created by Shonda Rhimes, season 2, episode 5, ABC, 2005.

“Emotional Consequences of Broadcast Television.” Community, created by Dan Harmon, season 6, episode 13, Yahoo! Screen, 2015.

“G.I. Jeff.” Community, created by Dan Harmon, season 5, episode 11, NBC, 2014.

Heritage, Stuart. “US TV shows are ending earlier than usual, and that’s a great thing.” The Guardian, Guardian News & Media, May 15, 2023, www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2023/may/15/tv-shows-ending-succession-barry-marvelous-mrs-maisel.

Herman, Alison. “The Life Span of Streaming TV Series Is Shrinking.” The Ringer, SB Nation, August 11, 2020, www.theringer.com/tv/2020/8/11/21363234/high-fidelity-canceled-streaming-tv-series-life-span.

Khan, Fawzia. “10 TV Shows That Overstayed Their Welcome.” CBR, Jan 28, 2023,  www.cbr.com/tv-shows-ran-too-long/.

Lindbergh, Ben. “Mourning the Loss of the Long TV Season.” The Ringer, SB Nation, August 4, 2017, www.theringer.com/tv/2017/8/4/16094348/inefficiency-week-mourning-the-lost-long-tv-season.

Nicholson, Tom. “Why It’s a Relief That ‘Succession’ Is Ending After Season 4.” Esquire, Hearst UK, February 24, 2023, www.esquire.com/uk/culture/a43062535/why-its-a-relief-that-succession-is-ending-after-season-4/.

Phillips, Brian. “In Praise of the TV Shows That Just Won’t Really End.” The Ringer, SB Nation, May 26, 2023, www.theringer.com/tv/2023/5/26/23736151/series-finales-spinoffs-bonus-episodes-ted-lasso-walking-dead.

“Repilot.” Community, created by Dan Harmon, season 5, episode 1, NBC, 2014.

“Sold! Buffy Moves to UPN.” ABC News, April 24, 2001, www.abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/story?id=106281&page=1.

“The Sound of Silence.” Grey’s Anatomy, created by Shonda Rhimes, season 12, episode 9, ABC, 2016.

“Wedding Videography.” Community, created by Dan Harmon, season 6, episode 12, Yahoo! Screen, 2015.