@KinoEscalate: Vampire Diaries is good, but not as much this season. This season it's much less loose. It's a show that should have had ended in 2 seasons overall.

@jnemesh: Actually, creating a franchise is a good thing, because it can eventually reveal more of the same universe, via sequel tv shows. The problem is that some kinds of shows can't be franchises, because their story doesn't allow them so.

@Lotusmonger: I do not agree with #8. If there's no mystery, there's no story for me. It's what drove me to LOST.

@Urabutln: Twin Peaks should have ended after the first season, and then maybe make a tele-movie, but that's about it. The execs were right to ask for the answer. The problem was that they also asked for a second season.

@jp182: I can't focus for more than 5 minutes on books (problem since I was a kid), so for me TV/movies is the only way to get entertainment. I'm a very visual person too (I'm a filmmaker, and I also paint), so it has to be through images. I can't play videogames either, because most of these are 3D these days, and…

@ultraaman: Actually, none of these shows you mention have an overreaching arc. They have a background setup story, e.g. the serial killer who killed his family in "The Mentalist" case, but that's not really a real arc. It's bread crumbs thrown at our eyes. These shows are by and large episodic.

@sixfootgnome: Exactly. LOST *could* have had a great finale. There were some community theories that were far more cooler than what we got from the writers.

@Post-Nuked: Well said. I better nail my eyes and ears than watch Glee. It represents exactly how unintelligent viewers can be.

@morodrim: Agreed. Read my comment on the thread right above. We need writers/producers who pitch shows for ~3 seasons of 12/16/18 episodes and no more, and have the whole story pre-drafted, for each episode, and with a clear ending.

@Shayne: Yes, and no. I agree that arcs that go nowhere are bad. But I prefer shows with big arcs rather than episodic TV. The *key* here is to go in front of the TV execs and tell them "I have such and such an idea for a TV show, but I need 3 seasons, of 12 or 18 episodes each". With ALL the episodes already drafted…

@fraserwight: Actually, I believe that the LOST writers did have an end in mind. It's just that that end was a bad end.

@MisterBuckles: The point is that we can't stand it anymore. We demand better than we currently have.

@bluehinter: I do not agree with this, because if you have a story like LOST, you can't just create a 13 episode mini show and hope for the best. You can't just "cut off " the story there. You either have the go ahead, or you don't. And personally I prefer complex arcs like LOST, which is arc'ed in 6 seasons, rather…

@aswearengen: The Big Bang Theory was such a show. It was ready to get canceled in the first season, and all of a sudden it became a hit on season 2. But yes, except this show, no other show has built an audience lately. "Castle" on ABC also built an audience btw, but it was a less significant amount of viewers than…

@Jack B. Quick (jbq): BTW, I forgot to say, I also like the UK documentaries. Comedy and documentaries work great for me from the UK TV. But serialized scripted drama shows, and especially scifi, I can't stand, sorry.

@Jack B. Quick (jbq): No, I didn't mean to be rude, I was just saying my opinion. I don't like UK shows, apart from comedies. For comedies I'm looking only at the jokes, so I don't care about the production quality. But for scifi, it has to be the way I expect it to be.

@RC: I don't disagree with what you write, it's just that today's audience doesn't get what it expects in terms of sophistication. It gets what it should have gotten in 1999 instead.

@Scimarad: IMO, FlashForward was better than Caprica. Caprica tried too hard, but in the wrong direction. The show was just way too slow, boring, and the religious themes didn't help at all an audience who watches science fiction for the science rather than the supernatural.

@Sailor_Vee: I agree with everything you said, except the Terminator show. It was not a good show, sorry to burst the bubble. In many ways, it made feel bored the same way Dollhouse did.

@DrZaius: SGU second season was actually pretty good. It's the best show of the rest of stargates anyway. It's not as cliche at least.