How 'Roseanne' Had the Most Disastrous Endgame in TV History

[workinclasszero]

One racist tweet later, TV's most popular show is no more – but the new 'Roseanne' had already done irreparable damage before that
By Rob Sheffield 4 hours ago RollingStone

Roseanne no longer holds the record for the ugliest endgame in TV history. The new champion is ... Roseanne. Back in 1997, America's favorite family flamed out with an "it was all a dream" final season that insulted any fan who ever loved the Conners. But then, like so many stories, this one got even nastier in 2018. Roseanne Barr, now a far-right pundit fond of racist tirades and conspiracy theories, rebooted the show, and Roseanne 2.0 shocked the industry in late March by blowing up into a ratings blockbuster – the biggest hit on TV.

Executive producer Wanda Sykes, who was just dandy with having her name in the opening credits until yesterday, defended the show this season, in strikingly lame terms. "Extreme anything is nuts," she told Metro Boston. "Extreme left is just as nuts as the extreme right. The only way that we're going to patch things up in this country is the people in the middle got to start talking to each other instead of just battling it out on Twitter." Note: She said this in April 2018, not October 2016. What kind of rabid both-sides apologist is still clinging to "just as nuts" equivalences at a time like this? A statement like this says a lot about how a disaster like Roseanne happened in the first place.

New Roseanne was designed to normalize the extreme right by presenting it as the safe middle. It did a good job with that. As the unflaggingly controversial Bill Maher warned a few years ago, it's pointless to suck up to the moderates on the other side, for one reason: "There are no moderates on the other side."

https://www.rollingstone.com/tv/news/how-roseanne-had-the-most-disastrous-endgame-in-tv-history-w520879

[Wellstone ruled]

1. Melissa Gilbert was the main

force behind this Show. And as Maher said,attempt to normalize . Gilbert has this idea she could bring the Fascist and the Fringe Viewers to the middle.

[Blue_Adept]

2. Sara Gilbert

Melissa was part of my Little House on the Prairie life.

[procon]

4. Whew... clarification appreciated. nt

[Wellstone ruled]

12. Sorry had the Prairie on my mind.

Just got off the phone with the Bro on the Prairie.

[workinclasszero]

5. This BS about bringing the left and right together to 'talk' has got to end

There is no accepting the racism, lies and anti-science of the GOP!

What happens every time is the normalization of republican fascism and the demonizing of liberalism which the new Rosanne show was all about.

[FakeNoose]

3. "It was all a dream" came from the old show Dallas

Remember Dallas? The prime-time drama series about the J.R. Ewing family that ran all through the '80s? Bobby Ewing (J.R.'s brother) left the show but came back for the final cliff-hanger show where he "woke up" and realized the previous 9 seasons had all been a dream. None of that stuff really happened! Regular viewers felt so cheated by that cop-out that most people quit watching after that.

Roseanne made a spoof of that Dallas "It was all a dream" show as her final show, and I guess most people got the joke. Or they didn't, I don't really know. Roseanne had lost most of her viewers by that time and very few people even cared anymore.

[lunamagica]

6. Not the whole nine seasons, just that one. Bobby died in the previous season finale

and a whole year went by where he was dead. Then in the last episode Pam wakes up to find Bobby in the shower. The whole year was nothing but Pam's dream.

And yes, the show could never recover from that.

[FakeNoose]

7. OK your memory is better than mine

Thank you!

[lunamagica]

11. ...

[Initech]

8. Can we please end the "extreme left is the same as the extreme right" nonsense?

We are *NOT* the ones who spout racist, sexist, homophobic bullshit and we are also not the ones who have baseless conspiracy theories like "the Storm" which Roseanne is a huge fan of. It's time for this shit to end now.

[workinclasszero]

10. Totally agree!

[CentralMass]

9. ...

[muriel_volestrangler]

13. "Conners face ruin from a flood...touched President Trump's heart and he's sending them thousands...

of dollars in FEMA money"

Seriously? That was the plotline? The show was a piece-of-shit bit of propaganda designed to make Trump look good? Fuck, everyone associated with it should have resigned when that script was OKed. Sitcoms aren't there to be North-Korean-style fellatio of Our Glorious Leader.

[lame54]

14. Sent at the speed of Ben Carson