“Jump the Shark” has Jumped the Shark

I was reading a post about Steve Carell leaving The Office, and against my better judgment read some user comments. Of course, several were along the lines of “The Original was better!” (yeah, haven’t heard that 15 BILLION TIMES over the last 6 years) but the other negative comment I kept reading was, “They need to just cancel the show, it jumped the shark years ago.”

Okay, to everyone out there in regards to "Jump the Shark"

Now, I remember when this term kind of came into internet vogue in the early 2000s, and I thought I understood it’s meaning. But Urban Dictionary tells me it’s: “a term to describe a moment when something that was once great has reached a point where it will now decline in quality and popularity.”

I take this to mean “Jump the shark” can refer to anything that’s not quite as good as it once was.

“My car sure jumped the shark after it reached 100,000 miles.”
“Ew, this milk has jumped the shark!”
“Grandma really jumped the shark when she developed osteoporosis.”
“I’m sorry, I have you break up with you, this relationship has jumped the shark.”

Wow, “Jump the shark” has, well, kinda jumped the shark in that people have taken this term that once referred to someone very specific and now just uses it as a quick and easy criticism of any TV show that had an episode or storyline they didn’t care for. The Old “Jump the Shark” website even had a category where people listed shows they felt jumped the shark on Day One. THIS MAKE NO SENSE!

The original meaning (from Wikipedia) was, “a moment…characterized by absurdity, when a show abandons its core premises and begins a decline in quality that is beyond recovery.”

It’s not just when a show gradually becomes stale and repetitive, which is pretty much bound to happen to any show that runs longer than 2-3 seasons, it’s the point where the show does something ridiculous and completely incongruent with the show, and THEN suffers a steady decline marked by gimmicky and desperate attempts to regain audience.

True “jumping the shark” is things like this happening:

• same character: different actor
• introduction of a new kid because the other kids on the show are getting older.
• ridiculously “themed” episode (I’m talking black and white “what would this show be like in the 40’s” episodes)
• character coming back from the dead
• completely outlandish storyline

A TV show can definitely have any of these shark jumping moments, but if it recovers from them, the series as a whole hasn’t really “jumped the shark.”

Now I’ll concede that The Office has had some “shark jumpy” moments (the Dwight/Angela/Andy story line in Season 4 comes to mind) but I also feel the current Season 7 has been their strongest in years.

So unless Michael Scott is killed off and then brought back from the dead, but played by a different actor, I don’t believe The Office has or will truly “jump the shark.”