Bring Back Filler

Alyssa Pendon (she/her)

Editorial Team Member

I don’t usually watch TV shows, only because I can’t handle the commitment to watch something. But when I get interested, I can’t get off my couch. So you can take my opinion or leave it, but I don’t understand the new way shows are produced. 

Yes, I am bitter because of the Stranger Things Season 5 release and was inspired to write this blog because of it. But it’s not just about Stranger Things. I don’t understand why shows have 10 episodes max, and each episode could be a movie. Releases are also years apart for no reason and everything is fit into such a short amount of time with no real development. There’s also too much plot armor for the characters. 

It might just sound like I don’t have an attention span to sit down and watch things, but I really do. I can sit down and read a book the whole day if you let me. I’m just annoyed that there's no plot development because there’s no time. It makes no sense to drop movies as episodes and then not even develop everything in time. Most of the time there's so much redundancy in each episode. It’s almost as if the writers forgot the phrase “show don’t tell.” Without spoiling too much, Stranger Things Season 5 is a perfect example of this. There were so many plot holes not addressed and too much time for fans to create theories that were better than the actual writing. There were also just too many characters that most of them weren’t even developed fully or barely had development at all. I think every episode just tried to pack too much at once. 

Even though it is nice to have all the content in 50 minutes each episode, I feel like the normal 20-minute 24 season episodes work nicely. There's more time for characters to be developed, but it also would probably take only a year for each episode. Also, releases for episodes can be spread throughout the year, and shows can even take a hiatus for a couple weeks if needed. And lots of TV shows would then be able to include filler episodes, which are episodes that aren’t necessarily moving the plot or character development but they are fun. Sometimes on TV I just want to see my favorite characters having a room to breathe. And I know not everyone agrees with me, as it might seem like a waste of time. But having more room to slow down could really help some shows compared to shoving everything in 10 episodes. And I also believe that if there's too much filler it negatively impacts the series more. I’m a huge nerd and I love anime, but I love every weird filler episode I see in different anime. It’s nice to see the characters in different scenarios and being able to see the characters in a different light. 

Not all TV is “dead,” Abbot Elementary does the 20-minute run time and 24 episodes seamlessly. Although Abott is a sitcom so it works, it’s one of the better TV shows out right now, since we have a smaller cast but lots of time for development of each character and a mixture of fun and intimate scenes. 

Maybe this isn’t too big of a problem, but I hate to spend so much time on something for it to be lackluster. We’ll see what happens in the future of TV.