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ZanyDelaney t1_iy9ik6a wrote

Reply to comment by getmybehindsatan in TIL During the 20th century TV series that reached 100 episodes were generally preferred for syndication, since that meant stations could run 20 weeks of programming without repeating a story. In recent years that number has fallen to 88 episodes. by UndyingCorn

I loved the Mary Tyler Moore show (1970-1977). It is high quality with many great episodes. But it too has several episodes that while pretty good, definitely do repeat ideas from earlier episodes and feel like filler. It can be a slog to produce top quality week and week (each of the seven seasons had 24 episodes).

I never liked the boyfriend of the week episodes that suddenly introduce a new guy who is usually never seen or mentioned in any later episode. The rare case a boyfriend returns the explanations for where he has been never match up with what we actually saw on screen.

There were actually a couple of trapped episodes but they were really good ones. (All are snowed in for "The Snow Must Go On" and "Not a Christmas Story".) Every episode of the show had few sets so I think the trapped bit wasn't done as a time saver it was key to the episode.

The final few episodes were the worst featuring a fantasy episode and a clip show.

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