Just observing the disaster of Suicide Squad game, the calamity of the current Doctor Who and many other franchises along the way, it feels like we are on the eve of a purge in western media where a lot of franchises are going to die or at the very least, be put on a very long hiatus.
In my opinion, a lot of these survive off habit, you get used to enjoying a certain thing, you regularly consume certain thing and never think about it. Until they make something that breaks that habit it won't die so thought I'd list off some of those bits of media that killed off a franchise:
Command and Conquer= C&C4: This one singlehandedly killed the franchise, even before they used it's corpse for a mobile game. The complete removal of bases from the game itself was the dumbest decision ever made, but not the first time EA would remove a core mechanic from a major franchise..
Battlefield: Battlefield 2042: the other example by removing classes for 'operators' in the game probably damaged it more than just how much it was a buggy unplayable mess. It was such a bad decision that they put the classes back in but with talk of the next being a live service and even the return of operators, I can hear the death chimes for this franchise just like honourable mention the Medal of Honour series.
Star Wars: The Last Jedi: it's amazing how this single film started this franchise tanking that was bought for billions and even had people appreciating the prequels more. From the bad writing, stale acting and stupid plot, this killed the enthusiasm for a decades long series.
The potential new ones: AC Shadows and GTA6: these two in the future have the possibility to kill their respective franchises. We are finding more and more on AC that it's looking like every wrong move has been taken and with how lackluster Mirage was received, it ain't looking good. GTA6 however, there's a possibility it'll simply be another Cyberpunk in just not meeting expectations which IS recoverable.
Just thought this was interesting to discuss seeing franchises both established and barely formed (cough Trench Crusade) killing themselves in a single release especially around our current time.
For me it was the last season of House of Cards on Netflix. The series was already becoming increasing unbelievable to me by that point with holes in some plots and lack of satisfying closure in others, but the last season went warp speed ahead on it. Spoiler alert: It ended with the entire U.S. cabinet becoming 100% female and standing in a line breaking the fourth wall looking right into the camera all smug and arrogantly. It couldn't be more obvious of a statement if someone in the background held up a sign reading "Women are better than men in every way possible."
Before that the messaging was more subtle but still noticeable. Like in the climate change movie (The Day After Tomorrow, I think)...in it was a very important government official who looked just like Dick Cheney denying that anything was going to happen when one of the climatologists kept warning him about the major weather disturbances.
Yea I noticed that too. I need to watch the original British version
Unless you are in it for the 'art form' don't go in expecting anything spectacular after having had the plot spoiled by the US version.
At least it had the good sense to not milk itself for multiple zombie seasons.