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Comment by softwaredoug | Hacker News Reader

A lot of shows go on too long. Andor, the best show of the year, had 2 perfect seasons.

Competitive markets provide natural death of weak content, without premature euthanasia of strong content. With on-demand streaming, viewers can stop watching if/when a show deteriorates in quality. Some shows have maintained relatively high quality over multiple seasons.

  The Americans (6 seasons, 75 episodes)
  Battlestar Galactica (4 seasons, 88 episodes)
  Borgen (3 seasons, 30 episodes)
  Burn Notice (7 seasons, 111 episodes)
  The Shield (7 seasons, 88 episodes)
  Slow Horses (5 seasons, 30 episodes)
  WestWorld (4 seasons, 36 episodes)
  The Wire (5 seasons, 60 episodes)

Star Trek: Voyager(7 seasons, 172 episodes) And they still rushed it at the end.

Yes but some badly ended, serialized, long running shows have made consumers fairly wary.

After Game of Thrones, I think the average consumer is less likely to dive in feet first without knowing the show runners have a clear plan.

I was taught that lesson during Lost. If I see a show start doing unnecessary romantic/drug/backstory scenes, I’m out.

I wish more content makers advertised that they have the whole story planned before the show starts (like Breaking Bad/Vince Gilligan). Show Horses is a good example of a modern story without much fluff.

AFAIK Andor was supposed to be 5 seasons, and the story for seasons 2-5 was squashed into season 2, because the production was too long, because that's how it goes these days in streaming.

It was indeed originally conceived as 5 seasons, but the creator Tony Gilroy has consistently said shortening it was his decision because the production was too long and taxing:

"We were halfway through shooting season 1, coming through Covid, and the monumental size of the show, the effort, and everything else was just dawning on us. We realized that I didn't have enough calories to do it, and Diego's face couldn't take the timing, because it just takes too long to make it."

https://www.gamesradar.com/entertainment/star-wars-tv-shows/...

"By that point, the work that was required to make the show, at its minimum, was just dazzlingly blinding to look at. And Diego was like ‘Oh my god, we told them we’d do five years.’ Nobody, if we were gonna do it like this, you couldn’t physically do it. It was just impossible."

https://screenrant.com/andor-tony-gilroy-original-five-seaso...

If HBO could make a new season of Game of Thrones every year, I don't see what is so complicated about Andor's production.

I think they cared a lot more about the cinematographic aspect and its connection to the story[0].

[0] https://www.pushing-pixels.org/2025/05/20/cinematography-of-...

Game of Thrones has enough story for 12 seasons. Their problem was the compression. Their showrunners got exhausted from it.

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