How about the show keeps going for as long as it’s good? Arbitrary time boxes on shows seems silly, some shows are great for 10+ seasons, would suck to lose that because we decided that wasn’t possible
The problem with American TV is that almost everything is unbounded. Some shows manage to keep things going. Others jump the shark.
It’s not that having 10 seasons is bad. But many shows tell the story they wanted to tell in much less time. At which point you should just stop.
Some formats are interesting though like American Horror Story. It’s more like an anthology. Different story each season. Some actors might return with different roles.
Dr Who is also interesting since the mechanism for “reboots” is built in to the character.
Or go the Disney route and expand the individual character stories like they are doing with Marvel and Star Wars.
I'm a fan of shows or movies being as long as they need to be. To Old To Die Young is a great example of a show that is bold and does this. Episodes range anywhere from 30 to 90+ minutes.
That said, for shows that have a continuous, overreaching storyline I'm highly suspect of the writers having no idea how the thing is gonna end. Sure, in some lucky cases it works out super well, but in other cases it gets us unsatisfying stuff that undermines the show like with Lost or Battlestar Galactica. Come up with the story arch and tell the story. Please don't keep stretching the thing out endlessly and end it when it's bad or the crew wants to move on. That's fine with shows that have disconnected episodes, but for modern shows or can ruin the whole thing and leaves me feel like I wasted a ton of time.
