Current Events > Has there ever been a US TV show where the whole cast changed

(+) Yeah! (+)

except for the main character? And not an anthology series.

Watching a Russian show that like completely changed pace and 98% of the cast after like four seasons and I'm just really confused/surprised by that. I have never seen a show do that before :\
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Saturday Night Live

TheDarkCircle posted...

Saturday Night Live

I guess technically not an anthology show, but I also meant like... continuous, plot-driven series (or at least sitcoms where you'd expect the same cast every week, not a variety/comedy show like SNL/MadTV/etc.).

I know shows have switched out a few characters here and there, or even sometimes an actress for a character (which is really dumb), but again, I can't think of an instance where the whole cast switched out except for the main character and one of the "main" side characters.
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Sliders on SciFi went on so long the entire original cast was replaced one at a time.
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Hexenherz posted...

TheDarkCircle posted...

Saturday Night Live

I guess technically not an anthology show, but I also meant like... continuous, plot-driven series (or at least sitcoms where you'd expect the same cast every week, not a variety/comedy show like SNL/MadTV/etc.).

I know shows have switched out a few characters here and there, or even sometimes an actress for a character (which is really dumb), but again, I can't think of an instance where the whole cast switched out except for the main character and one of the "main" side characters.

Scrubs
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s0nicfan posted...

Sliders on SciFi went on so long the entire original cast was replaced one at a time.

Oh yeah I forgot about that lmao
So depressing, I stopped watching at the last season because of that.
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24 was damn close to this a few times
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Family Matters came close...Towards the end there was maybe 4 people left...Carl, Steve, Eddie and Laura (and even Eddie was sporadic in the last few seasons if i remember right)....most of the other characters were written out of the show and others were brought in to replace them.
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And this show has gone in a completely different direction. It's about a guy who's a high school PE teacher but he also has some mob ties and it almost goes into a sort of Breaking Bad direction where he's coming up with these schemes and crap. His friend owned a strip club and there was sex in every episode.

And now in this season he's like a theater teacher and there's zero sex. Well, there was like one scene but it was more "serious" than the other ones.
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Hexenherz posted...

s0nicfan posted...

Sliders on SciFi went on so long the entire original cast was replaced one at a time.

Oh yeah I forgot about that lmao
So depressing, I stopped watching at the last season because of that.

The "front gate" episode is the single most frustrating episode in all of TV history. It's the one where they actually get back home but think something went wrong because the MC's front gate didn't squeak. Seconds after they slide away the mom comes out with a repairman to thank him for finally getting rid of that squeak
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I feel like there's a very prominent show that did this but it's slipping my mind.

Not a US show but Degrassi TNG completely refreshed its cast like 4 times.
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Sliders was the first one that came to mind actually.

Surely some of those daytime soaps would be the same. Those have been on for decades.
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s0nicfan posted...

Sliders on SciFi went on so long the entire original cast was replaced one at a time.

Rembrandt was there the whole time.
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What about like network crime shows? I'm sure Law and Order or something has done this right?
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Hawaii 5-0 must be like this outside of the two white guy cast members now right?
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ER?

s0nicfan posted...

Hexenherz posted...

s0nicfan posted...

Sliders on SciFi went on so long the entire original cast was replaced one at a time.

Oh yeah I forgot about that lmao
So depressing, I stopped watching at the last season because of that.

The "front gate" episode is the single most frustrating episode in all of TV history. It's the one where they actually get back home but think something went wrong because the MC's front gate didn't squeak. Seconds after they slide away the mom comes out with a repairman to thank him for finally getting rid of that squeak

Lmao yeah. I watched that show in the 90s so it had its charm, and then I rewatched it without looking anything up until the last season when they merged the two brothers into one character...

And like... then it hit me that that show had absolutely no plot to it.

They talk about the Krogans or w/e they were called invading other dimensions but they don't really do anything about it except for fighting them/running away from them in a few episodes.

Then there was supposed to be the plot about the evil professor going with them while the "good" professor gets left behind, but they didn't really explore that.

His girlfriend left (later to show up as a talking brain in a jar apparently?), and Kari Wuhrer took over, and that was a weird character because she was all super hard charging gung-ho straight edge yes-sir soldier girl, but then once the girlfriend left the show she immediately did an about face and became the ditzy blonde comedy relief act.

Yeah I remember that squeaky gate episode, IIRC it was like the Wizard of Oz-ish before they warped back? But that just exemplified how friggin' stupid these people were - instead of having some sort of reliable system to demonstrate they were in the right universe, they just relied on some kid's memory about how a gate squeaked. -_-

Blargh alright sorry I guess I blocked that shit out of my memory banks until you brought it up.
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Always Sunny had an April Fools joke for season 8 (I think) saying the cast was all new and it actually tanked their ratings for the first few episodes that season until people realized it was a joke
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Ok I realize how... dumb this topic was given all the legitimate answers here.
Have there ever been any shows that just radically changed everything between seasons though?
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I would guess General Hospital. That show has been going for like 50+ years
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Millennials posted...

Not a US show but Degrassi TNG completely refreshed its cast like 4 times.

This was the only one that came to mind. The story lines linked from year to year, but eventually the entire main cast was replaced.
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