10 TV Comedies That Dared To Try An 11th Season

Despite the fact that we're still living in the Golden Age of TV, there are few shows these days that tend to last as many as ten seasons, especially where drama, sci-fi and fantasy series are concerned.

But there is one genre that tends to push things into double figures, and that's the TV sitcom. Made on a much lower budget than the likes of Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad, sitcoms are minimalist in nature, requiring limited cast members and small sets that need little in the way of expansion or upkeep.

Because sitcoms are built around real life struggles and relationships, they can hypothetically run forever, as is the case with the following 10 shows, each of which pushed their simple premises to cover not ten but eleven or more seasons of hilarity.

That's not to say all of these shows are good or ended on a high, but the fact they managed to run for as long as they did surely deserves some major respect...

Airing its eleventh and final season in early 2020, Modern Family was one of the most popular and critically praised sitcoms on TV during its run, picking up an impressive twenty-two Emmy wins out of seventy-five nominations, and completing over 250 episodes.

The twisting, awkwardly funny exploits of an enormous family linked together by Ed O'Neill's patriarch Jay Pritchett, the series is split into three distinct families (nuclear, blended, and same-sex), and takes a look at the complex themes of the modern family set-up, marriage, childhood, sexuality and unconditional love.

Though it admittedly loses some of its steam during its final leg, Modern Family was nonetheless a striking achievement in ensemble TV comedy throughout its run, and very effectively captured the hilarity, tragedy and awkwardness of family life better than most sitcoms before or since.