10 TV Shows That Should Have Quit While They Were Ahead

5. The Following

It seems such a simple, fascinating high concept. The FBI estimates that there are as many as three hundred serial killers haunting the highways, cities and backwoods of America at any one time. Well, what if someone were to provide them with connections, a family... leadership?

It's only when you actually start watching The Following that you see what's wrong with it. Making every killer in the show a devotee of the same death cult (devoted to the works of Edgar Allen Poe, believe it or not - yes, it's that cliched) nullifies the whole concept of profiling, and getting to grips with the fascinating, idiosyncratic and individual psychology of the serial killer is pretty much the unique selling point of this kind of narrative.

Without that, The Following is just a succession of gruesome murders carried out by totally inconsequential henchmen, most if not all of whom are casually disposed of as they come between Kevin Bacon's protagonist Hardy and his nemesis Joe Carroll, played by James Purefoy.

You can see the writers and directors of the show struggling to create a propulsive, thrilling narrative... not realising that their own premise has stymied them from the beginning. A serial killer narrative following a succession of bland, blindly fanatical killers with nothing distinguishing one from the next is a poor entry in the genre. At least Criminal Minds, for all its procedural structure, gives us a different 'unsub' every week, with a different persona, unique motivations, etc.

It didn't help that each of The Following's three seasons were set one year apart from the other, either: parking the car and turning off the engine every year isn't the best way to keep the wheels turning.