7 Ingenious Ways TV Shows Bounced Back From Awful Seasons

There's no denying that Parks and Recreation got off to a rough start, often drawing up favourable comparisons to co-creator Michael Schur's previous effort The Office (which he produced) during its difficult first season.

Amy Poehler's Leslie Knope was dismissed by many as a gender-swapped Michael Scott and the show's focus on cringey humour and generating awkward tension in every scene resulted in characters nobody really warmed to.

NBC could have pulled the plug right there, but the network was rewarded for its faith in the series. The difficult inaugural season was chalked up to experimentation and the show came back with a fresh focus and rejigged dynamic in season two.

Rather than overhauling Poehler's character, the showrunners dramatically changed how the other cast members responded to her overzealous nature. They were no longer annoyed by her, instead holding her in a begrudged esteem. The chemistry that was once missing was now there in spades.

With a new dynamic in place, the show was free to find its own voice, but Schur and his creative team made other meaningful improvements too. They widened the scope by expanding the setting to encompass and an entire town and its residents, avoiding the suffocating sameness that set into The Office in later seasons as a result.