Why Do Some Television Series Get Drastically Retooled?

The typical lifecycle of a television production is generally predicated on an understanding between production agencies, broadcasters, distributors and executives providing financial backing.

This means that in most cases, television and streaming productions will typically either be developed as agreed or with gradual tweaks and adjustments, often the result of circumstances.

However, in some other cases, a TV show may see drastic alterations between production runs or even in the middle of a series that attempt to make the show more appealing to a target demographic.

This process is often known as retooling, as much like how a factory will change its tools to alter its manufacturing process, the various strands of production will drastically alter an existing TV show.

Why do TV shows get retooled? When is it an effective approach to avoid cancellation, and when can it create a self-fulfilling prophecy and get a production cancelled?

Why Do Some Television Productions Change Their Central Premise?

Retools can happen for many reasons and at various scales, often involving characters leaving or joining the cast, recasting of existing characters, changing interpersonal dynamics or the scope of the show as a whole.

Typically, however, the premise of the show will remain consistent; whilst the television series Top Gear added a studio setting, three central presenters and a far more comedic tone, it was still a magazine show about cars and remained as such until its hiatus in 2022.

However, some shows go much further than this, removing the central concept of the show entirely to the point that it can sometimes lead to an orphaned title.

Emmerdale Not Farm?

Perhaps the most dramatic, abrupt and successful example of this taking place was the Beckindale air disaster, the famous plane crash episode of long-running soap opera Emmerdale.

Known as Emmerdale Farm until 1989, the show retained a distinctly humble, soft, rural tone more reminiscent of radio series The Archers, but the plane crash and its aftermath made the show a national cultural touchstone overnight, and it remains a consistent success for ITV.

Not A Family Affair?

In 1997, soap opera Family Affairs was the first ever show broadcast on the then-new Channel 5, focusing on family and their friends living in a fictional London suburb, but the show struggled to get attention airing against Brookside, Coronation Street and EastEnders, so it would receive a drastic retool within a year.

Led by Brian Park, who had drastically retooled Coronation Street into a much grittier show the year before, the decision was made to kill off the Hart family in a gas explosion, instead focusing on the wider cast.

It was not the biggest success, with then-Channel Five director of programmes Kevin Lygo once being quoted by The Guardian as saying, “it’s not as bad as you think it is.” However, it did last until 2005, ending after an eight-year run.

Are All Retools Executive Decisions?

Retools are often characterised as being largely executive decisions, in part because they are often caused by changes that are in the control of broadcasters and executives.

These sorts of changes are often caused by:

• Changes in budget which decrease (in the case of a show like Blackadder) or increase (in the case of a show like Doctor Who, Emmerdale or Red Dwarf)

• Changes in timeslot or broadcaster, which can lead to changes in priority, tone, episode length or the boundaries of acceptable and desirable content. This notably happened with the 1970s version of Wonder Woman, which went from being set during the Second World War to a more contemporary setting for the time.

• Changes in casting, not only by bringing in or letting go of stars, but also by how many characters are focused on. Some shows go from being focused on a single title character to ensemble pieces or vice versa.

However, not all retools come from top-down decision-making, but can come as an inherent result of the premise, in response to audience feedback or even as a response to real-life circumstances.

Natural Retools

Some TV shows have premises which inherently require retooling after a certain point, particularly series featuring children and teenage characters that focus on a school setting.

Two notable examples outside of children’s television are Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Sabrina the Teenage Witch, both of which had characters go from high school to college, which changed the setting, much of the supporting cast and the tone of the show.

Audience-Driven Retools

In other cases, retools are driven by audience reception, demographic shifts and both positive and negative critical responses.

Much like Emmerdale, Coronation Street had a dark, gritty retool in the late 1990s, which led to successful storylines such as “Free the Weatherfield One”, but following several storylines that were seen by viewers as going too far, the soap changed course again, balancing its serious storylines with comedy and low-stakes pathos.

Similarly, Star Trek: Picard was originally intended to be a meditative character study of the eponymous main character in the twilight of his life and weighed down by personal, professional and institutional trauma.

Whilst not unpopular in this form, it was retooled as a reunion for the original cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation, driven in no small part by a nostalgia-clamouring audience.

Circumstance-Driven Retools

Finally, circumstances outside of the showrunners' and production staff’s control can force a retool to take place.

The most notable recent example of this was the revival of the sitcom Roseanne, which killed off the title character after one season due to a string of controversies surrounding actress Roseanne Barr. The show subsequently continued under the name The Conners.