Too Many Shows, One Universe: How Franchise TV Ate Your Weekend

Remember when watching TV was simple? You picked a show, you watched it, you talked about it at work on Monday. Maybe there was a spin-off you could optionally check out if you really loved the original. That was the deal.

Somewhere along the way, the deal changed. Now you sit down to watch a show someone recommended and discover it's actually the third entry point into a twelve-show universe, two of which are prequels, one of which was cancelled but is apparently essential context, and at least one of which exists only on a streaming service you don't subscribe to. Cool. Great. Very fun.

Franchise television isn't new, but the sheer density of it in 2024 is genuinely unprecedented — and it's creating a specific kind of viewer fatigue that's worth unpacking.

How We Got Here

The Marvel Cinematic Universe gets most of the credit (or blame) for normalizing the interconnected franchise model, but television was doing its own version of this long before the Avengers assembled. Dick Wolf figured it out decades ago: the Chicago franchise — Chicago Fire, Chicago P.D., Chicago Med — now runs to hundreds of episodes across multiple shows, with crossover events that theoretically require you to bounce between all three in a single week to get the full story.

That model worked because each show was mostly self-contained. You could watch Chicago P.D. without having seen Chicago Fire and still follow what was happening. The crossovers were bonuses, not prerequisites.

What's changed is the prerequisite problem. Modern franchise TV increasingly demands that you've done your homework. Miss a spin-off, and you might find yourself completely lost in the parent show's latest season. Watch things out of order, and major character moments land with a thud instead of a gut punch.

The Yellowstone Problem

Let's talk about the Paramount Network's Taylor Sheridan universe, because it's one of the most dramatic examples of spin-off sprawl in recent memory.

Yellowstone launched in 2018 as a pretty straightforward prestige drama about a Montana ranching dynasty. It was good. People watched it. Then came 1883, a prequel. Then 1923, another prequel. Then 6666, a spin-off. Then The Madison, a Yellowstone continuation of sorts. At various points there were discussions of additional shows, additional timelines, additional characters getting their own corner of the universe.

For a viewer who discovered Yellowstone in 2022 and just wants to know what order to watch things in — genuinely, what do you tell them? The prequels technically take place earlier in the timeline but were produced later. 1923 introduces characters who connect back to Yellowstone in ways that retroactively add meaning to earlier seasons. And with the main show's conclusion still being sorted out, the entire franchise feels like it's in a constant state of expansion without a clear center of gravity.

That's a lot to ask of someone who just wanted to watch Kevin Costner on a horse.

When Universe-Building Becomes Universe-Bloat

The thing is, not all franchise expansion is bad. Better Call Saul is one of the best arguments for spin-off television ever made — it took a comic-relief character from Breaking Bad and built something that arguably surpassed its parent show. It worked because it had a clear creative vision and didn't require you to constantly cross-reference other content to understand what was happening.

The difference between Better Call Saul and the worst examples of spin-off sprawl comes down to one question: does this show work on its own terms, or does it only exist to service the larger franchise?

Shows that work on their own terms add genuine value. Shows that exist primarily to set up plot points in other shows, or to expand a universe for expansion's sake, tend to dilute everything around them. They clutter up watch lists, create confusing entry points for new viewers, and — maybe most importantly — they can actually make the original show feel worse in retrospect by overexplaining things that were better left mysterious.

A Practical Framework for Navigating the Sprawl

If you're trying to figure out how to approach a sprawling franchise without losing an entire month of your life, here's a rough framework that actually helps.

Start with the original, always. If a franchise has a clear originating show or film, begin there. Even if it's technically set later in the timeline than a prequel, the original usually provides the emotional and narrative foundation everything else is built on.

Ask whether each addition is 'essential' or 'enriching.' Some spin-offs are genuinely required viewing to understand major plot points in the main show. Others just add texture and backstory that's nice to have but not necessary. Figure out which category each entry falls into before committing.

Give yourself permission to stop. This is maybe the most important one. Just because a franchise has twelve shows doesn't mean you're obligated to watch all twelve. If a spin-off isn't grabbing you by episode three, it's okay to bail. You're not failing a test.

Use fan-built watch guides. Seriously — the community work that goes into creating definitive watch orders for complex franchises is invaluable. Sites like AllTM exist precisely because tracking all of this stuff is a real and genuine need, not a niche obsession.

The Watch List Reckoning

There's a reason 'watch list paralysis' has become a recognized phenomenon. When a franchise has enough entries, the act of deciding where to start becomes its own obstacle. Some viewers just... don't start. The franchise becomes something they mean to get to someday, perpetually deferred because the on-ramp feels too complicated.

That's a real loss — for viewers who miss out on stories they'd genuinely love, and for franchises that end up with smaller audiences because they've made themselves too intimidating to enter.

The studios and networks building these universes would do well to remember that every new spin-off announcement is also a new barrier to entry for someone who hasn't started yet. Bigger doesn't always mean better. Sometimes it just means more overwhelming.

For now, though, the sprawl is here and it's not going anywhere. The best any of us can do is stay organized, stay selective, and maybe maintain a very, very good spreadsheet.