What We Lose With The End Of 'Somebody Somewhere'

The tender HBO series debuted in a bleak pop culture era. With its remarkable third and final season, it will leave behind a major gap in nicecore TV.

April 2020 to January 2022: That was the era when TV did somewhat of a soft relaunch of the “very special episode,” a type of storyline that ran rampant on ’90s series in which writers felt compelled to add An Important Message every so often. Think of the “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” episode about Will and Carlton getting arrested despite not doing anything illegal.

In some ways, it should have been expected that TV series like “Little Fires Everywhere” would be on the rise then. In the wake of George Floyd’s murder in 2020, even corporate brands were falling over themselves to prove their diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. While shows such as “Abbott Elementary” helped pull back from that pressure in 2021, real-life issues like the Jan. 6 riot, anti-vaxxers, abortion restrictions and climate change still dominated many others, including “Station Eleven.”

This was a stark contrast to “Schitt’s Creek,” the saccharine and hilarious Canadian family sitcom that, even after it switched platforms in its latter run, appealed to a loyal audience — largely because it was nice and unrelentingly human. After it ended on April 7, 2020, no one could have anticipated that TV plotlines would become as morose and angry as the world itself seemed in the years to follow.

As the 24-hour news cycle grew more depressing, perhaps fewer predicted that another series would be able to step in and fill the void that “Schitt’s Creek” left behind for unassuming, nicecore television, because there was such an oversaturation of terrible vibes onscreen that were often considered prestige.

But against all odds, on Jan. 16, 2022, HBO’s “Somebody Somewhere” became that show.