The last few pages of the chat thread (RIP) remind me of a phrase someone used the other day. The phrase is 'Jumping the Shark' and is used when something is dragging on for too long. It comes from one of the last episodes of Happy Days when The Fonz is waterskiing (with his leather jacket on, natch) when he sees a shark in the water ahead of him. It's too late for him to do anything so, he jumps over it, waterski's and all.
It was unanimously decided after then that the show really had come to, and overrun, it's natural end.