CW cancels Girlfriends, no series finale planned

by Carmen Van Kerckhove

Just read this on What About Our Daughters and am so bummed out. Here’s the statement from CW:

The prolonged strike has changed business conditions and our programming strategy for the balance of the 2007/08 season. To better focus its creative and financial resources, The CW will only resume production on shows that are in consideration for renewal next year. As a result, we will not order additional episodes of the long-running comedy, `Girlfriends,’ which planned to conclude its 8-year run at the end of this season. This was a very difficult decision for us, and was based solely on the considerable cost to license each episode in an extremely unusual business environment.

I think that Girlfriends is one of the few shows on TV that has consistently dealt with race in a realistic and interesting way. The quality of the show has definitely had its ups and downs (that whole story arc where Joan and William become a couple was horrifying) but I’ve been a loyal viewer almost from the beginning. Plus, the clothes were always fab — way better than that ridiculousness on Sex and the City.

This show is such a staple that among my friends, “Joan” has become a verb. When we tell each other to “stop Joaning,” we mean: “stop obsessing neurotically and overthinking things and messing up a good thing by imagining the worst-case scenario!”

After getting to know these characters for so many years, it’s kind of unbelievable that the network isn’t even bothering with a series finale to give us a sense of closure.