If there was one thing a lot of people complain about in regards to network television these days it would be the fact that there are too many sitcoms and too many of those sitcoms center on one liners and a “set up line followed by a punch line” formula. Often, laziness is the blame for this type of production but, honestly, that is not the case. The real villain is cost. Here is something I wanted to mention for historical purposes, but never really had the venue to discuss it before. Did you know that Hogan’s Heroes was still in the top ten of the Neilson ratings when it was cancelled? The reason it was cancelled was the fact that it lost money EVERY year it was on television and did not earn a profit until maybe its fifth year in syndication. Now, Hogan’s Heroes was a sitcom, but it  was a sitcom that was shot on 35mm film with a single camera, had a huge cast, shot interiors and exteriors on elaborate sets and also had a number of action scenes as well. In a way, this was not so much a sitcom as much as it was an expensive movie serial that could never raise advertising revenue to cover the costs of its very runaway budget. This is why it was dumped from the schedule despite still drawing in a solid audience. And, of course, this is also the reason that the common, inexpensive form of the sitcom has become the standard method of television production of the day.