With another Season that'll mostly be a huge cringeworthy waste (because the only respect that gets handed out is to idiotic fanatics who get nothing but cringe worthy content!) set to start tomorrow, figured it was time for another Hetty centric OP. (plus, this site needs something non political to try and light up a Saturday, IMO).
Up until Season 10, This show was basically run as perfect as it could be. It was very well established that Hetty was in charge, and that everyone should respect and fear her, and everything ran like a well oiled machine under her guidance. (plus, everyone looked like they wanted to be there and actually work together.).
I have my issues with Season 9, but strangely enough, given how a sheer impossible feat has been achieved in nearly every Season since Season 9 being far worse then the other, Season 9 actually did something right: It provided a well thought out 'blue print' on how to properly handle Hetty on her secret overseas missions! From the very start of Season 9, her location is revealed instead of dragged out for half the Season, Literally everyone is worried about her and wants to find her instead of pretending like their pedestrian issues are more important then her safety, there's frequent updates throughout the first half instead of 1 update every 6 or 7 episodes, and yes. What Hetty is doing is actually SHOWN in a few episodes instead of not at all.
The other thing that Season 9 did right: That whole secret mission back then was properly promoted!! There was enough seeds planted to make it interesting enough for fans to be interested, there was actual hype around it, and it all paid off in the end when Episode 13 (which was part 1 of the 2 part wrap up) got the highest ratings of that Season! Not to mention, the huge wrap up Episode 14 that aired 2 months later (2018 was a Winter Olympics year, and every show goes on break for 2 weeks while they air. And after that, CBS had some big events airing on Sunday for a couple weeks) had a very epic extended trailer released 2 weeks before it aired!! (That is seriously the best way to promote a big episode that would wrap up an arc that everyone wanted to see end.).
Let's face it, what a small and very powerful lady is doing overseas sounds 100000% more interesting then say, A silly married couple (who now look about as romantic as collage roommates) struggling to raise a '16 year old' who legally should never have been adopted to begin with AND who looks like an actual adult instead of a teenager! Or 2 diversity tokens whining about how 'tough' their lives are when they're not being coddled (and every one of their fantastically over hyped 'issues' that are purely invented by politically stupid writers), and just about everything else you can think of.
If what Hetty is doing overseas was actually USED properly instead of as a pathetic throwaway excuse to include her in an episode when she's actually not in it, then maybe the ratings wouldn't be so low. Maybe lots more fans would actually be more interested in the show instead of bashing it at every turn. And maybe there would be more 'excitement' and promotion from the rest of the cast instead of the same generic, boring, and probably forced Instagram videos saying how 'excited' they are about what they are doing and what their 'favorite' episodes from a previous Season is. (it looks so fake. Who in their right mind would think adopting an illegal alien in a way that would 100% never happen in a right universe is their 'favorite'?!).
Simple answer to crumbling ratings and very low and generic interest: Make Hetty's latest mission (probably shouldn't say 'latest' since it's been going on for 2 years now) a key arc! Give out details that sound interesting! Give fans an actual reason to WANT to be interested in what she's doing instead of the 'keeping everyone in the dark' crap! And actually PROMOTE the mission right! Fans were interested back in Season 9 because there was good reason to, it can be repeated here as well if there was actual effort from the writers and from CBS.
Giving fans very boring episodes and leaving out the good stuff year after year isn't going to help, it'll just keep making things worse. And as bizarre as it seems, I don't wish for this show to one day end on a very bad note. I still very much hope for an epiphany of sorts from the writers and that they finally once and for all see who can bring this show back it's spark that it held for so many years before Season 10 took it away for too long, and that is Hetty.
