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Anger Management (2012)

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  • And You Thought It Would Fail: Two and a Half Men fans expected the show to go badly and be canned almost immediately because of how controversial a figure Charlie Sheen was—even with the support he still got too. They expected the show would also not succeed in ratings or with critics either. While the show received poor reviews from the start and its ratings eventually declined significantly too, it still thanks to its initial ten episode order being strong enough got the additional 90 episodes that allowed it to make it to 100 in its entire 2012-2014 run and go into syndication—even if for only a few years, while Two and a Half Men after Sheen was fired managed four seasons of only 75 total episodes from 2011-2015.note 
  • Critic-Proof: With the first season by itself at least. Poor critical reception and yet FX deemed it successful enough in the ratings to continue through with the additional 90 episode order that would eventually bring the total number to 100—and that it would go into syndication for a few years after it ended too. It was however during that time when the 90 episodes were airing that the show's ratings dropped significantly and so much so to the point that FX eventually had to burn the episodes out over the course of a few weeks in order to make sure the whole thing had actually aired on the network—mainly due to the contractual obligation.
  • Fandom Rivalry: A bitter one with Two and a Half Men when Charlie Sheen was fired after Season 8 for his onset behavior and his character Charlie Harper was replaced with Walden Schmidt (Ashton Kutcher), to the point that each show's fans rooted for the other's failure and each show even took jabs at the other in-universe too.
  • Friendly Fandoms: With The Middle, as Daniela Bobadilla went from her role here as Sam Goodson for most of the show's run (first four seasons/volumes, 2012-2014) to Lexie Brooks for the final three seasons of that show (Seasons 7-9, 2016-2018).
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: After arguing with and almost attacking Sean (Brian Austin Green) in the pilot episode, Charlie says he hopes they can be friends while apologizing to him. Sean says there's a strong chance that'll never happen. Several episodes later, Sean returns and he and Charlie do actually hang out and become friends for the majority of the series moving forward.
  • Presumed Flop: The show's often considered a failure due to both the poor ratings and reception it received following Season 1's ten episode run. However, FX due to contractual obligations still produced 90 more, leaving the show's total episode count at 100 after its June 2012 to December 2014 run. Needless to say, other FX shows that tried to earn that 90 episode order after the initial ten failed to do so in the years that followed.
  • Retroactive Recognition: While there are fans who probably knew Daniela Bobadilla here before she joined The Middle as Lexie, others would've probably knew her for The Middle first and then saw her here as Sam as a result too.
  • They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: While it could've been a morbid curiosity factor that made the show popular in its first season to begin with due to how controversial Sheen was at the time—and pretty much has been most of his career too, there's multiple factors that have seemingly attributed to the show's fast decline in the year or so that followed: that it wasn't really like the movie to begin with; that that morbid interest from fans died down pretty fast anyway and/or that they made Charlie Goodson too much like the real Sheen as a character in order to try to keep fans and as a result, seemed to abandon the concept of being a series based on the movie altogether too.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Plot lines hardly featured Sam being confronted with the kind of flawed and reckless-type of guy her father Charlie is and this being on top of Daniela Bobadilla's performance being praised while interest in the character's personal and emotional growth being expressed (especially with her OCD) was something ultimately left by the wayside in support of showing more interest in Charlie's adult escapades instead—which in turn meant losing a major anchor to Charlie's character wanting to continue to improve as a person too.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Building off of Sam eventually being written out of the show and losing her threads as result too (as well as Selma Blair as Kate departing before her), they made Charlie Goodson far less of a grounded character when they decided to adopt more of Sheen's personal-isms into the show and seemed to divert attention away from him helping his patients by getting a little too involved in their lives in favor of more of his sexual escapades and hedonistic qualities that he became famous for on Two and a Half Men as Charlie Harper—and those things in turn seemed to only further alienate those who had continued to stick around for the show too.

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