The Simpsons in the UK

American TV is notoriously prudish though, even late at night. Plenty of British post-watershed (and probably even some pre-watershed) TV wouldn't get near US network TV at any time.

Though on the other hand, premium cable & streaming shows over there often go too far in the other direction (probably as a result of mainstream TV being so restrictive), the Twilight Zone remake and Star Trek Picard with their constant streams of profanity being prime examples.

Yes. Designated Survivor which for the first two series was an ABC commissioned drama was unbelievably non offensive. Then it transferred to being a Netflix original, and became unbelievably offensive!

It's far too over the top much of the time, even most British post-watershed drama doesn't have as much profanity as a large chunk of US streaming content does now. It's as if they've decided this new found freedom means they can just go all out, not whether they actually should. The explanation the producer of Star Trek Picard came out with basically just added up to "because the FCC aren't stopping us now" (of course, he never picks up on the fact that the FCC wasn't stopping the movies being littered with f-bombs if they wanted to, but they weren't. It's completely out of place in the Star Trek universe). Hopefully it will calm down once the novelty wears off. The occasional one could be fine, but the new Twilight Zone had an f-bomb every 2 or 3 minutes in most episodes, I doubt Rod Serling would have approved.

Although, I fondly remember seeing a schedule for Fox (USA) from around 2005-2007 with American Dad around 7:30pm, unless the rules have changed there, but one thing I do know is that nowadays, the USA watershed starts at 8pm.

Yeah, in the US you have the strange situation where shows like Family Guy, American Dad and South Park go out in the daytime and evenings, which you wouldn't see here (without heavy editing anyway, like Family Guy was in the Channel 4 and Sky One days. And South Park would become meaningless with the editing you'd need to do to make it suitable for pre-watershed airing), but plenty of content we get post-watershed wouldn't go out over there even late at night. Try showing Shameless on US network TV, the FCC would have a stroke (of course there is a US version, but it's on Showtime. I don't know if it's as strong as the UK version was though.).

Back then FOX used the 9:30pm timeslot to air many new shows causing American Dad to air at the beginning before The Simpsons (which for a long time has been at 8pm)

It is, and it is also one of the few US remakes of a US show which is actually better than the original, mainly thanks to having the freedom being on Showtime gives it - would have been a disaster on a network.


That said a few cable shows do have a cleaner version which can air on a main network made just in case. I think CBS showed Dexter during the writers strike (though violence is generally less of an issue) - and of course we're in a situation again where networks are looking at content from their cable or streaming partners to potentially fill some hours.

FOX treat any new show like trash, because they have done it with both Futurama and American Dad! (The Cleveland Show is meh to me) .That probably explains why they went to another network. And now, I feel like they might do the same thing to Duncanville. FOX UK would probably be even worse. The Simpsons are better off on Sky One and CH4 and new episodes of FG and AD are also better off on ITV2 because those channels actually treat them will respect (excluding CH4).

The American version of Shameless is better because they managed to keep the cast intact for longer which meant they could divert from the original UK premise. The UK Shameless lost its way when they decided to up the episode count to 16 episodes a year which made the quality dive.

Some cable networks used to have alternate takes of scenes which could be used when a show was syndicated which had no swearing or nudity, Sex and the City and The Sopranos were sold to TBS and A&E in this way.

According to imdb the only previous uses of the f-bomb in the movies was in a song lyric in the 2009 movie and an incomplete use in Beyond.

Even some of the minor swears in the Star Trek movies seem a little out of place, like they needed something to get a higher rating from the MPAA.

The syndicated version of The Sopranos looked like this

Agree on both counts. The last season on Netflix (which is one or maybe even two seasons behind the US broadcast) showed the quality hadn't dropped at all.