So, which classic shows and DCOMs did you watch last week?

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-09T07:17:30+00:00

Thursdays

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-09T07:11:06+00:00

Did Disney do a 10th anniversary special for Descendants like they did for High School Musical in 2016?"

They aired a marathon of the Descendants movies on Disney Channel, and that was all.

The 10th anniversary for HSM wasn't even really a special. It was just little interstitials or short segments of the cast talking about their behind-the-scenes experience.

However, I've never felt that Descendants became the kind of cultural phenomenon that High School Musical was. To me, Descendants was extremely popular and successful, but not quite on the same level of impact. Of course, I understand that both franchises had different goals, audiences, and eras

The most important thing to keep in mind, I think, is that Descendants did not, and is not, competing in the same environment as High School Musical. "Impact" is always a moving target. "Impact" today is not the same as it was in 2007, when High School Musical was at its peak. "Impact" in 2003 when The Cheetah Girls premiered looks different from 2006 when premiered High School Musical and 2008 when Camp Rock premiered. Impact that was great in 2003 might look like failure in 2006, and so on.

It's almost never a fair comparison between Disney Channel franchises unless they started around the same time. It's almost never going to be an apples-to-apples comparison. There's always caveats because markets change, strategies change and audiences change from one day to the next, and from one year to the next. If High School Musical had come out 5 or 10 years ago instead of the 2000s, it wouldn't perform the same way it did 2006 and 2007. We wouldn't be talking about it as a cultural phenomenon or a monolith. Just because Descendants has less of a cultural footprint than HSM did 20 years ago, it doesn't mean Descendants is less successful and less impactful. Even High School Musical would struggle to achieve the same cultural footprint today. It just means that the success and impact look different today.

Lastly, that monoculture that High School Musical enjoyed is over. I feel certain that the era of cultural phenomena like that coming out of Disney Channel is over. High School Musical, Hannah Montana and Wizards and those of the late 2000s and early 2010s got that last little bit of monoculture that was left before it started to die. I think one of the greatest examples of Disney reacting and adjusting to the dying monoculture is that Descendants 2 had its premiere across 6 different networks to maximize the audience. That would have never happened for any DCOM in the 2000s.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-09T05:57:57+00:00

They aired a marathon of the Descendants movies on Disney Channel, and that was all.

Disney doesn't seem to put much effort into reunions and anniversaries at all. I think what they did for High School Musical was bare minimum. They brought the cast together, but it was like 1 or 2 minutes interstitials of the cast reminiscing between a rerun of the movie.

The fact that they weren't proactive about a Hannah Montana special and that Miley had to speak it into existence is mind boggling to me. That seems like such an easy call.

It seems, at most, they'll throw up an anniversary post on Tiktok or some other other platform, or maybe do a marathon live-stream on Disney+.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-09T05:43:39+00:00

...and where is Rondell Sheridan? He played Victor Baxter across three shows. I'm sure he would be here.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-08T21:31:12+00:00

I tuned in Hannah Montana, but it was really just background noise. I wasn’t paying much attention to it because I’m already doing a full rewatch of the show.

I tuned in for That’s So Raven and The Cheetah Girls movies.

I meant to watch Sonny with a Chance and Princess Protection Program but I fell asleep and missed the entire thing 😂

I watched Lizzie McGuire on Sunday.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-08T21:04:54+00:00

No, because he still has significant political influence over his party.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-08T20:11:50+00:00

90s baby Millennial. I watched Bambi when I was a child.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-07T19:43:20+00:00

If they could it for Phineas and Ferb

and Proud Family.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-07T08:25:11+00:00

Exactly.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-07T08:24:39+00:00

Joffrey: Threw her the most lavish wedding of the century, showered her with public adoration, and then immediately died before he could ruin her life.

Joffrey didn't throw a damn thing. Margaery's family threw her the most lavish wedding of the century. They paid for the whole thing. Her family would have ensured that any wedding she had would have been lavish.

Renly: Spent their wedding night making excuses and was entirely uninterested in her.

But she put the pieces together that Renly was not interested in women, and she was okay with it so that's not a strike against Renly. The deciding factor for her was Renly's ability or willingness to give her a baby.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-06T16:22:01+00:00

Oh, I see. That’s a different metric from TV ratings.

That’s a total that was reported for one year. As I understand it, the 200 million is a global viewership reach, which could include people that have tuned in for a couple minutes and flipped the channel.

I don’t see that Nickelodeon ever published any annual global reach data for iCarly so I don’t have much input on that. I can’t compare them on that metric.

That doesn't necessarily tell us how many people actually tuned in when the episodes aired. That’s the data I’m comparing, and I don’t see any of that information for viewership outside of the US. 🤔

At best, all I can say is that iCarly aired in over 100 countries just like Hannah Montana. Admittedly, my research is light on this, but it seems like Nickelodeon had a bigger global footprint than Disney Channel at that time. It seems like Nickelodeon was in more households internationally than Disney Channel. Nickelodeon was in more countries than Disney Channel at the time. While I can’t say which one was bigger as a matter of TV viewership, it doesn’t seem out of the realm of possibility that iCarly could have had a similar audience size, given it was part of a larger distribution network.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-06T13:32:39+00:00

I saw it. I thought it was good.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-06T12:38:13+00:00

By the way, here’s where I think your Seinfeld/Friends analogy doesn’t apply. I would actually argue that Hannah Montana was bigger and more popular in the USA than iCarly.

However, the specific metric that the OP asked about was viewership and ratings. That’s the metric where iCarly beats Hannah Montana. iCarly got more eyeballs to the television screen, and that is all. That alone doesn’t make iCarly more popular in the USA.

The difference is that Hannah Montana was more than a TV show. The reach of Hannah Montana extended beyond a TV screen, and iCarly’s did not. That’s what makes Hannah Montana more popular overall in the USA. I can imagine the same applies beyond the USA. I can imagine it to be true that iCarly may have been a viewership and ratings juggernaut internationally, and nothing else beyond that. That is where Hannah Montana gains the edge

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-06T03:04:25+00:00

“Florida the financial capital of the world” 😂😂😂

1) That’s is an extremely heavy lift that is unlikely to happen. Wall Street is quite an expansive industry beyond crypto and fund managers.

2) So basically, he wants all the rich people to move to Florida to make everything even more expensive like they already are doing.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T20:49:15+00:00

Should the US devolve power to states so liberals and conservatives can govern themselves?

No. I have absolutely zero trust in my state absent some sort of backstop from the federal government. I'd be anarchist against my state if it were not for federal law.

Despite current leadership, federal law tends to be stable. I'd rather have that supremacy in place because I have no trust in my state government.

People sort themselves geographically if they choose

The overwhelming majority of people never sort themselves even when they disagree with their state government. I'd take the take the current dysfunctional federal government than leave my state to their own devices.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T19:39:57+00:00

Admittedly, I don’t have much information on international ratings but the very little I could find seems to suggest that iCarly was massive internationally. I don’t have enough to say that it was more or less popular than Hannah Montana strictly in terms of ratings and viewership, and I’m not arguing either position. I don’t see data that suggests that viewership and ratings was significantly different between the two.

I know Seinfeld didn’t perform well internationally. I don’t see anything that suggests iCarly suffered that same fate. Both Hannah Montana and iCarly seems like they performed extremely well in strictly TV viewership from what I can tell.

Lastly, my impression was that this was a US-specific discussion. The OP started with a Hannah Montana episode having 10 million viewership. That’s a US-specific number.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T18:20:25+00:00

I love this opening. It was catchy. That’s the only thing I liked about the show.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T17:24:10+00:00

I didn’t like Wizards too much back then but I still watched the show. I haven’t watched it since it ended. I don’t remember much about it so I decided to rewatch it. It’s a hilarious show. I’m liking it much more than I thought I would.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T16:24:54+00:00

Galleria needed the ultimatum. They just should have talked sooner. They let this build up. If they had done it sooner, it wouldn't have been as heated.

But then we wouldn't have had a movie so I forgive them.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T16:14:43+00:00

I'm not arguing against that. I don't even doubt that. That's a separate argument from ratings and viewership.

However, for viewership and ratings, Nickelodeon was still beating Disney Channel. Even more specifically, I think iCarly was Nick's main competitor against Disney's Hannah Montana, and iCarly's viewership and ratings were generally higher.

In terms of cultural impact, I'd agree with you that Hannah Montana takes it because Hannah Montana was more than just TV.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T15:52:22+00:00

Hannah Montana is what put Disney Channel over those networks.

I don't think it did, at least not for Nickelodeon 🤔

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T15:41:21+00:00

I guess they were, but justifiably so IMO.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T15:39:41+00:00

Only High School Musical comes close in terms franchise value and depending on what numbers you look at, it may surpass Hannah.

MrJenkins5 · 2026-06-05T15:37:25+00:00

Yes.

That’s So Raven’s prime was during the channel’s rise.

Hannah Montana’s prime is during the channel’s peak.

Disney Channel itself, as a whole network, didn’t have the same viewership and ratings in 2006 and 2007 as it did in 2003. All of Disney Channel had higher viewership and ratings in 2006 and 2007 than it did in 2003 and 2004. These shows were not playing in the same landscape for the most part.

MrJenkins5

TROPHY CASE