When Does Desperate Housewives Season 9 Come Out? Is It Renewed?

What is Desperate Housewives about?

Desperate Housewives arrived in 2004 with a dead woman narrating the secrets of her suburban street, which is either a gimmick or a genuine structural idea depending on how generously you're watching. Marc Cherry clearly intended both. Brenda Strong's Mary Alice Young, speaking from beyond the grave with a cool, ironic distance, gives the show its particular flavor: a heightened, slightly theatrical view of domestic life in which the pretty lawns of Wisteria Lane are forever concealing something ugly underneath.

The tone is the show's real achievement, at least in its best years. It is not quite a soap opera and not quite a satire, but something in between that network television rarely manages without fumbling. Teri Hatcher, Felicity Huffman, Marcia Cross, and Eva Longoria are playing types, yes, but they commit to those types hard enough that the characters develop genuine weight. Huffman in particular brings a sharpness to Lynette that keeps the show honest when it might otherwise tip into pure camp. Cross's Bree, the repressed perfectionist, is the character the writers seemed to enjoy most, and that enjoyment shows.

The show was a genuine cultural phenomenon in its first few seasons, drawing enormous audiences and critical attention that positioned it as smart entertainment for adults who had given up on network drama. Ratings were strong and the ensemble won fans worldwide. The later seasons tested that goodwill considerably, with storylines that grew repetitive and a sense that the writers were spinning wheels more than building anything. By season seven and eight, most critics had checked out, though dedicated viewers stayed loyal to the end.

What lingers is how confidently the first season in particular pulled off its hybrid ambition. A mystery, a comedy, a domestic drama, all held together by a dead woman's arch commentary on the lives of people she left behind. That's a strange idea, and for a while it worked.

Created by Marc Cherry

Is Desperate Housewives renewed or cancelled?

Why did Desperate Housewives end?

Desperate Housewives was always Marc Cherry's show in a fundamental way, and after eight seasons he had told the story he wanted to tell. The series finale in May 2012 was a planned conclusion, not a surprise axing. Cherry had been steering toward an ending for some time, and the finale gave the Wisteria Lane residents a proper sendoff rather than leaving things unresolved.

That said, the ratings picture made the timing feel right for everyone involved. The show had been a cultural phenomenon in its early years, drawing massive audiences and genuine water-cooler conversation after its 2004 debut. By the later seasons, those numbers had fallen considerably. Season 8 was still pulling a respectable audience by network drama standards, but it was nowhere near the heights of seasons one and two. ABC and Cherry were essentially in agreement that wrapping up on their own terms was better than watching the show decline further.

Eight seasons and 179 episodes is also simply a long run for any drama, and the creative challenges of keeping a mystery-driven suburban satire fresh were real. The show had cycled through multiple central mysteries, introduced and killed off numerous characters, and kept Marcia Cross, Teri Hatcher, Felicity Huffman, and Eva Longoria at the center of it all for nearly a decade. Ending it while it still had an audience and a functioning cast, rather than grinding on until cancellation forced the issue, was the right call.

Desperate Housewives Season 9 Release Date

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