Broad City will live on in the bedbug-infused mattresses of New York City and in the breath of every "Yas, queen!" but its time on Comedy Central is over. In a statement to The Hollywood Reporter, creators and stars Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer have announced that the show's next season will be its last.
"Broad City has been our baby and first love for almost 10 years, since we started as a web series," the women said in a statement. "It’s been a phenomenal experience, and we’ve put ourselves into it completely. Broad City’s always had a spontaneous pace and feeling, and ending after season five honors that spirit."
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While fans on Twitter are lamenting the news, it doesn't entirely come as a shock. The recent season, while still well-written and filled with the same awkward humor we've come to expect, was not exactly fresh, and most of that is because its so expected.
When Broad City came to Comedy Central in 2014, it was one of the only shows of its kind. Never before had we had pot-smoking, sex-having, minimum-wage heroines who, time and time again, were both the protagonists and butts of their own jokes. They were not heralded as feminist heroes nor were we supposed to hate them. They straddled an important line, and paved the way so well that now their time here is done.
Weird and unruly women have dominated TV and film following Broad City's initial example (Fleabag, Crazy Ex Girlfriend, Trainwreck), especially the stoner variety (Mary + Jane, Landline, the upcoming DUDE). Any show featuring two women in a city is automatically compared to Broad City, which means that by the fifth season, we can't help but compare it to itself.
This goodbye doesn't mean we won't be seeing Jacobson and Glazer in the near future. While Broad City has ended, the two women signed a bigger first-look deal with Viacom, the company that owns Comedy Central, and they already have three projects in the works.
"We are very excited to bring new voices and points of view to Comedy Central and continue our collaboration together in new ways," their statement concluded.
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In other words, they're just closing one chapter before beginning another, and it's a smart move. So much of what Broad City could do, it's already done. It gave us the perfect GIF for catcallers, an entire pegging plotline, a whole line of sex toys, and Garol. The episodes were eccentric and foul and myriad and fun, and now they've run their course. Abbi getting too high at a party or Ilana having a problem with her vagina has stopped being an exciting storyline because we now live in a society where it's no longer unheard of to have this type of woman on screen — and we have Broad City to thank.
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