What are some examples of TV shows answering to their detractors? Probably the most famous incident of our generation is the “Itchy, Scratchy, and Poochie” episode of “The Simpsons”, where “Worst. Episode. Ever.” was born. The nerds who nitpicked at Itchy & Scratchy and gave detailed critiques to each episode were parodies of the newsgroup hounds who did the same about OFF (alt.tv.simpsons for “our favorite family”).
On “South Park”, in response to claims that the series was nothing but bad animation and fart jokes, the producers created “Terrance & Phillip”. It’s a fictional cartoon, loved by the South Park kids, that’s nothing but bad animation and fart jokes (and in the movie, foul language).
But my favorite TV response to criticism is “Queer as Folk”'s “Gay as Blazes”, the ground breaking gay show of the QAF universe. Instead of silencing their critics by parodying themselves, they slyly did the opposite and gave them exactly what they asked for. “Gay as Blazes” was everything QAF wasn’t. It featured a perfectly interracial (I think only one was non-Hispanic white) group of intellectual, monogamous gays who whiled away their hours brunching together a the home of a host, discussing politics, and denouncing promiscuity. The show was, of course, abysmall (but bafflingly a hit in the QAF world). The producers seemed to be saying “There. Is THIS what you wanted to see?” I loved how they just left it there for you to “get” it - I don’t recall any characters ruining the joke by pointing out how GAB runs counter to their own experiences.
So what else is there? I specified TV shows because I want to only include responses to actual criticsm, not anticipated criticism, of which only series are capable.