You'll be able to keep hate-watching Real Time With Bill Maher through at least 2022

Say what you will about Bill Maher, but he’s managed to scrape together a successful career as a talk show host despite being disliked by pretty much everyone. He’s too liberal for the right-wingers, but too annoying, anti-PC, and generally unlikable for the left-wingers, so it’s a testament to… something, surely, that he’s been able to do Real Time on HBO for 18 years despite all of that. In fact, HBO wants him to continue doing Real Time, as Variety is reporting that it has renewed his show through 2022—which will bring it up to 20 seasons. (Variety also helpfully references the time Maher defended Donald Trump’s use of “Chinese virus” to refer to the coronavirus, because we had forgotten about that and it’s a good one to add to the list of reasons why people don’t like him.)

There’s no real explanation for why HBO continues to hand out renewals to Real Time With Bill Maher even though nobody likes the show, so the only possible explanation is that so many people are hate-watching it that it doesn’t matter how anyone really feels about what they’re seeing. Or maybe complaints on social media or news stories about Maher saying some awful thing are actually a useful promotional tool? You have to pay for HBO if you want to see what everyone’s mad about, right? You know, if that’s the approach HBO is taking, the Game Of Thrones finale suddenly makes a lot more sense…