The news that Young Sheldon season 7 will be significantly shorter and the show's final season means that The Big Bang Theory spinoff is unlikely to revisit a classic sitcom staple before it ends. Young Sheldon has already touched on most classic family sitcom tropes throughout its six-season run. Between George Sr's work struggles, Missy and Georgie's respective rebellious phases, and Georgie's baby adding another generation to the show's dysfunctional family, The Big Bang Theory spinoff has ticked off a lot of boxes set up by decades of family sitcom convention. However, Young Sheldon has missed a few tricks.
For example, the spinoff can't stage an episode that illustrates the future of its main characters since The Big Bang Theory already showed viewers where the Coopers end up. Similarly, the canon death of Young Sheldon's George Sr. limits the sort of stories that the spinoff can tell, since viewers already know that, whatever else happens, Sheldon's father will pass away before his son reaches his mid-teens. Much like The Goldbergs could last for ten years but could never leave the '80s and progress into the '90s, Young Sheldon's format has limited The Big Bang Theory prequel's plots. Now, its final season makes this worse.
Since Young Sheldon season 7 will be its last outing and will only feature 14 episodes, it is fair to assume that Young Sheldon will never make a Christmas episode. This is a shame, since The Big Bang Theory had some classic Christmas outings, and comparable family sitcoms such as Roseanne, Malcolm in the Middle, The Goldbergs, and Modern Family all got a lot of mileage out of the holiday season. Christmas is a rare time when extended family reunions are commonplace and even the most stable families are put under pressure, so Young Sheldon seems like a natural fit for this genre mainstay.
However, it is likely too late for Young Sheldon to add a Christmas episode to the show's lineup. What makes the spinoff's lack of festive outings doubly shocking is how much The Big Bang Theory benefited from this sitcom trope. The Big Bang Theory season 2, episode 11, "The Bath Item Gift Hypothesis," which saw Sheldon gift Penny with a hug when she gave him Leonard Nimoy's autograph, was a classic that proved just how great the pair's dynamic could be. Since some of Young Sheldon's season 7 storylines seem doomed to fail, the spinoff could do with this sort of reliably funny, agreeably sentimental sitcom plotting.
Young Sheldon's final entry has 14 episodes and begins airing in February 2024, meaning that the series will be over long before the holiday season in November and December even if it features a hiatus during its run. Also, airing a Christmas episode in the summer would obviously have less impact than producing one around the holiday season. As such, it seems extremely unlikely that Young Sheldon season 7 will include a Christmas episode. While Young Sheldon season 7 might still try to shoehorn in this sitcom staple, The Big Bang Theory's spinoff may be better off cutting its losses at this point.
