How old is young Sheldon Cooper in episode 1 compared to the series finale?

Time works funny on TV. With serialized dramas like “Lost” that span entire seasons in just a few weeks, it’s been a struggle for the writers to figure out how to keep their lead child actor aroundknowing that at any moment can give a growth spurt. For weekly sitcoms, it’s easier because they usually take place in real time and the characters experience the change of seasons along with the viewers at home. This allows children to age naturally on screen, even if it seems too fast for comfort. (For example, Carl and Debbie in “Shameless” went from innocent children to dorky teenagers in the blink of an eye.)

Although the first seasons of “Young Sheldon” were at a light pace, like a regular sitcom, where with each season the child characters aged one year, in the following seasons everything changed. All of a sudden, the writers started stretching the timeline so that Sheldon stays at 13 and 14 longer than usual. As a result, Sheldon begins the series at age 9 (about the same age as actor Ian Armitage) and ends with Sheldon at age 14 (although Armitage was now 16).

The reason they did this is because Big Bang Theory Young Sheldon had a clear expiration date set from day one. The producers and writers always knew that George Sr. (Lance Barber) should have died when Sheldon was 14 years oldand they knew that Sheldon would also be transferring to Caltech when he was 14. The writers knew that the series couldn’t continue with Sheldon separated from his family and George Sr. living six feet under water, so it postponed those canon events as long as possible. Honestly, it’s hard to argue with the results, as Sheldon and Missy’s (Raegan Reward) cast still topped Season 7’s 14 points. At least it’s not something that requires a lot of suspension of disbelief.

Of course, Young Sheldon was simply following in the tradition of countless other sitcoms that messed with time, often to an absurd degree. That ’70s Show somehow managed to stretch the last four years of the ’70s into eight seasons, to the point where the group celebrated Christmas too often to make any sense. A generation earlier, the hit series “M*A*S*H” stretched the three-year Korean War into 11 seasons, asking viewers to admit that the war was so intense that it caused some of its main characters to age three times faster than the average person.

In addition, there are animated sitcoms in which there is no need to age the characters at all. At this point, Bart Simpson has been trying to get out of the fourth grade for 36 years (though he recently turned 11 in the series’ 36th season premiere), just like Stewie Griffin (who is technically my age since he was born in ’98) is doomed to be a kid forever. Animated sitcoms tend to adopt a floating timeline style, which leads to awkward moments where characters’ backstories are constantly updated to keep up with the times. That’s how Homer Simpson, who started out as a baby boomer, is now a millennial teenage flashbacks show him acting like a total ’90s kid.

While not a sitcom, Stranger Things is probably the best modern example of a TV show that grapples with the ravages of time. These child actors have aged nearly nine years starting in season five, even though the characters themselves (many of whom haven’t yet hit puberty in season one) are only supposed to be around four years old. The show seems to address this a bit with its own fifth and final seasonwhich is expected to take place 18 months after season 4, but the awkwardness is still impossible to ignore. Stranger Things is still a fun show, but because its long production time flies so much against the canonical scale, it’s much easier to appreciate Young Sheldon for its consistent annual schedule. The Big Bang Theory spin-off may have been a little out of step with the timeline in recent years, but it could have been a lot worse in this regard.