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There was a post on this a while ago, but it hasn't been touched in two years.

I've always had an interest in movies, and film criticism has been a hobby of mine for about four years or so. One thing I've always wondered is what would have happened if Gene Siskel (of Siskel & Ebert fame) didn't die of cancer in 1999.

My hypothesis is this—

The show continues as it did in OTL, except with Siskel instead of Richard Roeper. If we presume Roger Ebert still contracts thyroid cancer in 2002, and his battle with the disease is the same, then he will leave the program permanently at around the same time. Then, Siskel will be left with a rotating handful of guest critics, perhaps even Roeper at some point.

I think there still would have been a decline in the show's popularity, and it may have gotten kicked in 2010 or '11. I doubt that an Ebert Presents-style show would have happened (i.e. produced by either Siskel or Ebert, but hosted by two new critics). (This is a shame for me, as it's likely Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, one of my favorite younger film critics, would still be entirely obscure). Siskel would most likely still write for the Chicago Tribune up until the present day.

We can presume Ebert dies in 2013 as in OTL, and at this point, the changes in his and Siskel's legacies are seen. Ebert was more of a prolific writer than Siskel (who wrote mainly capsules IIRC) so there's a solid chance he's still remembered as the more influential writer of the two, while Siskel is regarded as a legendary television personality.

I'm not sure how exactly this would impact the world of film criticism. This is still an incomplete theory, but I wanted to share it anyway.
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