So I had a class about the worst movies of all time with one of my students today, and “jump the shark” came up. He asked a completely reasonable question: why a shark? Why not an octopus? The answer is extremely literal. In a 1977 episode of Happy Days, Fonzie accepts a water-skiing challenge and jumps over a shark while wearing swim trunks and his leather jacket. The phrase itself came later. In 1985, University of Michigan student Sean Connolly and his roommates were discussing the moments when television shows started going downhill. Asked when Happy Days had crossed that line, Connolly answered, “When Fonzie jumped the shark.” His roommate Jon Hein later launched jumptheshark.com in 1997, and the expression spread. Today, to “jump the shark” means making such a far-fetched or attention-seeking creative choice that viewers begin to suspect a series has run out of better ideas. It does not simply mean “a bad episode,” and people rarely agree on the exact moment. And now I'm curious, what movie jumped the shark for you?