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Arts and Entertainment Editor Bob Sokolsky says it’s happening again. This time to ABC’s “Desperate Housewives.”

The series is scheduled to wind up in May, ending an eight-season run. But Sokolsky says it’s really been six. At least, they ran out of material after six.

The result has been a recycling of scripts with Susan doing Bree’s role, Bree doing Gaby, etc.

Sokolsky calls that an old gimmick that probably started during the radio soap opera era. Or, he adds, it may have even been pioneered by the old comic strips that found heroes like Li’l Abner having the same adventure every year.