Instead of being cancelled why wasn't ENT moved to SciFi?

[RaymondJames]

I wasn't a fan of Enterprise and still am not. What killed Enterprise was UPN moving it to the infamous Friday Night Death Slot. However some shows survive and kick ass in the Death Slot, Stargate SG-1 fro example, Atlantis, Law & Order SVU, Monk... so many.

I just feel that Enterprise was a death wish from day one.

[galleywest]

There's a whoooooole forum for talking about the movie, so please direct discussion (and/or complaining, defending, wailing and gnashing of teeth) of the new movie there.

[Trekwatcher]

While I was very, very sad to see ENT go off the air, I wonder if moving to Scifi would have been a good thing. ENT via Paramount had awesome production values and most Scifi shows have a decidely cheap feel to them. S3 and S4 had, IMHO, great scriptwriting that could have easily been continued on Scifi, but I wonder if the whole thing would have become shoddy looking. Plus, I wonder if all of the cast would agree to go from a prime network slot to a cable only show.

[Bacl]

A lot of shows don't survive that sort of transition very well. Although most people were upset with the series finale itself, at least the show had a good last couple years of quality.

Better that than to end up on sci-fi and turn into another ghost of what it once was, only to be canceled again.

[Temis the Vorta]

Because doing a quality job on ENT would be too pricey for Skiffy and Paramount would be idiots to denigrate what is, after all, still a valuable brand name by doing a hack job of it.

It's much more intelligent to do what they are doing now: re-invigorate the brand with the strategy most likely to work - fresh writing/production team, going back to the elements that the public knows (Kirk, Spock, Enterprise) - and throw boatloads of money behind it.

If Abrams hadn't come along, Star Trek would have been revived anyway sooner or later. The big thing in Hollywood is brands, brands, brands, sequels, sequels, sequels. That's all they care about anymore. And most of the brands that can be turned into profitable sequels are either coming from comic books or old TV shows. If they'll bring back Get Smart, of course they'll bring back Star Trek.

And I doubt the Star Trek fanbase is any bigger an issue to Paramount than the Get Smart fanbase was. I'll bet there were dyed-in-the-wool Get Smart fans who thought recasting the role with that guy from The Office was the biggest abomination in human history.

[egonbeeblebrox]

Temis the Vorta wrote:

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I'll bet there were dyed-in-the-wool Get Smart fans who thought recasting the role with that guy from The Office was the biggest abomination in human history.

Yeah, I was worried Steve Carrell would miss the point by *That* much...

[Therin of Andor]

MattJC wrote:

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Seriously, I've heard enough about this piece of shit to know I won't be happy with it.

You're not telling us anything new.

Please do yourself a favour and don't see it. You'll never know what you missed. But don't complain if we see it, and maybe even love it.

[galleywest]

So, maybe I didn't make it clear upthread. Conduct discussion of the new movie in the appropriate forum, please, or I will have to either move this thread or close it down. Considering the weird hybrid "1/2 about the topic at hand and 1/2 off-topic arguing about the new movie" this thread has become, I would probably have to close it. I still think there is discussion to be had here and people do seem interested in the actual topic, so please keep it on said topic, okay? Thank you, that is all.

[gblews]

RaymondJames wrote:

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I wasn't a fan of Enterprise and still am not. What killed Enterprise was UPN moving it to the infamous Friday Night Death Slot. However some shows survive and kick ass in the Death Slot, Stargate SG-1 fro example, Atlantis, Law & Order SVU, Monk... so many.

ENT being moved to Friday nights wasn't what killed the show although its clear the new timeslot didn't help. The show was pretty much dead on arrival at that time slot.

Paramount's parent company, CBS, had let it be known that the decision that season 4 would be ENT's last, hell, Star Trek's last, al least for the foreseeable future, had been made before the move to Friday nights.

And if I recall correctly, and I may not, ENT's Friday night ratings were at least the equal of the Stargates (or pretty close). L&O and Monk of course, are entirely different animals.

[MrPointy]

ENT was pretty much killed during the middle of Season 3, but Paramount wanted to bring the final episode count to about 100 for syndication purposes, so we got S4. Nothing was going to save Enterprise after that point, short of the show magically getting >6.0 ratings.

[commodore64]

^ Agreed. And it's too bad. I think Enterprise is a lot more entertaining than the movie of the week or Flash Gordon.

[Noname Given]

Sheridan wrote:

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Hey, I just watched all four seasons of Enterprise last year for the first time and I have to say I loved Enterprise. In my opinion I would put it at 2nd place with TOS being 1st out of all the Trek series and I thought it was a shame it was cancelled. I was wondering if they considered or tried moving Enterprise to the SciFi channel to continue its 5th, 6th, and 7th seasons instead of canceling it? Isn't that what they did with Stargate SG-1? In it's 5th season it was moved to the SciFi channel instead of being cancelled(I assume that's why it was moved) so I'm wondering if they tried doing that with ENT but failed?

Actually, it was said the USA Network was actively interested in picking up the show (as were local stations who said they' love a package like what Paramount did for first run TNG and DS - but Paramount no longer had a first run syndication division) ; where Sci-Fi said it might look into it, were the show offered; but Paramount didn't want to shop the show - at that time (as was stated above by others) Paramount felt it had enough episodes of 'Star Trek' across the 5 series, and was not interested in continuing to produce any more.

[Skywalker]

I also kind of remember something about how Spike was interested in picking up ENT, too (this was back when they still actually wanted to have Trek on their channel). That would have been the easiest route to go, since Spike and UPN were both owned by Viacom at the time. Oh well...

[pookha]

several different companies including the inhouse spike and usa put out feelers as well as turner broadcasting.
turner was the most vocal with one vice president ridiculing the decision to kill a show that was long term showing a profit.

but moonves possibly for reasons related to soon to happen spilit of viacom wanted the show dead and for sure didnt want it to go another part of viacom controlled by his rival

the show at the end of the third season for the first time since the start of the second season was on an upswing in the ratings.
zero hour pulled in more people then the previous year expanse did.

really the big thing that hurt enterprise that has since changed is how the ratings are counted for a show with muliple showings.
at different times it was said the weekend broadcasts pulled in a sizable number of people . believable considering how often the during the week broadcast was premempted for some sport thing since the local stations knew they still had the weekend showing of enterprise.

but i dont know if sci fi really wanted but if they had been able to look in the future and seen how the reruns would at times have better ratings then first run bsg episodes.
yeah i suspect they would have loved to have three first run years of the show.

[TroubledTribble]

Augustus wrote:

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Oh man, just calm down and let's see the movie first...

Mattjc let me ask you an honest question. IF this movie is hugely successful and the Star Trek franchise does get a reboot and we all benefit by more movies, series, and merchandise..... What difference does it make?
At this point Trek is pretty much dead, unless someone does something. JJ is trying to do just that. Can't you give him the benefit of the doubt, until we see the movie?