Canceled Shows: If they were popular from the start

[JirinPanthosa]

I'm possibly the only person in the world who thinks this, but...I wanted more Flash Forward! I was excited to find out what sequence of events was leading to 'The End', and I loved the way all the visions played out in the finale. Yeah the hero was the poor man's Jack Shephard, but he got the job done. (And that doesn't stop Person of Interest from staying on the air).

But, if it hadn't been cancelled after one season, it's likely the show would have gotten ridiculous by now.

Other, 'What if it had been cancelled' situations.

What if Lost had been canceled after season three? Abrams probably would have still left it with future Jack screaming 'We weren't supposed to leave', but it would have been assumed everybody got home directly following that episode and much more of the weirdness and mystery of the island would be open mysteries, and all the time travel stuff would never be part of the story.

What if The Simpsons had been canceled after the first few seasons? People would probably be begging for it to come back the same way they did with Futurama and Family Guy, and it'd probably be even more popular now.

[lennier1]

cardinal biggles wrote:

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Ironic, considering Roddenberry's "Wagon Train to the stars" sales pitch from 1964.

Roddenberry had one advantage: In the days of TOS the Western genre was still a popular thing that made a lot of money.
Nowadays, productions of that genre are a rather rare sight, making it harder to pitch things like that successfully.

[Mr. Adventure]

^ I think timing played a part as well, Firefly came out between Voyager and Enterprise, when Farscape, Stargate, Andromeda were on the air as well as oddball shows like Lexx and Starhunter. With a lot of material out there I don't know if people were as ready to experiment as they might have been a few years later.

[Greg Cox]

cardinal biggles wrote:

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If it were co-written by Joss Whedon and David Milch, I would totally watch this.

Actually, that's the pitch I used to hype The Six-Gun Tarot by R.S. Belcher, a novel that came out last month from Tor.

If you're interested, the book is getting fabulous reviews and there's even a book trailer on YouTube. Check it out.

Thanks for giving me an excuse to plug the novel again!

[Mr. Adventure]

^^ you're shameless Greg Cox

[Greg Cox]

Mr. Adventure wrote:

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^^ you're shameless Greg Cox

Or I'm a just a very proud editor.

Seriously, it's a great book that would make a cool (non-cancelled) TV show.

[The Borgified Corpse]

I agree that Firefly would probably fare better with audiences now that it did back then. The space sci-fi field was a bit crowded back then, whereas it's almost deserted now (aside from Doctor Who & The Clone Wars).

Still, it wouldn't hurt if Joss could try to come up with names that aren't completely counterintuitive or vague. Serenity doesn't sound like an action movie. Firefly tells you absolutely nothing about the show itself. And Dollhouse really confuses everyone when they first hear it, even if the metaphor is suitable.

Greg Cox wrote:

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I do think that the overtly "Western" trappings on FIREFLY initially confused and/or turned off some people. I know that, among my own circle of friends, it caused some head-scratching and took a little getting used to.

"Is it supposed to look like a cowboy movie?"

"I think that's kinda the idea, yes."

"Oh. Not sure what I think about that."

I think America currently has a very ambivalent relationship with Westerns. There was a poll not too long ago (on NPR or something) about which cancelled TV shows would you most want to see come back on the air. The top 2 vote getters were Firefly & Deadwood.

Then there was Cowboys & Aliens. I had been reading about the movie for a while online but most people had never heard of it. I recall seeing one of the first trailers for it in a packed theater (opening weekend of either Iron Man 2 or Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows, Part 1 as I recall). And when the title "Cowboys & Aliens" came up, you could hear half the audience groan with dread while the other half went "Huh?"

jayceee wrote:

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So far I haven't come across any tv shows which were almost impossible to figure out eventually.

It's more an issue of how much initial patience the show asks of its audiences. Wonderfalls was a great show but with a quirky premise and a subtle tone that made it hard to really put across the idea in 30 second spots.

Greg Cox wrote:

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There's also the time-honored "X meets Y" formulation.

"It's BUFFY meets DEADWOOD."

"It's GOSSIP GIRL with elves and fairies!"

"It's THE SOPRANOS--in space!"

Lost Girl-- "It's like Angel but with lots more fucking."

Mr. Adventure wrote:

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Firefly - Western in Space, that's what went around and why Firefly was dismissed by so many initially. I really wish the internet archive had a TrekBBS snapsot when Firefly premiered. A lot of people didn't give it a chance based on that.

OTOH, in my circle of friends, I've found that Firefly was generally a much easier sell than Buffy/Angel. Even though I'd say Buffy/Angel was the much better series, my friends seem to find spaceships far more appealing than vampires. Go figure.

lennier1 wrote:

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They basically made it worse with every season because they tried to "fix" what didn't need fixing.

At the end of season 4 the showrunners merged the Taelons with a competing alien race to get those space vampires (failed attempt to merge two offshoots of an ancestral race back together). That's when they flushed even the last reasons to be still watching that train wreck down the drain.
Guess after the terrible seasons 2-4 they wanted to create something so bad, it actually made the previous ones seem almost bearable.

I actually started the show with Seasons 3 & 4 and only recently got around to seeing Season 1. Personally, I'd say that Season 1 is a bit overrated and Season 4 is way underrated. I loved all of the conniving backstabbing going on between Sandoval & Zo'or in Season 4. Plus, I thought Liam Kincaid was a much more charismatic lead than William Boone. (Season 5 was certifiable, unmitigated shit but I've never heard anyone dispute that.)

[TheSeeker]

Tom Hendricks wrote:

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Of all television shows cancelled after one season or less, Journeyman was the only one that truly upset me.

My wife and I were pretty bummed out by that too.

Another show I would have loved to see get at least one more season is John Doe.