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What if TNG have been cancelled?

It's worth pointing out that TNG's first season was originally put into production by Paramount solely an inducement for TV stations to continue buying the 79-episode TOS syndication package (with which TNG was initially paired)—as many were showing reluctance to do. The fact that we eventually got season 2 (not to mention seasons 3-7) was a bonus—it could have all ended with episode #26 back in 1988.
 
It's worth pointing out that TNG's first season was originally put into production by Paramount solely an inducement for TV stations to continue buying the 79-episode TOS syndication package (with which TNG was initially paired)—as many were showing reluctance to do. The fact that we eventually got season 2 (not to mention seasons 3-7) was a bonus—it could have all ended with episode #26 back in 1988.

That's correct. The most likely thing that would have happened was for TNG to get cancelled after the first season (or even halfway through the first season before newer episodes were filmed) and S1 would have been tacked on to the TOS syndication package. We still would have gotten STV: The Final Frontier because Shatner was contractually obligated to make it, but that movie would have bombed like it did in real life, and I doubt they would have made TUC without people still having an interest in Star Trek that TNG provided. But with the proliferation of other sci-fi shows in the '90's like Babylon 5, Farscape, etc., the possibility of "Star Trek: The Next Next Generation" probably would have happened with a '90's take on things rather than an '80's take on a '60's format that all the Trek shows from TNG to ENT had in common (and there would have been zero influence by Roddenberry, because he would have passed away by this time.) Heck, JMS might have produced it rather than Babylon 5.
 
If TNG had been canceled in the first or second season, the way I see it maybe going is that the TOS movies would've still finished out their run, and if Undiscovered Country had still been successful, then maybe we would've gotten a Sulu/Excelsior spin off, or maybe even a TOS reboot series. The Starfleet Academy movie might have gotten made too.
 
like others have said, if TNG was canceled early in its run, STV would have been the end of the franchise for at least a decade. And whenever it returned, it would have been stuck as the Kirk/Spock/McCoy show forever.
 
We still would have gotten STV: The Final Frontier because Shatner was contractually obligated to make it, but that movie would have bombed like it did in real life, and I doubt they would have made TUC without people still having an interest in Star Trek that TNG provided.

I still think we would have seen TUC, or at least a further Trek movie. TVH did so well (after a run of films which did well financially) and it's possible TFF would have been regarded as a 'blip' in that pattern. The performance of TVH just a few years previously would have been more than enough reason to attempt to return to the well one more time.

They just wouldn't have let Shatner anywhere near the directors chair and hopefully would have put the time and resources behind a potential alternate ST6 that TFF sadly didn't have.
 
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