Remembering The First Canceled TV Show For Every Year Since 2000

[TMC]

http://uproxx.com/tv/2015/10/first-canceled-tv-shows/

Of the 16 new shows to debut on the Big Four networks (ABC, CBS, FOX, and NBC) this season, not a single one has been canceled. Orders have been reduced, as E! Online points out, but The Player going from 13 episodes to nine isn’t the same thing as NBC saying thanks, no thanks to Wesley Snipes, and putting the series out of its misery. Are we living in a kinder world? Not exactly.

All you Blood & Oil fans, all dozen of you, are going to feel duped when you realize your DVR season pass is useless in a few weeks.

Just how unusual is it that after many of the new shows have aired five of six episodes, none have been canned? Let’s take a look at the first cancellation for every fall season since 2000, not counting programming on The CW, WB, or UPN.

[robyrob]

they only list 2000 to 2003 on there - where's the rest of them?

[king of comedy]

very short list

[James28]

This topic got me thinking about creating an Ultimate History of the First Cancelled TV Show of the Fall Season.

I'll start with Fall 1973, when ABC had a sitcom based on Bob & Carol and Ted & Alice. The TV version of Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice lasted seven episodes before ABC pulled it from the schedule due to very low Nielsen ratings.

In fall 1974, ABC had two half-hour shows sandwiching The Six Million Dollar Man on Friday nights: Kodiak (at 8:00 PM) and The Texas Wheelers (at 9:30 PM). Both were cancelled and pulled from the schedule after four episodes each, although The Texas Wheelers would air four more episodes during the summer of 1975.

[littletydramon]

Ive always wanted to see both of Daniel Stern's two canceled series. Copies are impossible to find though. Hell, I can't even find a commercial of either one.

[um]

Originally Posted by littletydramon

Ive always wanted to see both of Daniel Stern's two canceled series. Copies are impossible to find though. Hell, I can't even find a commercial of either one.

Name Daniel Stern's two cancelled series. A bit of it could be found on YouTube. I have been surprised as to what very obscure TV shows of the past I have found there.

[James28]

Continuing the Ultimate History of the First Cancelled TV Show of the Fall Season:

Two sitcoms on NBC's Fall 1975 schedule, The Montefuscos and Fay, were the first shows of the 1975-76 season to be cancelled. Airing on the Thursdays-at-8 hour, both were pulled from the schedule after their eighth episodes had aired (Montefuscos had a 9th episode that was preempted by Game 5 of the 1975 World Series, while Fay would air two more episodes on May 12 and June 2, 1976).

Of the 1976-77 season, the first shows to be cancelled were Ball Four (after 5 episodes), Doc (5 episodes into season two), and The Blue Knight (4 episodes into season two), Ball Four was a freshman while Doc and Blue Knight had debuted in September and December of 1975, respectively.

1977-78's first cancellations were Young Dan'l Boone (on CBS), and Sanford Arms and The Richard Pryor Show (both on NBC), all after four episodes.

For 1978-79, we have the ABC sitcom Apple Pie (just 2 episodes!), the NBC drama W.E.B. (4 episodes), the NBC sitcom The Waverly Wonders (4 episodes), Mary Tyler Moore's variety series simply titled Mary (3 episodes), the sitcom In the Beginning (5 episodes), and the Time-Life produced newsmagazine People (8 episodes), the last three on CBS. Also, Operation Petticoat (which debuted in the Fall of '77) was canned 4 episodes into its season two.

And for 1979-80, there's the CBS drama Big Shamus, Little Shamus (2 episodes), the CBS sitcoms Struck By Lightning (3 episodes) and Working Stiffs (4 episodes), the ABC medical drama The Lazarus Syndrome (5 episodes), and the ABC sitcom Out of the Blue (8 episodes). The Bad News Bears (on CBS) would also be yanked four episodes into its second season, though seven more episodes aired in the summer of 1980, with an additional three left unaired.