Why was my favorite series canceled?

Have you seen the hundreds of comments on social networks asking for the renewal of Anne with an E? Has it happened to you that you are waiting for a new season of your favorite series and suddenly you find out that it was canceled? All of us who watch series and movies have gone through that. Sometimes we trust that the series is so good that we hardly think about its cancellation, but the film and television industries do not always follow that idea. Therefore, we present the main reasons why, against all logic, series or movies are canceled.

Audience

Logically, this is the main reason. Each time a series or movie is produced, it is estimated how many people will see it or what its income will be at the box office. If the numbers are not very close to the goal or if the necessary box office is not achieved, new deliveries of the product will hardly be made, even if it is very good. Think of a series that you have loved that has been canceled and check the audience, maybe there is the answer. In such a big competition it is difficult to keep the audience captivated for several seasons.

Some series, like Elementary , managed to survive despite their low audience. This thanks to international sales, that is, the audience outside the US borders saved the series until it reached seven seasons. Also, the way of measuring audiences has been transformed, no longer taking into account only the people who watch the episodes on the day of the premiere, but also those who watch it through digital platforms, whose numbers can be even higher. The Ministry of Time , the successful Spanish fiction, created a discussion about it this year. Digital audiences increased the number of viewers to 47%, according to El Español , so measuring the numbers only from the broadcast can be misleading.

You may also be interested in: 5 reasons to watch The Ministry of Time

Production costs

Do you know how much each chapter of Game of Thrones cost? According to GQ , in the first seasons each episode costed an average of 6 million dollars, in the sixth season an average of 10 million and in the eighth 15 million. High-budget series play in very risky terrain, since large audiences are needed for the investment to be worth it, the phenomenon of Game of Thrones achieved the expected numbers. When the audience is not good there are two ways, cut expenses, episodes or cancel it.

Dead Drop Diva is a good example of a budget cut. Lifetime had canceled the series, but managed to negotiate cost reduction with Sony TV, so it returned for two more seasons. On the other hand, Sense8 is an example of definitive cancellation, according to Fotogramas , its 9 million on average per episode could not be sustained for long, at least Netflix gave it a closure with a special episode.

Agreements between production companies, channels and platforms

Companies like Netflix don't make their audience numbers public, so many of their cancellations create unknowns about the real reasons. In the case of Anne with an E , the CBC (producer of the series) announced in 2019 its separation from Netflix, according to information from MSN. That is, they did not reach an agreement on the future of the production that was officially canceled this year. Disagreements of this type are common, sometimes series with excellent numbers are canceled for problems between production companies and channels.

Scandals

When a series goes from being unknown to being a phenomenon, the salaries received by the protagonists automatically increase. Some become the highest paid in Hollywood. In addition to this, the eye of public opinion stares at them, so any scandal is usually detrimental to productions. Sexual harassment, racist messages from a decade ago, creative disagreements, drunkenness, beatings and more serious things are usually what lead to the cancellation of a series, even if everything else has worked correctly.

House of Cards is a clear example, Kevin Spacey, the protagonist, was accused of sexual harassment of a minor. The scandal led the production to fire the actor, at a cost to Netflix of 39 million dollars, for contract reasons, according to La Nación . The series had to close without Spacey a final season that was a failure. Likewise, the ABC series Roseanne was canceled due to a racist tweet from its protagonist, Roseanne Barr. The series featured good numbers, and although the actress apologized, the production did not ignore her comments, as reported by the Huffington Post .