TV shows nowadays seem to last forever. If they’re successful, chances are they will keep on being picked up for another season, often at the expense of quality. The pressure for new shows to do well is incredible and a lot don’t make the cut.
Although some shows deserved to be canceled and probably won’t be missed, some others truly deserve a second chance, if only to round up their main story arc in a satisfying way for both the writers and the audience. After all, all stories deserve to be told.
Pushing Daisies
Canceled after only two seasons, Pushing Daisies tells the story of Ned, a pie-maker with the odd ability to bring living things back from the dead with a simple touch. Sounds amazing enough, but there’s a catch: if Ned touches said thing after bringing it back to life, it will die again and will remain so. When he accidentally brings back his childhood sweetheart back from the dead, Ned has no other choice but to tell her the truth. Incidentally, Ned also relieved his ability to a detective with whim he will, later on, solve crimes with.
This show was incredibly original, in terms of both storyline and visual. She story was told from the point of view of an external narrator with a great sense of humor. Sadly, the creators never got the chance to finish their story on screen and the audience was left with a big plot-twist at the end of the second season.
The Santa Clarita Diet
Older shows are not the only ones who have suffered from premature endings. In April 2019, news that The Santa Clarita Diet would not come back for a fourth season fell on us like a house on the Wicked Witch of the West, which is downright rude considering the massive cliffhanger that season three ended on. Come on, we deserve better.
The reasons behind this cancellation are unclear as the ratings for the show are fairly high and the online following is still going strong. The show brought a new way of apprehending zombies in stories. It really is a shame to have to say goodbye to our favorite zombie, Sheila, and her family.
Terra Nova
In the year 2149, planet Earth has become too crowded, the air quality is too bad for Humans to survive much longer and all hope seems to be lost until a group of scientists who discovered a one-way portal allowing humans to travel to a parallel time-stream where they could survive. The only downside, this time-stream is similar to our Cretaceous Period and humans need to learn how to co-exists with dinosaurs.
Despite feature a strong cast and executive producing team, the series was not picked up for a second season but still ended on a cliffhanger.
Freaks and Geeks
Freaks and Geeks is high up on every list of best one-season shows, and rightly so. This American teen comedy follows two groups of teenagers, the “Freaks” a group of slackers who count among them Lindsay, an acclaimed student going through a tough time and the “Geeks” a group of freshmen trying to navigate high school as best they can.
The show had an incredibly talented cast and launched the career of actors such as Linda Cardellini, Seth Rogen, and Jason Segel. Despite its popularity, the show was canceled before reaching the end of its first season, ending on a cliffhanger that will probably never be resolved.
Galavant
Galavant is a medieval, fantasy musical following the life of Sir Galavant, a dashing knight determined to build back his reputation. We don’t get to see many musicals on TV anymore and Galavant came as a total surprise when it first came out.
This show is everything the world could ask for: it has songs, good jokes, it’s absurd in all the best ways possible, had magic and is set in medieval times. Although the show was well-received, ABC, unfortunately (and surprisingly), chose not to renew it for a third season. A shame because Galavant is a feel-good show with talented writers and actors and it deserved a longer run.
Torchwood
Torchwood is a spin-off of the British show Doctor Who, which is still going strong and just started it’s 12th season, starring a very popular character: Captain Jack Harkness, head of the Torchwood, a British, secret association which goal is to defend the Earth from extraterrestrial menace and invasions.
In its last arc, the show introduces a menace never seen before: for no apparent reasons, humans stop dying, no matter how horrible maimed they are. Unfortunately, the end of the season falls flat and brings no resolution. Of course, fans expected season 4 to bring answers to their many questions but the show was canceled and left us in the dark.
The IT Crowd
This British comedy show following two geeks, Moss and Roy, working in the IT department of a big company and their manager, Jen who got offered the position by mistake after indicated that she has some experience with computers on her resume.
The IT Crowd is a gem and it deserves all the praise. Sure, if you aren’t at all into technology, some jokes will just fly by you, but the interactions between the characters as well as their personalities make for some truly funny and iconic moments. The series was picked up for a fifth season which was never made and was instead replaced with a special episode to round up the whole story.
Timeless
Timeless is one of those series that will hook you from the start. You won’t be able to stop yourself from watching just one more episode, just because you need to know what happens next.
The story follows an eclectic group of people recruited by homeland security to partake in a top-secret mission. Their goal is to track down and stop a mysterious man who stole a time machine and goes back in time to ruin some major events in human history. Sadly, the show was canceled mid-production and the second, and last, the season had to be rushed in order to round up the main storyline and give the audience a somewhat satisfying ending. The rushed ending made the second season weak compared to the first one and the show deserved more time to complete such a complex story.
The Client List
The Client List is the story of a desperate woman, Riley, who’s husband suddenly ran off on, leaving her to raise their two children and pay off their debts on her own. As she struggles to make ends meet, Riley takes a job in a massage parlor but quickly learns that the place doubles as a prostitution house. Though she at first rejects the idea of doing such work, her financial situation and responsibilities towards her children leave her no choice and she gets caught up in some dark situations.
The series was canceled after season 2 and did not give the creator an opportunity to finish up their story. The last episode of the second season offers more questions than answers and was clearly not meant to be a series finale.
Lie to Me
Yet another show that canceled after its third season. Lie to Me follows Dr. Lightman, an expert in the science of body language and microexpression, who collaborates with both local and federal law enforcement to solve crimes.
There are a ton of crime shows out there, some are incredible and deserve all the praise they get while others are either bland or have been running for so long that the quality of the content is no longer there, yet they are continuously renewed. Lie to Me acted as a modern Sherlock Holmes and brought something totally new to the genre as Bones did before it. The show definitely deserved more than three seasons.
