A couple weeks ago, ABC officially cancelled their freshman TV show, FlashForward. Though it got off to a good start in the fall, the show’s ratings declined fairly steadily throughout the season. Like many ongoing serials that are end before their time, the last episode of FlashForward left many questions unanswered.
In the FlashForward series, the world’s population passes out unexpectedly for 137 seconds and has a vision of a future date. The series features a large ensemble cast that includes Joseph Fiennes, John Cho, Jack Davenport, Zachary Knighton, Peyton List, Brian F. O’Byrne, Courtney B. Vance, Sonya Walger, Christine Woods, Genevieve Cortese, Dominic Monaghan, Gabrielle Union, Lee Thompson Young, Ryan Wynott, Barry Shabaka Henley, and Lennon Wynn.
Fans of the series have been trying to get the network to reverse its cancellation decision and are now planning an unusual demonstration on the show’s behalf. In addition to sending calendars, friendship bracelets (similar to the one Fiennes’ character wears), and letters to the network, they plan to stage blackouts in front of ABC network offices and affiliate stations across the country — for 137 seconds.
The pretend blackouts are planned for June 10th and will take place in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Detroit, Seattle, and Atlanta. And, though they don’t have ABC network locations to target, fans in various countries around the world — Canada, England, Spain, Italy, Germany — are also planning similar demonstrations.
Ultimately, the networks care about ratings (something FlashForward was sorely lacking) but this demonstration is sure to get their attention. It’s highly unlikely that ABC will reverse its decision to cancel the series but hopefully they will be persuaded to give the series some sort of closure.
What do you think? Do you believe that ABC can be persuaded to bring FlashForward back for season two? Would you be satisfied with anything less? Perhaps a TV movie or an additional episode to wrap things up?
It’s really a shame the show ended the way it did. I support bringing it back – if just to complete the story – it seems unfinished and it was just starting to get interesting.
I am boycotting ABC this summer.
What I would like to do is start a TV network where all the canceled shows go to wrap up. Buy the show broadcast rights and produce a few episodes to bring it to an end. You could rerun the shows complete from start to finish every year or so to pick up new fans and sell the completed series as a DVD set. The first ones I’d pick: Firefly, Jericho, Amsterdam, Journeyman, The Unit, Kyle XY, Crusoe, Defying Gravity, Early Edition, Dead Like Me, Eli Stone, Threshold, Invasion, My Own Worst Enemy, Flash Forward, Terminator – The Sarah Connor… Read more »
somebody needs to get in touch with the people who started the “save farscape” campaign. maybe the fans will get a two part mini to give some closure.
and whoever put roswell in the same sentence as star trek….oh that made my stomach churn. 😉
I am tired of ABC canceling all the good shows (ugly betty, pushing daisies, eastwick, dirty sexy money) only to air
lousy reality tv (only good reality show is DWTS) . If you don’t save FlashForward I doubt I will give ANY new ABC
series a chance because I don’t want to invest my time in another show you will cancel anyway. If FlashForward isn’t
saved, ABC will forever mean “already been canceled” in my mind.
BRING BACK FLASHFORWARD
Friends, I liked “Flashforward” myself, but I’m a senior citizen who’s watched TV from the gitgo, and I have a realistic outlook. What worked in the old days doesn’t work now. The “Jericho” debacle most likely ended the renewal of any show cancelled dueta low ratings. The nets, and Neilsen, have a whole bag of data-gathering methods to tell them who’s watching what fom any given demographic, and those stats influence the programming decisions of the suits. More than one show I’ve liked over the last 60 years has suddenly been yanked, and I useta do my bit in protesting,… Read more »
I agree! I looked forward to this show every week! It’s got a great storyline and I am tired of the networks cancelling shows I like. How do they really do their rating systems?? I watch it!!
just dont think the american public gave it time and did not understand it. take will and crace it made american public scream with laughter but made the english scream in anoyment . sex and the city not funny , desprate housewifes desprate . csi not interesting .lost boring. prison break dull . flashforward wanted you to want to no wat happend next at all times .
just dont understand y they had to cancel it because they show all the other over hyped shows like prison break csi and all the others lol . take lost for instence a good show but went on and on and on and on.sex and the city its gone on and on and on maybe abc spent to much on them to afford flashforward
I say leave the show alone. I agree, the show had some good points but people are making it out to be some great ground breaking show in which it wasn’t. Great idea, bad execution !! But I always find it funny that people will do these protest AFTER the show is cnxled but yet, knowing the ratings are low, knowing the show may get cnxled, no one does anything until it finally is cnxled. Should have spoke up before the ax was handed down……so get a life and just find a new show to watch. The show is dead… Read more »
The saddest thing is that big brother is starting its 9th season (and hopefully last), in the UK, and an excellent series like FlashForward, hardly can complete the first one.
Apparently minorities, doesn’t have that kind of rights…
I guess I’ll comeback to books, at least it is possible to finish them
I couldn’t disagree more about the squeaky wheel. Roswell and Star Trek are older, better examples of this kind of campaign which launched similar (and much smaller scale) efforts to renew shows and succeeded, resulting in healthily-lived dramas with proper conclusions. Think about the massive nature of this event. Then think about what the people are doing — let’s dedicate an entire day of our week to saving this show, during the work week. Think about it; how many people do you think each one that makes the event represents that couldn’t make it, had plans fall through, have work,… Read more »
robycop3 is right! Its a loosing battle! At the risk of dating myself, this battle has been going on for a very long time! I remember when some crazy show that nobody would want to watch was canceled by the network suits of the day. We wrote, protested, complained, threatened boycott, Wrote the advertisers, blah blah blah… But nothing mattered to them, the Network was clear, no one was watching this stupid show, so after an overly long tedious run of I think 5? seasons they and their superior wisdom ended it… Life went on, and they gave us new… Read more »
V is a horrible show.
Don’t know what I could do to get this series get back to its feet…
I hope it works because I have been having a horrible breakdown since it was cancelled. I fell out of chair when I found out it was cancelled.
It’s a waste of your time & effort to tryta get a net to bring back a show cancelled because of low Neilsens. It just aint gonna happen! The nets learned a sharp lesson from CBS’ un-cancelling “Jericho”.
The net suits know that, although protestors staging ‘blackouts’ & who send letters, postcards, & emails may be “squeaky wheels” that get the “grease” of press coverage, they actually make up only a tiny fraction of a percent of total viewers, which isn’t nearly large enough to influence a prog director’s decisions whatsoever. Sorry, but “Flashforward” is dead.