Much to the dismay of the show’s loyal followers, The Unit was cancelled by CBS in May. The series’ viewership had declined in its later years but, despite being preempted several times, still attracted 9.67 million viewers in season four.
The Unit was supposedly being seriously considered to continue in first-run syndication but the deal didn’t work out, likely because of production costs. Sadly, while the military drama and Dennis Haysbert, Regina Taylor, Robert Patrick, and Scott Foley will be around in syndication for years to come, we won’t be seeing season five of The Unit.
It turns out that the writers had a full plan for year five which Executive Producer Shawn Ryan was expecting to be the show’s last. He pitched the storyline ideas to the CBS execs but ultimately they weren’t interested.
At the recent TCA press tour, Ryan shared with The Futon Critic what would have happened. He said, “It was going to be a whole new show in the sense that we were going to be training some young people, Bob was going to be training some people for a whole new organization. Jonas was finally going to be seeing his run end.”
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Ryan continued, “The final season was going to be, I figured the fifth season was going to be the last… It was going to be a long, sort of final mission for Jonas. He’s not medically cleared, Mac has to go in and sort of change the medical records so that Jonas can keep on [going on missions]. We had a whole thing planned, it was going to be good.”
Of the cancellation, Ryan points to CBS’ last-minute decision to save NBC’s discarded Medium series. If things had been reversed and The Unit “had been owned by Paramount and Medium had been owned by 20th Century Fox, we’d be making the fifth season of The Unit right now. I don’t know how else to say that.”
What do you think? Do the plans for season five sound like a good way for the military drama to finish?
Image courtesy CBS.
bring the unit back – now!!!!!
It was one of the stupid things that was done by these so called excecs, they keep proving that they know nothing about what the people want to see.
Here is a season five finally: The Unit storms the liberals in Hollywood, and season six is a go!
They should have finished season five to tie things up. Fox seems to keep all the crap shows and continues the sucky ones. I never did understand that.
pardon my french here but medium is a load of **** compared to unit, unit is a different plot or storyline every episode but unit changes like the weather like for example when charles grey got hit i thought he was gonna die but then hector got hit!!! never see it comming and guarantee noone did, id go into school and me and my mates would talk bout wat happend on the unit… medium?? to predictable and the charcters are to bland atleast in the unit there all diverse
please reconsider this….make just one more series or one more episode there was too many lose ties to just leave it like that. i personally believe tom ryan and mack should have a fight or mack should kill him as he slept with tiffy .
Very sad to see this fine show go. What a shame it is that CBS chose to keep plugging away with lame shows like The Medium & others over this continuously interesting action adventure series. My wife & I always looked forward each new episode. Oh well, at least ABC has kicked up its lineup a little to help us forget CBS’s lackluster knee-jerk management style.
the unit was the only show that cbs had. Maybe cbs will go under now serves them right
I kept waiting for the show (The Unit) to return and then Isaw that it wasn’t coming back! I can’t believe it! It had everything! Medium is so predictable. There is a problem and she dreams the answer, how exciting is that?! Her husband is the best part of the show!
The unit was a great show depicting true events. CBS is only interested in liberalism therefore, they do not want to endorse our military’s courage & stregnth. God bless them all. CBS has been blocked from all 5 televisions in my home…
I’m real sorry this series was canceled. I’d never even heard about “The Unit” until a few weeks ago. I was in Blockbuster, looking for something to purchase. I saw the box set of the first season of The Unit, since it was on sale I purchased the set. This normally wouldn’t be my usual viewing fare, nor do I imagine I am the shows natural demographic target. However, I admire David Mamet, and I hate commercials so I buy DVD’s when I like a TV show. Though I didn’t like the subject matter; men on mission’s, Military matter, testosterone… Read more »
CBS is the best network and has all the best shows. So why did you take The Unit off the air when it was one of your best shows??? Please bring it back!!!
bring it back
Cant believe they canceled the Unit. One of the best shows on TV. What the f–k. Who decides what to keep? What a idiot.
You have got to be kidding, Right! You all cancel out the Unit and replace it with crap. The Unit was the best series you all have had in a long time. please return the program to 10 million of us who faithfully watched it.