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.
I saw a demographics conference last night on television media and to my surprise
and joy all TV networks were cancelled due to lack of imigination. Imagine that.
The only network worse than CBS is NBC, enough said.
This is absolutely absurd. Why do the networks keep doing this? My wife and I love this show, we would tape every week and sometimes watch it 2 or 3 times before the next weeks show came on. They like getting rid of these great shows and keep crap on like the ridiculous shows like the Mentalist or How I Met your mother. Come one CBS, take a stand for once and do the right thing, and please, how many Survivors are you going to do? Just don’t replace the Unit with another crappy reality show. I am really pissed… Read more »
All I have to say is that I am very disappointed with CBS, I guess we as viewers and OIF veterans really do not matter. This show helped me through a lot of long nights and now you take off a show that allowed me to get away for a few hours in the show while I was in theater. Shame on you CBS, I guess that’s why I don’t watch any of your shows now; The Unit and our local news was the only reason why I would even view your stations and now there is no reason to… Read more »
I am prior military and definitely not in the “demographic” age group. This was one of my favorite shows. The show was often preempted because of football games (and I am a die hard football fan), I never missed and episode – I even set the programmer to record it if it came on to late for me to stay up for. The Unit was well written with great actors and the action and excitement television shows are supose to bring to the entertainment arena. CBS could have considered some loyality to the fans and allowed the show to go… Read more »
This show, was unlike anyother I have seen to air. Obvious aspects and some fine details were dead on in this show as how things were done in that particular buisness. It was something to look forward to every week.
I really liked the show. It is unfortunate that they are going to cancel. I realize at the end of the day CBS is like every other Business. They care first and foremost about the all mighty dollar. I just wonder if they keep in mind shows like M.A.S.H whos ratings were very bad at the start. One of these days someone will take the right step and not just switch to the latest fad, But spend more time and capital into developing shows that people already like.
It’s not often that TV shows attract my attention since I make it a point to stay away from TV shows overall. However, there are a few shows that I do watch for the quality acting and interesting storylines, and The Unit is one of them. I guess CBS doesn’t care, but they just lost me as a viewer completely since this was the only show on CBS that I care about.
I’m so disappointed that the Unit has been cancelled 🙁 It was one of my favorite shows! I’m curious if taping the show through DVR actually hurt the ratings. I was reading that the best way to support a show is to watch it live, but I don’t have time so I tape everything.
I am a 20 year law enforcement officer and married father of two kids. The UNIT was my wife and my favorite show. It was written to entertain men and women who daily experience ups and downs. The writing and action was brilliant. The UNIT writers understood esprit de corp of the military and also how to harness support for the US Military. Fans of The UNIT looked forward to the next episode. So much so that we would scan the CBS lineup just to find it each week. CBS executives made an unwise choice in cutting The UNIT over… Read more »
I’m completely heart broken that they have cancelled the show i was so so looking forward to season five. It hard to fine shows of this quality on tv today.
This was a very stupid move on the part of CBS. Lets create another CSI but take an actual original idea off the air, seriously? The least they could was let us have some closure to the show, maybe a short mini-series or a movie? Anything! You’ve got to make what people like and people like the Unit!!
What a huge disappointment! Our entire family loved “The Unit”. We have teen boys and a 21 year old daughter. We would all sit around and watch it together, it was great family fun. And CBS thought “Medium” was better? Does anybody actually watch that garbage?
An excellent show, not always militarily accurate, but still entertaining. It did accurately depict the oftentimes high-optempo and little downtime of today’s armed forces. Some of the story lines were a bit far fetched, but still interesting, thought provoking, and entertaining. It should be brought back to its’ planned conclusion.
I am extremely disappointed that this series was cancelled. The acting and action were superb. It was a mistake not to continue with the 5th season.
Leslie
The Unit was a great show with some great talent. It offered something for the viewers except reality TV or another cops & robbers show. What a disappointment to have it cancelled!!