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.
My god at least make a movie to tie it all up. I guarantee it will make mad money
I have all four seasons and as is this is not a very good ending it should have whent out with a really good BANG. I would not trade all four seasons for nothing.
the unit is a great series it should continue
make season 5
I am an avid Unit fan, living in Spain, I have just watched seasons 1 – 4 pratically back to back, I have the whole of my fanily watching it and feel that the unit are also my family, please don’t end it there, it was not enough, us fans need more, season 5 could close so much more about the characters, lets face it none of us wanted that to be the end between Jonas & Molly!!
Please Please Please season 5 we want you…………………….
i think they should shoot the 5th season and at the lease put it on the internet under there site so people can by it. Another possibly is if they did something where they have people go onto there website and subscribe to the 5th season and after a cretin number of subscribers they shoot the season and put it up on the internet
I live in South-Africa and is busy with my commercial pilots license (my life long dream) and this TV series was so amazing that I almost gave up flying to go and join US special forces… PLEASE don’t stop with season 4!! TV show or not, The Unit inspires a lot of people around the world! Patiently waiting on season 5… Rudi Oberholzer
Please, please dont stop wih series 4 i beg, find another station.
A movie to close it out would be fantastic, and could even have a bit of a Firefly/Serenity like boost, where the movie could stand on its own, while attracting new viewers to the syndicated releases of the existing material. Plus imagine how much more could be done without the restrictions of network television on this!
Make a final movie. One of the best shows I have seen on network TV.
Please bring back Unit season 5 OR make a couple of movies direct to dvd. There’re loads of die hard military drama fans waiting for a 5th season…. Do not disappoint us.
very nice series
I have very much enjoyed watching all four seasons of the Unit and am very dissapointed that there is no more for me to watch. It was my favourite TV show ever and I was hoping for another series. I know it’s probably too late to re-film another series, but next time dint cut such a good show- especially after just four seasons!
yer i have watched all the seasons on dvd and i just finished season for and its a crap ending serously you end the best american tv serise ive seen with that dont get me wrong season4 was epic but i looked every were for season 5 and i looked on a popular streaming site and thersover 8000 views for episode 5 of seson 4 so please find another station ether in america or here in the uk.
Just finished with season 4. Gotta bring season 5 out now – season 4 has no real ending, don’t leave us fans with this crap u might call ending, shoot season 5 and bring it on tv. Transmission out.