Lost in Space : Why was it cancelled ?

[DumbDumb2007]

Why was Lost in Space cancelled ? The show was a riot. It shoiuld have been oin the air longer. Will it ever come back as a tv movie ti wrap up the Robinson's story ?
I remember a tv special on aroune 1997. I remember seeing Billy Mumy and Jonathan Harris talking in costume. Where they in charceter ? Was that the actual Jupiter 2 set pulled from storage or was it a new one done with the original blueprints ? a continuation would be a rip ! the movie that came out was not what i expected.

 

[Christopher]

It was cancelled for the same reason virtually any TV series is cancelled: because its ratings fell too low to justify making it anymore. Producing TV shows cost money, which is paid for by advertisers buying commercial time. If a show's ratings fall, then advertisers will be less willing to pay for ad time, and the network won't be able to afford making it anymore.

There have been many attempts at a revival, but the only one that ever got made was the feature film. Now, Irwin Allen, Guy Williams, and Jonathan Harris are all dead, so there's no real chance of any kind of wrap-up.

The special you're thinking of seems to be Lost in Space Forever, a 1998 tribute hosted by John Larroquette. It did indeed feature a scene with Mumy, Harris, and the Robot in character on a reconstructed Jupiter 2 set.

http://www.amazon.com/Lost-Space-Forever-John-Larroquette/dp/B00004S896

 

[Gertch]

I loved this show as a kid. When it went into reruns I couldn't be happier. What was neat was my childhood best friend's dad looked just like Guy Williams and was a scientist with MIT. And a girl in school said her uncle was Mark Goddard (Lowell was just 2 towns over so we believed her). We also used to "play" LiS during recess.

My ring tone is LiS season 2 opening theme. I hope that computes.

 

[Christopher]

^^Seasons 1 & 2 had the same opening theme. Do you mean season 3?

 

[Professor Zoom]

Christopher said:

There have been many attempts at a revival, but the only one that ever got made was the feature film. .

I thought a pilot was shot for a new TV series but it wasn't picked up. Didn't BSG use some of their sets? I thought I heard that...

I would love a revival of the show. The movie was even a lot of fun. Not great, but pleasant.

 

[Dar70]

Christopher said:
It was cancelled for the same reason virtually any TV series is cancelled: because its ratings fell too low to justify making it anymore. Producing TV shows cost money, which is paid for by advertisers buying commercial time. If a show's ratings fall, then advertisers will be less willing to pay for ad time, and the network won't be able to afford making it anymore.

There have been many attempts at a revival, but the only one that ever got made was the feature film. Now, Irwin Allen, Guy Williams, and Jonathan Harris are all dead, so there's no real chance of any kind of wrap-up.

The special you're thinking of seems to be Lost in Space Forever, a 1998 tribute hosted by John Larroquette. It did indeed feature a scene with Mumy, Harris, and the Robot in character on a reconstructed Jupiter 2 set.

http://www.amazon.com/Lost-Space-Forever-John-Larroquette/dp/B00004S896

Actually the show was going to have a fourth season but IA didnt like the budget cuts.(Which mayu have been done on purpose to get Allen to end the show)

There was a new reunion movie in the works called Lost in Space: Journey Home. It was to begin filming in January of 2003. Jonathan Harris died Novemeber of 2002 of from a blod clot to the heart caused by back therapy I believe. They decided to not go through with the movie after the death of Harris. Sadly we will never get a reunion movie. Wish producers wouldnt sit on this stuff for so long. it could have been done years ealier with a full cast.

 

[Harvey]

Professor Zoom said:

Christopher said:

There have been many attempts at a revival, but the only one that ever got made was the feature film. .

I thought a pilot was shot for a new TV series but it wasn't picked up. Didn't BSG use some of their sets? I thought I heard that...

Yeah, John Woo of all people directed the pilot, but it wasn't picked up. http://imdb.com/title/tt0777269/

Galactica used some of the sets from that show as Pegasus.

 

[bigdaddy]

I can't picture this show costing a lot of money, so maybe they ran out of stories dealing with planets of the week. Too bad the Stargate writers weren't around then, they are great at rehashing story-lines.

 

[Maurice]

There are numerous theories about this...

 

[Christopher]

Professor Zoom said:

Christopher said:

There have been many attempts at a revival, but the only one that ever got made was the feature film. .

I thought a pilot was shot for a new TV series but it wasn't picked up. Didn't BSG use some of their sets? I thought I heard that...

I was thinking of original-cast revivals, direct continuations of the old series. But I guess I sort of contradicted my intent by mentioning the feature film in the same sentence.

Dar70 said:
Actually the show was going to have a fourth season but IA didnt like the budget cuts.(Which mayu have been done on purpose to get Allen to end the show)

I read a paragraph to that effect on Wikipedia, but it was so poorly written and lacking in attributions that I chose not to repeat its assertions without corroboration. It still ultimately comes down to the same thing, though: the budget cuts were made in response to sagging ratings. The network could no longer afford to make the show according to standards that Allen would find acceptable.

bigdaddy said:
I can't picture this show costing a lot of money, so maybe they ran out of stories dealing with planets of the week.

No, they ran out of viewers. Irwin Allen never had to worry about running out of stories; he could always have an episode of one of his other shows rewritten. There were occasions where different Allen shows recycled the same plots.

And in fact, LiS was a big-budget show. It had a significantly bigger budget than Star Trek did; IMDb estimates that TOS's budget was about $100,000 per episode on average, while Wikipedia reports that LiS's budget started out around $131,000 per episode in the first season and was up to $165K in the third. That was big money back then.

 

[Jax]

ratings were not a problem...

LIS finished season one with a rating of 32nd, second season in 35th place, and the third and final season rating 33rd.

Several theories have been suggested..

The show had ratings to ensure a fourth season, but it was expensive. The budget for Season One per episode was $130,980, and for Season Three, $164,788. During that time, the actors' salaries increased, in the case of Harris, Kristen and Cartwright, nearly doubling. (Their negotiated salaries for the fourth season were presumably even higher.) There is other evidence that at least a part of the cost problems were the actors themselves, for example director Richardson saying of Guy Williams requiring there be frequent closeups of him:

According to Billy Mumy, the show had already been picked up for the fourth season, but with a cut budget, Irwin Allen said he couldn't continue the show under those circumstances. In fact, at the fourth season renewal meeting with CBS's Bill Paley, Irwin Allen got up and walked out when being told that the budget was being cut 15% from season 3, thereby sealing the show's cancellation

Robert Hamner, one of the show's writers, states (in Starlog, #220, November 1995) that Bill Paley, the head of CBS, despised the show so much that the budget dispute was used as an excuse by Paley to terminate the series.

The Lost in Space Forever DVD cites declining ratings and escalating costs as the reasons for cancellation

However the ratings disute this.

Probably not the main reason, but a contributing factor, at least, was that June Lockhart and director Don Richardson were no longer excited about the show. Lockhart is quoted as saying in response to being told about cancellation by Perry Lafferty, the head of CBS programming, "I think that's for the best at this point..." (although she goes on to say that she would have stayed if there had been a fourth season). Richardson had been tipped off the show was canceled, was looking for another series, and had decided not to return to "Lost in Space," even if it continued

 

[Gertch]

Christopher said:
^^Seasons 1 & 2 had the same opening theme. Do you mean season 3?

Yes.

Youtube has quite a few cast interviews.

 

[Maurice]

Christopher said:
And in fact, LiS was a big-budget show. It had a significantly bigger budget than Star Trek did; IMDb estimates that TOS's budget was about $100,000 per episode on average, while Wikipedia reports that LiS's budget started out around $131,000 per episode in the first season and was up to $165K in the third. That was big money back then.

Sadly, IMDB is wrong, as it often is. Star Trek's per episode budget in the 3rd season "would have to be $178,500--$9,000 less than the the Desilu budget--no ifs, ands, or buts." This quote from Solow/Justman's "Inside Star Trek" book, page 399 of the hardcover first edition. That would make a 2nd season episode cost $187,500 per.

 

[Robotpo]

I've heard LOS was canceled because the network wanted to give Irwen Allen less money than he wanted to continue the series, so he bailed.

 

[davejames]

I've always wondered how much of a competition or rivalry there was between Allen and Roddenberry, or between the casts of Trek and LiS.

I know most of them were just working actors happy to have a job, but it still must have annoyed the Trek cast somewhat to see the higher ratings LiS was getting.

 

[Robotpo]

^^ Interestingly, LOS changed format and became much more space-based in Season 3 to compete with ST, (just as it had become an over-the-top comedy in Season 2 to compete with Batman: The Series)...

 

[EnsignRicky]

Well, Voyager was certainly a...... Well let's just say spritual successor.

 

[Maurice]

I doubt anything LiS did was to compete with Trek. LiS was a successful show with a good timeslot. Trek was barely getting renewed.

 

[Tralis]

^ I disagree. Not everything is based on timeslot. If Network A has a sci-fi show at 6:00 and Network C has one at 8:00 a lot of viewers might be inclined to watch one over the other. Both shows were space opera with bits of sc-fi. Many people still can't seperate the cliche's between the two, a factor that was worse before TNG.

I think Trek did sci-fi more believeably, and both were rather expensive to produce, so LOS couldn't find the exclusive viewership to support continued airing.

 

[Robotpo]

DS9Sega said:
I doubt anything LiS did was to compete with Trek. LiS was a successful show with a good timeslot. Trek was barely getting renewed.

Well, this is directly from the production crew of the show, and the format change is pretty obvious as well. So apparently, they did.