Why was it cancelled?
- Thread starter BillJ
- Start date
Sixteen was just about the number of episodes to make for a Saturday morning cartoon at the time. Hanna-Barbera's Speed Buggy from 1973 ran 16 episodes; Filmation's Brady Kids had a 16-episode first season in 1972 and a 6-episode second season the next year (nb); My Favorite Martians got a 16-episode season in 1973 also. The New Adventures of Gilligan (again Filmation) got 16 episodes for its 1974 season and 8 episodes for 1975.
My guess is that 16 episodes just seemed like plenty. They'd be shown about three times before the summer doldrums and so never have time to wear out the audience. If the show proved popular enough to stick around another six or eight episodes means they can freshen it up through October and November and then settle to two or three reruns of each episode per year for as long as the network will take it. So it was probably be less a matter of anything about Star Trek, and just ``cartoons are done this way, that's all''.
My guess is that 16 episodes just seemed like plenty. They'd be shown about three times before the summer doldrums and so never have time to wear out the audience. If the show proved popular enough to stick around another six or eight episodes means they can freshen it up through October and November and then settle to two or three reruns of each episode per year for as long as the network will take it. So it was probably be less a matter of anything about Star Trek, and just ``cartoons are done this way, that's all''.
according to Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Animated_Series
Incidentally, Bill J, I had that very comic book you have for an icon, when I was a kid.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Animated_Series
I only caught TAS in reruns as a kid in the late 70s/early 80s, but I remember liking TAS very much. Then again I was also already a fan of TOS. I think I was around 5 or 6 when I started watching TOS and TAS.
Incidentally, Bill J, I had that very comic book you have for an icon, when I was a kid.
I wonder how many new fans TAS did generate. Seems like most people's story is very similar to yours - watched TOS and then enjoyed TAS.
Kinda hard to say for sure, but I suspect that any adult viewers TAS had may have simply been those who were fans of TOS that were watching TAS with their kids OR just saw it as the unofficial Season 4.
As for child viewership, I think it was largely kids drawn to it because they were either fans of TOS, or maybe even fans of Star Wars, or the Star Trek movies of the time. Any child viewers who never saw TOS or Star Trek movies might have just been kids who watched it because it was on, and would have watched any Saturday cartoon on at that time slot.
It was probably too much trouble for Filmation to keep producing it. Like others have said, it wasn't popular enough with the kids (sponsors' target audience for saturday morning programs).
Why Filmation didn't fight for it to keep it on the air? Likely the same problem that afflicted Jonny Quest just a few years earlier: the lack of skilled animators who could draw realistic-looking characters and action, as opposed to cartoony Fred Flinstone rubbery type characters.
Hanna-Barbera very rarely attempted a ''realistic'' super-hero type show in the years after Jonny Quest (IIRC they had Devlin in the early 70s, a mixture of Evel Knievel/Circus life type of dramedy with barely any movement, then jump ahead to Galtar in the mid-80s), but Filmation still tackled a more realistic type of project on and off in the years after, such as with Tarzan and Lone Ranger. But never were these shows filled with action...
Why Filmation didn't fight for it to keep it on the air? Likely the same problem that afflicted Jonny Quest just a few years earlier: the lack of skilled animators who could draw realistic-looking characters and action, as opposed to cartoony Fred Flinstone rubbery type characters.
Hanna-Barbera very rarely attempted a ''realistic'' super-hero type show in the years after Jonny Quest (IIRC they had Devlin in the early 70s, a mixture of Evel Knievel/Circus life type of dramedy with barely any movement, then jump ahead to Galtar in the mid-80s), but Filmation still tackled a more realistic type of project on and off in the years after, such as with Tarzan and Lone Ranger. But never were these shows filled with action...
There's a really good documentary on youtube about Filmation and how they had to their animation with shortcuts and low budget.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IauV2h2d84U"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IauV2h2d84U"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IauV2h2d84U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IauV2h2d84U"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IauV2h2d84U"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IauV2h2d84U
Cool! Thank you for posting this.
Thanks for sharing that!
It didn't crossover with Scooby Doo! 
Well...it IS on our computer screens right now. Sooo...it does meet the "on screen" criteria. I'm putting it in my personal continuity!
Saturday morning cartoons in the 70s rarely got long runs. Look at Filmation's Archie series, which started with The Archies (1968-69), then got replaced by Archie's Comedy Hour (1969-70) then Archie's Fun House (1970-71) then Archies TV Funnies (1971-72) then Everything's Archie (1973-74) and finally U.S. of Archie (1974-75). Their Tarzan show got a single stand-alone season of 16, then got packaged as a segment of other shows with pickups of 6, 6, 8, and 0 episodes for each subsequent season.
I sometimes think the studios changed the shows and their titles each year to try to get a minimum season order of 16 as opposed to the typical pickup of 6 to 8. There had to be some reason they changed it up every season.
I sometimes think the studios changed the shows and their titles each year to try to get a minimum season order of 16 as opposed to the typical pickup of 6 to 8. There had to be some reason they changed it up every season.
Last edited:
Well, don't forget HB produced Scooby-Doo, The Herculoids, Space Ghost, The Fantastic Four, Shazzan and The Super Friends. All of these had more realistic figures rather than caricatures. Even Josie and the Pussycats (which was based on an Archie Comics line) and The Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan were closer to real people than, say The Flintstones.
Depends on age, possibly. Watching in the UK, as far as I recall the first episode of any Trek I ever saw was Yesteryear (running on a Saturday around 5.30pm-ish in the Doctor Who slot when I was maybe seven). When I saw the live action version (which was by then run, or rather re-run, in the later 7.20pm weekday slot later taken by Blake's 7) I remember being astonished that they'd managed to find real people actors who looked so like the ones in the cartoon (and then realised that obviously when they'd made the cartoon they'd drawn the characters to look like the actors, and then used the same actors in the live action series. The idea that the live action one had been made first didn't occur to me until a bit later...)
4 of the shows you mentioned were the same time period as Jonny Quest, but I can't believe I forgot about Super Friends and Scooby. Probably because an episode for each had about as much animation movement as in Spider-Man. Thanks for the reminder.
To the person who got part of this o'most
Right, please tell me how far back can you remember
The network wars?, and do you know who didn't want to
See any thing like that on tv? From the year of 1966
To 1968?. And what was the time it was on
TV for the west cost ?.
Right, please tell me how far back can you remember
The network wars?, and do you know who didn't want to
See any thing like that on tv? From the year of 1966
To 1968?. And what was the time it was on
TV for the west cost ?.
Similar threads
