Head Cases: Fastest Canceled Show?

[sabotai]

I never watched this show and I guess no one else did either. Canceled after only 2 episodes. Is this the fastest a show has ever been canceled?

[TazFTW]

The Mike O'malley show was cancelled after 1 ep.

http://www.tv.com/the-mike-omalley-show/show/1433/summary.html

[gottimd]

I can't wait until the Season One DVD box set comes out.

[WrongWay]

Was there a reality show about picking your neighbor this year that got cancelled during it's first episode?

[CAsterling]

I actually watched the second episode and thought it was a nice gentle entertaining comedy....nothing special, but amusing enough.......it didn't deserve to be cancelled after that short a run.

The way tv shows get cancelled is why I tend not to go out of my way to watch new shows at the start of the new season, I tend to enjoy the ones that do get cancelled......Firefly, Profit and Space Above and Beyond being prime examples

[lighthousekeeper]

i watched the season premeire and the 2nd episode and i loved it. thought it was hilarious.

oh well.

[yabanci]

I stumbled upon this on Wikipedia a while ago. Some real gems here.

List of television shows canceled after one episode
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_television_shows_canceled_after_one_episode

In the competitive business of television, ratings are the primary determinant as to how much a station can earn in advertising revenue. As ratings are wholly determined by the television audience, it is financially unsound for a television station to invest millions of dollars into a show that might turn out to be a flop. Pilot episodes are the first episodes in a planned television series meant to gauge public interest in the show (ratings) and therefore determine how much potential the series has for making money. Some of these are successful, and go on to become well-known series. Others are canceled shortly after their first airing. Rarely, a show is canceled after (or during) their first airing, and never given a second airing; these rarities are the subject of this list.

Note that this list excludes backdoor pilots (pilots which are shot in such a way that they can be aired either as a TV movie or as a regular episode of another series). This list is not exclusive to American series and contains a few examples of shows that, while successful in one country, were cancelled quickly elsewhere.


List of television shows canceled after one episode

Australia's Naughtiest Home Videos
1993 comedy series spun off from Australia's Funniest Home Video Show, hosted by Doug Mulray. This show was actually cancelled during its first episode. Nine Network owner Kerry Packer purportedly personally telephoned the station, telling them to "Get that shit off the air". After a commercial break, a re-run of a Cheers episode was aired instead. It is understood that Mr Packer was alerted to the content of the program by several of his personal friends.

Co-Ed Fever
1979 comedy that attempted to imitate the then successful National Lampoon's Animal House. The pilot was aired as a "special preview" of the then coming season, and the series was canceled in the interim between this airing and the actual date when the series was due to be aired.

Dot Comedy
2000 comedy show on ABC featuring humorous material found on the Internet.

Heil Honey I'm Home!
1990 comedy show on British Satellite Broadcasting in which Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun have survived the war and are living in 1950s New York City next door to a Jewish couple. The show was cancelled after the first episode despite the fact that the rest of the season had already been filmed.

Lawless
1997 action series starring Brian Bosworth as a private investigator.

The Oblongs
2001 comedy, and a somewhat special case, in that it aired a full season on The WB and is rerun on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim in the United States; but when shown on Australia's Channel Nine in 2003, the network pulled the episode mid-airing, thus arguably qualifying it for this list.

South of Sunset
1993 private detective show on CBS starring Glenn Frey. This was the first US-produced series to be cancelled after one episode since 1969. The remaining five episodes eventually aired on the VH1 cable network a year later.

Transformers: Zone
1990 Japanese anime that was cancelled after one episode, and the remainder of its story was published in a magazine.

Turn-On
1969 comedy/variety show canceled for being a terrible derivative of Laugh-In. Although not the first series to be immediately cancelled, Turn-On is generally considered the best-known example.

The Will
2005 reality TV show on CBS in which family members and friends competed to be named the beneficiary of a will.

Who's Your Daddy
2005 reality TV show featuring a contestant who was adopted trying to guess which of eight men is her biological father.

You're in the Picture
1961 game show starring Jackie Gleason; notable in part for Gleason going on the air the next week and saying of the show: "Honesty is the best policy. We had a show last week that laid the biggest bomb! I've seen bombs in my day, but this one made the H-bomb look like a two-inch salute." Technically the series wasn't cancelled, but rather Gleason renamed it The Jackie Gleason Show and it became a talk show for the remainder of its limited run.

Shows cancelled before airing a single episode

Even more rare than series cancelled after a single showing are series cancelled before a single episode is broadcast. Not counting pilot films, which do not always result in a series pick-up, there have been occasions in which a network has announced the debut of a new series only to cancel the series before broadcast.

One such example is Manchester Prep, a series based upon the film Cruel Intentions that was commissioned by the Fox network and advertised as a new series, but, perhaps due to its controversial subject matter involving teen sexuality, was cancelled before broadcast. The pilot episode of Manchester Prep was later partially refilmed to add nudity and adult subject matter, and released as the R-rated direct-to-video film, Cruel Intentions 2.

The BBC commissioned a cartoon series called Popetown in 2002 which consisted of comical misrepresentations of the Roman Catholic church. After a sustained campaign from senior Catholic theologians, the series was never broadcast on the grounds that it was not of sufficient quality. It is however scheduled for release on DVD in 2005. [1]

The ABC reality show Welcome to the Neighborhood was cancelled before it aired because of its subject matter that "risked fostering prejudice." A conservative white neighborhood has to choose their new neighbors from a group of families that are black, Hispanic and Asian; two gay white men who've adopted a black child; a couple covered in tattoos and piercings; a couple who met at the woman’s initiation as a witch; and a poor white family.

[mauchow]

^^^^ that is hilarious stuff

[Ryche]

The Oblongs....damn I hated that cartoon, makes me feel good that Aussies had the sense to not show more than one episode. That show single handedly stopped me from watching Adult Swim because they'd air it in the middle of the other cartoons, forcing me to change the channel.

[Radii]

Australia's Naughtiest Home Videos


That's a travesty..

[Swaggs]

My wife is gifted at picking new shows to watch that get cancelled. And she continues to get burnt after all these years.

[RebelMan]

Heh, until now, I thought it was that L.A Firefighters show starring Pamela Andersen. How dare they replace Space: Above and Beyond with that trash.

[WrongWay]

When is this DVD set comming out?
Heil Honey I'm Home!
1990 comedy show on British Satellite Broadcasting in which Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun have survived the war and are living in 1950s New York City next door to a Jewish couple. The show was cancelled after the first episode despite the fact that the rest of the season had already been filmed.

[Groundhog]

Australia's Naughtiest Home Videos

I actually was watching this when it got pulled. I was only 11 at the time and remember watching the TV in disbelief as two men raced up a beach with flaming news papers stuck up their arses.

[Karlifornia]

Heil Honey I'm Home....It's hard for me to comprehend why this didn't have a lengthy run....

...Wait, no-It's hard for to comprehend how money was ever put forth to film it.

[Anthony]

i am going to masturbate right now. i hope everyone reading this pictures me with my genitals in my hand and going to town. i don;t care you can report this to skydog. i am all powerful and i hate seagulls.

[Tekneek]

Girls Club was cancelled after two episodes a few years back.

I remember it only because FOX was promoting it via every possible medium for weeks...and then killed it after the second episode.

[HomerJSimpson]

Sorry, but "Head Cases" had good potential, but the writing sucked. A great waste of good talent and a decent idea.

[Chas in Cinti]

I Tivo'd the first 2 episodes of Head Cases... I actually enjoyed it. It was just starting to get it's feet about half way through the 2nd episode. It didn't "commit" to either side of the fence (Drama v. Comedy) and I had a feeling this would happen... eh well...

[Ramzavail]

Mike O'Malley should stick to being "the Rick"

[albionmoonlight]

Wasn't the show that CBS pimped during the last March Madness canceled before the tournament actually ended?

[Johnny93g]

Heil Honey I'm Home!

This has to be the stupidest and most insensitive tv show ever scripted, let aloned cast, produced, filmed and aired

[cuervo72]

Mike O'Malley should stick to being "the Rick"

He's done ok with Yes, Dear.

[Pumpy Tudors]

I remember seeing tons of advertising for South of Sunset. I don't remember what I was watching when I saw it. I had thought that it was the NCAA basketball tournament, but the show didn't premiere until October of 1993. Maybe they were saying "watch this new show next fall." Anyway, they pimped the hell out of that show, and it only lasted that one episode. Every time I think of TV shows being cancelled quickly, that's the one that comes to mind, only because it was advertised so much.

I hadn't realized that Head Cases was cancelled already. They must've shown commercials for that program at least 5 times during each NFL broadcast on FOX. I never watched the show because Adam Goldberg's hair looked like it was going to jump out of the screen and attack me. :(