Well, I just got the news and the news ain’t good.
CBS have made their decision and Eleventh Hour isn’t getting a second season. We had the numbers, we had great fans, we had a cracking set of new stories ready to go, but the show isn’t being picked up.
This is a message for everyone who’s made a comment or written in or otherwise made their feelings known.
I want to give my thanks to everyone who was a part of the renewal campaign, and to everyone who showed their support in other ways, and to every one of over twelve million people who made time every week to watch the show. And thanks to Rufus and Marley and Omar and Cyrus and Ethan and everyone whose names you may not know but who came together and met the challenge of making big science thrillers work.
Because of the so-called CBS “cone of silence” during scheduling, there really was no way of knowing which way it would go. But I began to get a sense of it in the last few days, when other shows were getting calls over one detail or another and we were getting nothing. Even so, you don’t give up hope; but as the suspense grew and grew I was beginning to get an inkling of how Richard Harris felt in A Man Called Horse.
(You should know what I mean. The scene where they test him by hanging him up by… well, you either know it or you don’t)
Usually what happens at this point is that the creator starts talking about keeping it all together and making a movie. I’m not going to do that. And for one good reason; Eleventh Hour‘s setup and its character set make a purpose-built instrument for telling stories on TV, and TV is where they belong.
I will say this. Don’t worry about me, I’m not out of the game and I have other irons in the fire. My relations with the JBTV and Warner Brothers people are still good. I’m going to communicate with our cast and tell them what I’m telling you now; that if, while I’m working on other stuff and keeping my family fed, I should sniff any opportunity to bring Eleventh Hour and some of those untold stories to your TV, I’ll be on it like a dog.
25 responses to “Eleventh Hour – We’re Cancelled”
First, I am so sorry to hear this. Your show is brilliant and does not deserve this treatment. CBS does not know the mistake it has made.
You said that you are going to keep your eyes open for other opportunities to bring EH to our TV screens and I hope that this can happen. The fans over at the Renewal Campaign already had plans to appeal to you and Mr. Bruckheimer to bring this show back to us in any way that you can. Another network. Cable. This show is just too good to end because of the short-sightedness and bad decision-making of one network. Please consider our plea. I know of other shows that have been canceled and then gone on to live healthy lives somewhere else.
Thank you for being so available to us and thank you for EH.
Thanks so much for getting the word to us Mr. Gallagher.
What a disappointment.
I want to thank you, Rufus, Marley and everyone that worked so hard to bring such a uniquely quality program to us.
I’m sure all 12 million of its fans, like me, will continue to cherish the 18 awesome, mind-enhancing episodes we were fortunate enough to receive.
Thank You.
I’m REALLY unhappy about this! I so wanted a second season (or more). And it’s just too bad no other studio has stepped forward to pick it up the way they have for several other shows. It just so sucks.
I plan to get the DVDs as soon as the season comes out and as soon as we can allocate the funds.
Nikki Finke comments on the decision here:
http://www.deadlinehollywooddaily.com/primetime-pilot-panic-more-cbs-moves/
Mr. Gallagher, this is the worst news I’ve ever heard. This is ridiculous, I don’t know why CBS made this decision. I don’t understand the move and Eleventh Hour was doing good in the demos.
There has got to be a possibility to have this show in another network. Twelve million viewers is a lot to cancel a show. It was doing great and I’m sure it was going to do better. Rufus and Marley are perfect for those roles.
We invested so much time in these characters and we’re not ready to let them go and we don’t want to let them go this easily.
Excerpt from Nikki Finke’s comments:
“….and that it rated lower than 2 shows CBS cancelled – Eleventh Hour and Without A Trace.”
I have no words to describe how frustrating this is.
Another network should be smart about this and snatch Eleventh Hour up quickly.
Damn. Sorry to hear that.
I didn’t know how to feel when I first heard this news. I couldn’t stop crying, swearing, but at the same time, K and everyone else gave me hope.
Like Lu said,”We’ve invested so much time in these characters”, but I’m not ready to let go of them yet.
To me, Eleventh Hour wasn’t only a simple TV show, but my life. I had become attached to it from the first episode. I don’t know if I can live without it anymore!
Saying goodbye is a really hard thing for me. So, screw that, I won’t say goodbye! I’ll save my the rest of my tears for the joy of having a season season of Eleventh Hour, okay? 😉
Ouch! Sorry, Stephen. But you can’t keep a good writer down!
Sorry to hear the bad news. Across the board the networks appear to have made some very strange decisions.
Really sorry to hear the news, Stephen
Just like here in the UK, you wonder why decisions like that are made. I do hope that another Network realises its worth.
Mr. Gallagher, I was too depressed yesterday to leave a post on your blog. I feel like I’ve lost a close family member with the cancellation of Eleventh Hour. It was my favorite show and I will never understand why CBS chose not to renew such a thoughtful and interesting series. Thank you so very much for sharing those wonderful stories with us!
Mr. Gallagher,
Your show was terrific; smart, hip, thought provoking, even at times, funny! Thank you for creating a show worth watching on TV!.. something I otherwise rarely do.
As an aside, I was pleasantly surprised when friends told me an article I wrote for Family Security Matters was picked up by an EH fan and posted to the renew EH site – a very new audience for my work to be sure!!! And appreciated (thanks DVIKIB)(fyi…Article showcased EH to talk about science in the US and other issues). Mr. G….Thanks for the inspiration! I normally write about WMD and global threats. It was fun to write about a show that has tremendous possibilities to enlighten, inspire, oh and entertain, too!
The show provided a lot of positive messages. CBS was clearly shortsighted.
Wishing you much continued success.
RBM
ToxDoc – Right after I posted part of your article and link to the full article on the CBS fan forum, I printed and mailed your entire article to CBS. What an amazing article it was. Too bad it didn’t stop CBS from cancelling the
show -it certainly should have! Thanks for your wonderful analysis!
Mr. Gallagher,
Your fans are still grieving and want to see how you are doing.
Also, I have sent you an email (from luvinx8) and would like to know if you have received it?
I’ve had a number of such off-blog messages, yours included, and because they raise some different points I’m trying to give each one an individual reply. Takes me a little time to catch up.
Dear Mr.Gallagher,
There is quite a stir about EH, especially on the Campaign site. You have so much support for this show, people seem to have ‘woken up’ and realised what has been missing in a TV show at long last. Good luck with EH, never say never because a show as good as this will NEVER lie down.
Jackie
Thank you Mr. Gallagher.
As K and I were discusing, there are so many fans out there that didn’t even know the show was ‘on the bubble’ because it had been doing good in the ratings (should I say SO good?) that now that the news that is canceled is out there they just can’t believe it.
We still support this show because it’s excellent. In these days of reality TV, a show like Eleventh Hour teaches us something and provides a message besides entertaining. It’s definitely the kind of show I’d want my children to watch.
My husband and I both really love EH.
We need more tv like this. Eleventh Hour is GOOD storytelling. I LOVED the last episode…beautifully done.
Here's another nudge from a viewer and fan who would continue to watch this show on ANY other network, should it get picked up. I would also be happy to buy DVD boxed sets of it later. I really hope you can find a new home for your show…your stories for it deserve to be told.
My husband and I really loved your show. We felt that it was a cut above most of the shows that the networks just keep on showing. We have actually stopped watching some of them in the middle of an episode because they were either too trashy or too violent to watch. It is bad when a husband and wife are too embarrassed to watch a network TV show together.
I hope you can find a way to bring the Eleventh Hour back to our TV screen.
Thank you so much, Mr. Gallagher, for the one season that we enjoyed so much.
Diane Eppler, Lake Butler, FL
Thanks, Diane. Much appreciated.
I am absolutely gobsmacked that there is to be no more Eleventh Hour!! It was the best thing on TV and I looked forward to watching each gripping episode. Rufus was perfect it was almost written for him! All hail Rufus!! Mr Gallagher I do hope that the idiots that aren't giving it any more air time decide to put your work back on. I feel bereaved and miss the programme and cast.
Forever Eleventh Hour!!
I hear that Rufus has been cast as Aurelio Zen in a series of adaptaions of the Michael Dibdin novels. So at least you can get to see him play the good guy again!
Still pissed about it. I haven't watched CBS since. They have no idea how big this show could have been.
I only wish another network would have picked it up.
Appreciate it, Doctor M. My score since Eleventh Hour has been pilots sold 4, pilots made 0, so I've never been out of work but it hasn't given me the combination of access and leverage it would have taken to engineer a relaunch.