Andromeda And Mutant X Cancelled 442
dmehus writes "Science fiction fans may be dismayed to learn that "Mutant X" and "Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda" have been cancelled, despite the fact "Andromeda" had been cleared for a final season beginning in the fall. That prospect seems highly unlikely as the show's producer, Fireworks Entertainment, is shutting its doors for good and owner CanWest Global Communications (which also owns canada.com, the National Post, Global Television, and a bunch of other media assets) announced it will take a $159 million writedown on Fireworks. The news means "Mutant X" has a series total of three seasons and 66 episodes, while "Andromeda" will have a series total of 88 episodes in four seasons. Slashdot has previously covered 'Andromeda'."
88 and rough end is tough fate in TV biz... (Score:5, Interesting)
So, Andromida stopping at 88 is kinda an ugly number to get caught at. Sci-Fi might have an interest in funding a series-ending run of about 13 episodes to run as an exclusive event, and therefore give the show some life in daily reruns. 88 with an abrupt-stop ending just isn't that valuable for reruns in comparision.
Of course, that depends on Sci-Fi being able to see the value in rerun rights. If the library of Fireworks assets including the 88 existing episodes get sold to a party that's not interested in letting Sci-Fi have the show on a 5-a-week daytime basis at a reasonable price... then there's no point in doing the deal.
The Sci-Fi saves the show thread is a longshot, but it could happen so it can't be ignored. The show's not dead yet, but it's taken a usually-fatal blow.
Re:88 and rough end is tough fate in TV biz... (Score:5, Interesting)
That said - the original Star Trek was a good series. I've seen some Andromeda, and while it looked okay and had the occasional interesting moment (not to mention some impressive visuals and sets - I remember seeing a giant observation deck with a diplomatic function going on), it never hooked me. Probably part of it was that I can't stand Kevin Sorbo - although DeepWater Black's Gordon Michael Wolvett was a welcome addition to the cast, and Lexa Doig is reasonably easy on the eye.
No offence to those who like Andromeda, but I think it's about time people stopped cashing in on Gene Roddenberry's name just to get ratings. (modern Trek's high point was DS9 - since then, it's just been flogging a dead franchise!)
DISCLAIMER: The above views of TV shows are just my opinion. Yours may vary. Remember, opinions are like assholes - kindly stop shoving yours in my face
Re:88 and rough end is tough fate in TV biz... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:88 and rough end is tough fate in TV biz... (Score:3, Informative)
For the uninitiated (and there probably aren't many on
Re:88 and rough end is tough fate in TV biz... (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, Andromeda did have a basis in Roddenberry's work -- at least more so than Earth:Final Conflict did (unless I missed something). The original idea was a show called "Genesis II" about a man named Dylan Hunt who was put in some kind of suspension for an experiment, and found by a group called Pax something like 150 years later, after Earth had been through bad events and balkanized. He and the Pax teams would use subshuttles to get to all the different city-states that had grown up after a technological and civil collapse. The intent was to give the characters access to many different cultures, like the Enterprise had in Trek, and let us watch as Pax and Dylan rebuilt society. There was another pilot, very similar, called "Earth II" (I think), that, again, had Dylan Hunt sleep for a long time (this time on a space station), before returning to a balkanized Earth to help rebuild civilization.
Re:88 and rough end is tough fate in TV biz... (Score:4, Interesting)
All I'm saying is, Gene's been dead for over a decade. Isn't it about time TV stopped making shows from his thirty year-old rough drafts? Strikes me as a combination of authorised plagarism (his widow and son are involved in it) and grave robbery...
Re:DS9...Huh? (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not the best TV scifi eve
75 (Score:2)
Re:88 and rough end is tough fate in TV biz... (Score:5, Insightful)
Finally, I would note that the idea of Sci-Fi funding enough episodes just to round out to 100 is just silly. After all, they're the only network that's likely to be interested in rerunning Andromeda ANYWAY, so why would they want to make the property more valuable (and thus more costly) unless they truly think that making new episodes is a profitable proposition (as they did with SG-1)?
One could say ... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:One could say ... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:One could say ... (Score:3, Funny)
Hey, at least the 88 episodes aren't being sent to a far away planet where a young energy beam can become the only surviving fan other than somebody frozen for 1000 years.
Re:One could say ... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:One could say ... (Score:5, Informative)
Futurama lasted only 72 episodes, yet is still doing perfectly well in 5-a-week infinite reruns on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim. It is possible to survive with less than 100 episodes... but the show has to be detail-filed and good in general.
Re:One could say ... (Score:3, Insightful)
Then, then next season, the credits started with a line like "The universe can be a dangerous place." I almost shut it off right there, but wanted to give it a chance. I thought that season opener (where they rescue Becca and Tyr) was we
Re:One could say ... (Score:3, Informative)
The exact episode was Ouroborus. They fired the head writer, dropped the character "Rev Bem", (actor Brent Stait chose to leave), threw out the character bible for Trance Gemini and didn't both to replace it with anything. Every episode after that one was pretty bad, it was often glaringly obvious that episodes that had originally been written to star another cast member had been rewritten to expand Sorbo's role.
Gordon Michael Woolvett and Laura Bertram were the highl
on the other hand... (Score:5, Insightful)
Science fiction fans may be dismayed to learn that "Mutant X" and "Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda" have been cancelled
Though fans of quality television will rejoice. Mutant X? It has to be one of the worst TV shows I've seen more than 5 minutes of in the last 10 years.
Re:on the other hand... (Score:2)
Re:on the other hand... (Score:3, Interesting)
It's sad, but Enterprise just blows. Andromeda was way better I thought.
Re:on the other hand... (Score:2, Informative)
My understanding is that some company involved in the first X-Man movie got a contract to do a tv series based on the x-man 'concept', and thinking they were going to get to do X-Men the tv series they got another company to buy in and help out. Well aparently the first contract (with Marvel) was such that that the first company got told by marvel they couldn't actually use the x-men or any specific marvel char
Re:on the other hand... (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe CanWest is doing a good thing by putting FireWorks out of its misery rather than delivering sub-standard final seasons.
Re:on the other hand... (Score:5, Insightful)
Bah! (Score:2)
I think the problem is more likely to be that they concentrate so much on being flashy that they forget other aspects that go to make a good program.
That said I've never seen Andromeda and couldn't bare to sit through either of the episodes of Mutant-X I tried started watching.
Re:Bah! (Score:2)
e.g. the writing and acting
Re:on the other hand... (Score:4, Interesting)
That's 67 episodes (I'm fining them an extra one...) too many as far as I'm concerned. Andromeda was just barely watchable and only because I of Keith Hamilton Cobb's (Tyr Anasazi) overacting while he was still there. I tuned in to see just how much he would ham it up this week.
Mutant X on the other hand was unexcusably horrible on all levels.
Sci-Fi Channel must be kicking themselves in the ass. The passed on Firefly to get a show whose studio goes belly-up before they even air an original episode.
Re:on the other hand... (Score:2)
Re:on the other hand... Mutant eXcruciating. (Score:2, Insightful)
Mutant X was so bad it made my teeth hurt.
Re:on the other hand... (Score:3, Insightful)
"Dismayed" is a bit strong. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:"Dismayed" is a bit strong. (Score:2, Interesting)
In anycase I've bought all the Andromeda dvd's.
The most recent one that came out was 3.4 though, so how do you get access to season 4 dvds??
Re:"Dismayed" is a bit strong. (Score:3, Interesting)
Snap. I'm almost ashamed to have the Firefly box set in the same media tower as Andromeda.
Apparently Australia has been getting DVDs the fastest. Might have something to do with the fact t
Re:"Dismayed" is a bit strong. (Score:3, Interesting)
One good (bad) thing I can say about Andromeda is that it excelled at shark jumping. Too many characters for one thing. While some shows can make that work (Firefly) Andromeda didn't seem to have the budget (or the writing talent) to have all the characvters in each episode. Also whats the point of having a ship staffed by thousands if 6 and an AI can do the job just as well. I could go on and on, but I'd rather go to bed...
Re:"Dismayed" is a bit strong. (Score:3, Funny)
Unfortunately, Andromeda is not a show that you can refer to by episode numbers and have it make any sense: perhaps in 10-20 years, when there have been multiple conventions, a balding Kevin Sorbo can do a skit on some lesser comedy show and when DVD 4.6 is brought up, he can say "Get a Life." THEN you can start refering to Season X, Episode Y.
But that time has not yet come.
Re: "Dismayed" is a bit strong. (Score:4, Informative)
> WTF is "jumping the shark"?
Originally it meant a show doing something outrageous and irrelevant in order to boost sagging ratings, e.g. Fonzie jumping over sharks on waterskis.
Now the term seems to be generalized to a couple of broader meanings by a lot of people, such as (a) making changes that take it away from its original conception, or even (b) simply going down the tubes.
And yet... (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't it obvious? GOOD SF doesn't sell. Cheap commercialized tripe does.
Re:And yet... (Score:5, Interesting)
Lets be honest.. (Score:2)
Re:Lets be honest.. (Score:3, Funny)
that would be me. I was smoking drugs at the time...
Re:And yet... (Score:2, Insightful)
There's a lot of TV hours out there per-week. One of Enterprise isn't a plague on humanity, and it beats the living crap out of yet another our of reality TV.
Re:And yet... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:And yet... (Score:2)
Re:And yet... (Score:5, Interesting)
Isn't it obvious? GOOD SF doesn't sell. Cheap commercialized tripe does.
Did you just call Andromeda and Mutant X good sci-fi?
Andromeda has spaceships making race car noises, and Mutant X had its Xavier-wannabe use communication satellites to download the DNA needed to stop an epidemic in mutants!
Not that I'm defending Enterprise, I think Rick Berman should be stoned to death, but Andromeda? Mutant X? Good riddance!
Re:And yet... Earth: Final Conflict (Score:3, Interesting)
Yet another quality Slashdot communitycancellation (Score:5, Funny)
Is nothing sacred anymore?
What's next - Lucasfilm is cancelling Episode III!!?!?
Re:Yet another quality Slashdot communitycancellat (Score:5, Funny)
We can only hope...
Cherry flavoured hope. (Score:2, Funny)
Will that be the "Classic Hope", or "New Hope"?
Re:Yet another quality Slashdot communitycancellat (Score:2)
88? (Score:4, Funny)
*88* episodes? The fact that someone kept Andromeda going for 88 episodes is deeply disturbing. I always assumed there were only about 4, and they got repeated a lot.
Re:88? (Score:3, Interesting)
Not really (Score:4, Insightful)
Heh, more likely they won't. Save your pity for Firefly. [amazon.com]
Mutant X (Score:5, Insightful)
Ripoff... yes... (Score:4, Interesting)
As I recall, the reasoning behind Mutant X was that Marvel has some agreement with Fox regarding any X-Men TV series, but they weren't getting anywhere, so they scrambled to get *some* mutant-related show on the air with any other network.
Mutant X is basically just X-Men tweaked to the point where isn't legally X-Men, and can therefore be aired on UPN. Of course it's crap, but I doubt it can be called a ripoff when it's done by the same people. Unoriginal, sure. Derivative, certainly. Ripoff? Not so much.
No Offense Intended (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:No Offense Intended (Score:2)
I watched the first series thinking `well, first series' are often bad. It will get better.' I watched the second, thinking `it is going to get better, right?' I didn't watch the third at all.
Re:No Offense Intended (Score:2)
Andromeda suffered from the Earth:Final Conflict syndrome - an interesting beginning that rapidly degenerated into unwatchable crap after creative team / cast changes. Andromea had me hooked at the start, and turned me off completely by the start of the third season after Robert Hewitt Wolfe was forced out as head writer.
There's little to mourn about Andromeda or Mutan
Re:No Offense Intended (Score:5, Insightful)
How do people whatch that dren?
Simple, the majority of people are idiots, and TV networks look to attract as many viewers as possible. If its a well written show with many plot twists and great dialogue, its bound to confuse a significant portion of TV viewers, who find it uncomfortable. The key is to find an acceptable level of mediocrity. If people weren't getting dumber and less literate, there would be no motivation to reduce the reading level of news magazines.
Re: No Offense Intended (Score:3, Funny)
> uncomfortable. The key is to find an acceptable level of mediocrity. If people weren't getting dumber and less literate, there would be no motivation to reduce the reading level of news magazines.
Would you mind explaining that again, without using so many big words?
Noooo (Score:2)
And Rommie? My favorite sci-fi babe? Oh man......that is a though blow.
Obligatory (Score:4, Funny)
Good riddance to bad crap (Score:5, Insightful)
There's no science. Please, someone find me the gene that lets a guy turn into some kind of Lava monster. That's a more amazing evolutionary feat than the bombadier beetle. It's like the worst parts of the worst episodes of X-Files all jammed into an solid 40 minutes, with an entire rip on the whole X-Men concept to boot.
And Andromeda...starts out with this gimmick of a holographic hot chick representing the ship (sort of a video version of Star Trek's talking female ship voice). Then they drop all pretense and somehow she becomes a walking talking hologram. And then later, I'm not sure, but did she end up turning into a real girl somehow? And those stupid names. God, who the hell green lights crap like "Rev Blem" or "Trance Gemini"...oooo! So alien! So spacey future sounding!
Forget it. Other shows, like Farscape or whatever, hey...I'm not a fan, but I can be appropriately sad to hear another Sci-Fi show bites the dust. But Mutant X? No. Andromeda? Quit beating the dead Roddenbery. These shows should die...every dollar not wasted on them is perhaps another dollar that can maybe somehow through a miracle end up going towards new Firefly episodes.
- JoeShmoe
.
Re:Good riddance to bad crap (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good riddance to bad crap (Score:5, Interesting)
Enterprise was sold on the principle of a "simpler, earlier Trek". Remember the exolinguist Hoshi? Remember the struggle to communicate? Wasn't that supposed to be a major theme of the series? It took precisely five episodes for the show to go from "omg omg omg the computer will take six hours to translate this so we know if this alien is hostile" to "I'm Captain Archer onboard an alien prison ship but apparently everyone speaks English or the Universal Translator is now small enough to fit invisibly in my ear". Enterprise has pretty much thrown out everything it was based on, giving us episodes involving time plots and DeathStars more complicated that anything from the other so-called advanced series.
Back to Andromeda...I gave it a try or two for the first half season or so then promptly forgot about it. A couple years later when I revisited it during a bout of insomnia, I remember thinking that absolutely nothing was the same. The angry fend for himself bounty hunter was somehoe like the chief ship security officer, the pacifist preacher was doing some kind of ninja kung fu, and the hologram of the ship was somehow walking around and trying to get laid. Or something like that. Anyway, I got the sense that the series had probably been through two or three shark jumps and flipped back to Cheers reruns for the 10000th time.
- JoeShmoe
.
Re:Good riddance to bad crap (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes. The show was never great television, but really, the first season had more promise than I think people like to give it credit for. The show's head writer (and the real creator, despite the Roddenberry name), Robert Hewitt Wolfe, was floundering toward a long story arc with a dark, complex background. The first season had perhaps too much of a penchant for visiting old Trek tropes, but it frequently found rather cleve
Re:Good riddance to bad crap (Score:2)
I'm not sure, but i think it's a slightly mutated descendent of the Roddenberry gene :)
Re: Good riddance to bad crap (Score:2)
> And Andromeda...starts out with this gimmick of a holographic hot chick representing the ship (sort of a video version of Star Trek's talking female ship voice). Then they drop all pretense and somehow she becomes a walking talking hologram.
In a low-cut miniskirt.
That's where the series lost me. (In more than one sense of the word.)
Re:Good riddance to bad crap (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously, names all mean something. So, if you were an alien, wouldn't your name be translated too? You'd have aliens with Indian sounding names like "Son of the stars".
It always bugged me on Star Trek (really any Scifi) show when they just sprinkle alien words (or even worse...subtitles) throughout the otherwise English dialog. How exactly does the translator know when to let a word slip through untranslated? The fact that the aliens woul
Re:Good riddance to bad crap (Score:2)
It's not just you. I looooove Star Trek, but that always bugged the crap out of me too. It wasn't quite so bad in TNG on out, but that sort of thing is one of the things that makes TOS so painful to watch (and delightfully campy =P0.
Re:Good riddance to bad crap (Score:3, Insightful)
The rest of what you say is perfectly valid, but the above would actually be a usefull function to add to a translator. It would be much more usefull for it to know to leave "Joe Smith" alone. That way when the aliens say "Joe Smith," he'll know they're talking about him. And given the odd results you can get by translating a phrase back
Re:Good riddance to bad crap (Score:2)
2) Feel free to check my postings from two years ago where I defended Firefly on numerious occasions from the accusations of it being "space cowboys" or "Buffy in space"
3) I like how going along with a minority means I'm some kind of conformist me-too sheep. Gee, if only I could be as free thinking and independant as the majority opinion!
- JoeShmoe
.
Conversely... (Score:5, Funny)
that giant sucking sound you hear (Score:2)
what if all the crap shows got cancelled so they could produce a good one? hmmm.
btw, whatever happened to battlestar galatica? i thought that had potential.
Re:that giant sucking sound you hear (Score:2)
sweet.
He's dead, Jim. (Score:5, Insightful)
Too bad (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Too bad (Score:3, Insightful)
I disagree
Unlike all the other Star Trek series, DS9 had the interesting "Advantage" of being situated in a space station. Which essentially was a non-moving set/location. So while all the other Star Treks were about mindless exploration (and meeting new species in each episode), DS9 was all about building what was there because it was
Re:Too bad (Score:3, Funny)
Kinda missed the point of the franchise there, didntcha?
Fireworks did put out some decent genre TV (Score:2)
Re:Fireworks did put out some decent genre TV (Score:4, Informative)
Holy cow! (Score:5, Insightful)
Even if I hated both of these shows, I would still be sad to see them go. The main reason is... With the trend of sci-fi shows being cancelled, eventually all we will be left with are the vapid teeny-bopper soap operas (Smallville anyone?) that seem to be so prevalent lately.
Re:Holy cow! (Score:2)
Re:Holy cow! (Score:5, Funny)
You, sir, showcase the alarming arbitrariness of the TiVoless.
Also (Score:2)
Are they making Sci Fi TV anymore or is this like the moon landing, where they pretend to but they actually did it in a hurry then shut everything down years ago?
Rommie!!! (Score:2, Funny)
That said, she never did get to wear any skimpy costumes or space bikinis in Andromeda. Perhaps now she'll have time to find a show where she can really, uhm, display her qualities.
As close to the horses mouth as I can find: (Score:5, Informative)
Its still running? (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, thats probably all the entertainment i got out of Andromida after the first episode. The quote "Did you see the size of him? He looks like some ancient Greek God or something!" did it for me...
Did any of you manage to see "John Doe"? Now that I was sad to see canseled. And canselation of Firefly should be considered an act of treason, any an all people involved in that decision should be procecuted to the full extent of the law in all countries Firefly was shown.
Pure science fiction will never sell. (Score:5, Insightful)
Throw a little soap opera in there, and you may have a winner.
Re:Pure science fiction will never sell. (Score:3, Insightful)
A lot of people (myself included, for a long time) were put off by the perceived arrogance of its hardcore fans, and statements like that, i.e. if a guy like that watches that show, then I probably wouldn't be interested... it had nothing to do with not really understanding science. One of the reasons I can't stand Star Wars is because the rabid fans have just completely ruined any enjoyment I got out of the films by almost making a religion out of it (Matrix was another one.)
A lot of people perceive sci-
Of course science does not sell... (Score:5, Insightful)
Consider the oldest stories, like the Indian epic the Mahabharata or the Greek's Iliad. It's not about the wars or conflicts. It's about the interplay between people. It's always been about the context of the people. We as people want to see other people experiencing things.
Now, look at the lastest successful sci-fi, IMHO Babylon 5. Sure, they made space fighting a lot more realistic. But it was the story of the Shadows vs. the Vorlons, Sheridan's heroic sacrifice on Z'ha'dum, and the betrayal of Garibaldi. Really, look at this summary [midwinter.com] about the conflict:
Little here talks about science, the reality of evolution, or the underlying science. It's about philosophy, life, and the questions we all encounter along our own life. That's the story, and that's what made it more interesting than any show about cool tools. It's never been about the tools. They just get us to start watching. It's always been about the relationships, whether we want to admit it or not.To hell with em, Dr. Who is returning! (Score:3, Interesting)
Scifi? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Scifi? (Score:2)
This was, er, supposed to be a reply to one of the posts speculating that Scifi would bring the show back to get it to 100 eps.
Oh, just go ahead and mod me offtopic. So embarrassing to do this early in the morning...
Two things we should think about. (Score:5, Informative)
2. Andromeda WAS good with good story arcs till Sorbo decided that his "fans" couldn't handle anything more than 1 story long and became "episode adventures" after he fired a true writing guru...
"Robert Hewitt Wolfe has parted company with the last bastion of scifi for people with half a brain - Andromeda. Wolfe said: "Basically, they want the show to be more action driven, more Dylan-centric, and more episodic. They also want more aliens, more space battles, and less internal conflict among the principal characters. Also, they want a lot less continuity so as not to confuse the casual or new viewer with too much backstory."
Well congrats Sorbo, your simple plan worked perfectly. Maybe they'll invite you back on a Young Hercules episode. Wait...that was cancelled too you say? HA!
Yo Grark
That's sad... (Score:2, Informative)
I stopped watching it, though, because it pissed me off constantly. I never saw a show fall so far short of its potential.
Interesting note - some writer said the Nietzscheans were going to be called the Dawkinites (or something similar) initially, because they strong
Finally (Score:3, Interesting)
make that 3.5 (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, there is ReBoot
However, it is animated so it may not count in this list, anyway.
Re:Number of SF series completing their run? (Score:2, Interesting)
Even though there wasn't much of an overall arc I guess TNG went through it's natural lifespan, likewise DS9.
Buffy and to a degree Angel both got to live out their natural lives, but I agree, investing your time and commitment to an SF show these days seems to be doomed to failure these days. Even now I still have trouble getting my
Re:Well FINALLY!! (Score:2)
Re:BOO HOO (Score:2)
Didn't see HER in that movie, did ya?
Re:If all today's sci-fi is so bad (Score:2, Informative)
Stargate has some dodgy moments these days (especially those involving a heavy 'Sam Carter' or 'Jonas Quinn' presence) but generally holds together due to the strength of the other characters - I'm hoping that the Stargate Atlantis spin-off will pick up the baton and start with an early sprint.
ST - Enterprise has so
Re:Ummm... (Score:2)