# Enterprise Executives in Fear of Cancellation **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 19, 2004, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232 "2004-01-19T21:03:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2004, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/1 "2004-01-19T21:03:54Z")
> [@](#): > > An anonymous source revealed that executives at Star Trek: Enterprise are trying to save the show from cancellation, and that this may include taking the show to another network. > > This anonymous source spoke to Cinescape’s Patrick Sauriol about the atmosphere on the Enterprise set. “Star Trek’s executives…are running on ‘Red Alert’ mode to save Enterprise from cancellation doom, and this may include shopping the show to another network or cable channel,” the source revealed. > > According to the source, the cancellation of Jake 2.0 was unexpected, as both it and Enterprise had been promised full seasons. “Apparently, Trek staffers were assured by higher-ups at UPN, including people in Les Moonves’s office, that Enterprise and Jake 2.0 were safe,” the source said. “After all, Jake 2.0 was signed to complete this season’s run of episodes.” > > Just last month, the news broke that Enterprise’s number of episodes was going to be cut down from 26 to 24, and that the show might be moving to Friday nights. However, the Friday night news was dismissed as an incorrect rumor and denied by UPN. > > However, now rumors of a schedule change seem to be resurfacing. “With the hammer coming down on Jake this week, in addition to the ‘trimming’ of UPN’s order of Enterprise episodes this season, Star Trek’s executives fear the promises given were disingenuous at best,” the source said. This also comes on the heels of UPN’s recent refusal to comment about the future of the show. Sigh. I already spewed all my vitriol towards UPN in the other thread about Jake 2.0 being cancelled but if this does wind up happening, I can honestly say that I will \*\*never \*\* watch UPN again. Fucking cretinous imbeciles. ---
**Author:** ![RikWriter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/49beb7/32.png) [@RikWriter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RikWriter)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2004, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/2 "2004-01-19T22:25:00Z")
> [@Aesiron](#): > > Sigh. I already spewed all my vitriol towards UPN in the other thread about Jake 2.0 being cancelled but if this does wind up happening, I can honestly say that I will \*\*never \*\* watch UPN again. Hell, if they cancel Enterprise there will be nothing on UPN TO watch. ---
**Author:** ![Rabid\_Squirrel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Rabid\_Squirrel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rabid_Squirrel)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2004, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/3 "2004-01-19T22:46:45Z")
Supposedly, (I think I heard this from Dark-Horizons), they reduced the number of episodes to 24, so they have the option of wrapping it up after season 4 and getting 100 episodes for syndication. Take that with a pinch of salt though. ---
**Author:** ![Wearia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/13edae/32.png) [@Wearia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wearia)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2004, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/4 "2004-01-19T22:53:08Z")
The worst thing about this news is that it means no more Enterprise threads ☹ . Other than that, if Enterprise didn’t have the Star Trek name behind it, it never would have made it out of season 1. ---
**Author:** ![Lightnin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lightnin/32/180_2.png) [@Lightnin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lightnin)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2004, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/5 "2004-01-19T23:33:52Z")
Dammit, dammit, dammit. I don’t care much for Enterprise- hell, Firefly has pretty much ruined me for all other “spaceship shows”- but I was really starting to like Jake 2.0. Damn execs. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/6 "2004-01-20T01:05:51Z")
Well, if nothing else, it would cut off the agony of indecision every Wednesday at 8:00. “It isn’t very good, maybe I should give up… Nah, I’ll give it one more week… Man, that wasn’t very good… It better be cool next week…” ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/7 "2004-01-20T01:09:57Z")
No sense blaming the suits. Blame the folks who ain’t watching. I actually like the show but I don’t have any television at all (I live in a rural area with no broadcast reception and I don’t want to pay for satellite television for only one show)(though I miss TV tonight because I’d like to watch CNN for the caucus reports)… So you can blame me if you’d like. I won’t take it personally. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/8 "2004-01-20T01:15:56Z")
> [@Jonathan Chance](#): > > No sense blaming the suits. Blame the folks who ain’t watching. Maybe blame the creators for not making a better show. ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/9 "2004-01-20T01:32:16Z")
> [@Jonatahn Chance](#): > > No sense blaming the suits. Blame the folks who ain’t watching. No. I blame the executives… Enterprise may not be TNG or DS9 but it still has it moments. It’s also one of UPN’s two highest rated shows - SmackDown! might be higher rated but I honestly don’t know - so to cut it is suicidal, even if the ratings aren’t stellar. It’s one of only two fucking shows that’re even keeping the god damned network afloat. Also, as **Revtim** suggested, I blame Berman and Braga for failing to use this vehicle to its fullest extent. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/10 "2004-01-20T01:44:04Z")
I’m usually right there bitching about networks screwing over sci-fi shows, but what else could UPN do here? I know they’ve been advertising the heck out of it. Have they been shifting it around on the schedule? Have they regularly pre-empted it? Have they put it up against another show it can’t possibly compete with? Have they put it on a night when no one is even home to watch TV? AFAIK, the answer to all of the above is “No.” If UPN has done everything it can to make sure people know when and where to tune in to _Enterprise_, and they’re still not getting good ratings, than the problem is with the show, not the network. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/11 "2004-01-20T02:04:20Z")
> [@Aesiron](#): > > No. I blame the executives… Enterprise may not be TNG or DS9 but it still has it moments. It’s also one of UPN’s two highest rated shows - SmackDown! might be higher rated but I honestly don’t know - so to cut it is suicidal, even if the ratings aren’t stellar. It’s one of only two fucking shows that’re even keeping the god damned network afloat. High ratings don’t equal high profits. Let’s say you’ve got two shows: _Cool Sci-Fi Show_ and _Lame Reality TV_. CSFS is the network’s highest rated show. Every show earns them $1,000,000 in ad revenue. LRTV only draws a fourth as many viewers, and it’s ad revenue is a corresponding $250,000 per episode. But LRTV is cheap to make. It only costs them fifty grand an episode, so every time they show it, they get a net profit of $200,000. CSFS has all these expensive computer graphics and complicated action scenes. It costs $900,000 to make one episode of CSFS, leaving only $100,000 in profit. Thus, even though CSFS has four times as many viewers, it’s only half as profitable. _Enterprise_ may be UPN’s most popular show, but that doesn’t mean it’s popular enough to be profitable. ---
**Author:** ![drewbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drewbert/32/15890_2.png) [@drewbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewbert)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/12 "2004-01-20T04:00:04Z")
Anyone think that Voyager and Enterprise would have done better if they’d started out in syndication? TNG and DS9 weren’t tied to a network and did pretty well. Just a pet theory of mine which I haven’t analyzed too deeply… ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/13 "2004-01-20T04:00:55Z")
So it’s official, they need me to take over. I’ll make Star Trek great again! ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 4:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/14 "2004-01-20T04:23:56Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I’m usually right there bitching about networks screwing over sci-fi shows, but what else could UPN do here? I know they’ve been advertising the heck out of it. Have they been shifting it around on the schedule? Have they regularly pre-empted it? Have they put it up against another show it can’t possibly compete with? Have they put it on a night when no one is even home to watch TV? AFAIK, the answer to all of the above is “No.” If UPN has done everything it can to make sure people know when and where to tune in to _Enterprise_, and they’re still not getting good ratings, than the problem is with the show, not the network. Actually, the answer to a number of these questions is YES. When have they ever advertised the heck out of it, except maybe a little bit more during sweeps months? When was the last time you saw Enterprise advertised on a billboard, a bus stop shelter, on the side of a bus, or even in your local paper’s tv guide? I’ve had to remind the L.A. Times TV Times more than once about ENT being on Wed. nights and that it deserved a blurb now and then. And for the past two weeks, UPN had run promos for the new episodes only on Sunday nights, not on Wednesday nights, when they should be pushing for people to be watching. Pre-empted? Well, not where I live, but yes, it has been pre-empted in a number of places due to sports or telethons. Putting it up against shows it can’t compete against? Yes. UPN’s own parent company, CBS, has been known to move the heavily watched Survivor or CSI episodes to Wednesday nights now and again, making the competition for viewers even fiercer than usual. Those who have phoned Paramount about this have been advised to call, email, write and fax UPN’s director of programming, Eric Kim, to ask for more promotion. That’s what I’m doing. UPN has no business bitching about low ratings when they won’t make more than a minimal effort at promotion. ---
**Author:** ![minty\_green](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f6c823/32.png) [@minty\_green](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/minty_green)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/15 "2004-01-20T04:33:07Z")
Enterprise sucks. And I say that as a fairly serious fan of the franchise, even though I have never been able to watch more than 30 seconds of the opening credits to Enterprise thanks to that godawful song. Dead serious. Kill it. Now. ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/16 "2004-01-20T05:12:08Z")
There’s also the fact that UPN has been around for a decade now and still doesn’t have nationwide saturation. I’ve been without a local UPN station for two years now and I know of others that’ve never had one. It’s a bit hard to have stellar ratings for a show when a lot of your fans can’t even catch the show. And I’m not sure I’m understanding you, Minty, but if you mean that you’ve never been able to watch Enterprise because you turn the show off after thirty seconds of listening to its theme, then the franchise isn’t losing much of a fan. ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/17 "2004-01-20T05:13:00Z")
There’s also the fact that UPN has been around for a decade now and still doesn’t have nationwide saturation. I’ve been without a local UPN station for two years now and I know of others that’ve never had one. It’s a bit hard to have stellar ratings for a show when a lot of your fans can’t even catch the show. And I’m not sure I’m understanding you, **Minty** , but if you mean that you’ve never been able to watch Enterprise because you turn the show off after thirty seconds of listening to its theme, then the franchise isn’t losing much of a fan. ---
**Author:** ![Rainbowthief](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/4bbf92/32.png) [@Rainbowthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rainbowthief)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/18 "2004-01-20T06:39:07Z")
I think this was a story planted to shake up Trek fans or maybe encourage a big letter writing campaign (like “Designing Women” in the eighties) to show how serious fans of the show are about keeping it alive. Every modern Trek show has gotten seven seasons: TNG, DS9, even the unwatchable Voyager. What I don’t get is, how can the ratings be so bad? It really is a damn good show. All Doping around about panda this and quantum that aside, the cast is consistently good, the stories are usually entertaining and well written and I like the little differences that set it apart from previous Trek shows, like having a sung theme instead of instrumental (though the new version sucks hard), airing the show in widescreen and setting the show in the early days of Starfleet. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/19 "2004-01-20T06:40:55Z")
Paramount is the official owner of the Trek franchise, right? They can always syndicate the show like they did TNG. When TNG was a first run series, our local NBC affiliate showed it Sunday night after the late news. For new shows! Not reruns! Was perfect for us Trek geeks. Syndication is the way to go, imho. UPN has no focus and no direction. :dubious: btw, I’m in on the letter and e-mail campaign. I’ve already forwarded the info to about 200 people. If we all do that, maybe we can make a difference (like in the 1960s TOS letter writing campaign.) ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2004, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232/20 "2004-01-20T07:15:21Z")
[QUOTE=Rainbowthief] I think this was a story planted to shake up Trek fans or maybe encourage a big letter writing campaign (like “Designing Women” in the eighties) to show how serious fans of the show are about keeping it alive. snip [QUOTE] Actually, this campaign has been going on since last March. See [The Enterprise Project](http://www.enterpriseproject.org). [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-executives-in-fear-of-cancellation/225232.md?page=2)