Animated series that were pulled before their time

A

Anime_Addicted!

New member
Is there any animated series out there that you think could have lasted longer, but were pulled with only a limited amount of episodes?

One series that fits this situation would have to be Ruby-Spears' animated Superman series. I saw this series from Netflix about two months ago, and I really enjoyed it (I'll probably be buying the DVD set to this series, someday). It saddened me that this series only had a season of 13 episodes back in 1988. In my opinion, I think that this series could have lasted longer.

Here are two more animated series that I think fits this situation.

Transformers Animated - While this series had a decent run, and a good conclusion, I think that it could have had at least one more season.

Super Robot Monkey Team Hyperforce Go! - This series was going to be five seasons long, with the fifth season wrapping everything up. Unfortunately, this series was canceled with only four seasons made, ending the series on a cliffhanger.
 
The only real example I can think of is Invader Zim. Because production was halted so abruptly (and in the middle of the season), any number of top-drawer episodes were never finished.

There are another couple where the last episodes are cliffhangers (Duckman, Darkwing Duck and Sonic Satam and, like you said, Super Robot Monkey Team Hyper Force Go! ), but other than that I can't really think of any.
 
Calamity Jane. I don't know if the show ever would have turned out REALLY GOOD, but it sported an interesting enough look.

Aside from anime, I still haven't seen an action cartoon featuring a female last more than 2 seasons. She-Ra, barely. Jem might count too, although it's not strictly action-y (but is drawn in traditional action comic book style).
 
Sonic Satam and Spicy City. Blame Power Ranger's high ratings that canned the chance of the 3rd season happening....Ive felt that Spicy city had some more film noirish stories to tell. There needs to be more film noir animation.
 
Y'know, the sad thing about SatAM's ending is that the episode itself would have been an epic satisfying finale...and then they pull a random freakin' cliffhanger within the last 30 seconds. Same thing happened with Legion of Superheroes (in that situation, however, they knew ahead of time that it would be the final episode, but they went through with it anyways).

Then again, I guess you could chalk the cliffhanger of the latter as more of a "Never the End" kind of ending like (for example) Xiaolin Showdown and Justice League Unlimited had.
 
One that comes to my mind is Time Squad. I thought that it was unique and funny and I honestly thought that it was around for longer than it was.
 
Calamity Jane - I really would have liked to see the rest of the series on Kids' WB! They promised in a promo that it would return but it never did. I think it may have aired in full overseas.

Astro Boy (1960's English dub) - Some reports claim the series was pulled from its original US TV broadcast for being too violent. Only 104 episodes (out of 193) were dubbed into English. The real last episode from the Japanese version (193) is presented subtitled on one of RightStuf's DVD boxsets.
 
Clerks: The Animated Series

Clone High

The 1990s Iron Man and Fantastic Four animated series - The second seasons were dramatic improvements (particially the Iron Man series) over the firsts. I think that the poor reception of the first seasons and it being on the fairly dying syndication market (as opposed to say Fox like the X-Men and Spider-Man animated series were on) killed any chances of there being a third season of The Marvel Action Hour.

The New Adventures of Mighty Mouse

The Pirates of Dark Water - It ended before all of the stones could be collected.
 
I can think of several that fall under this catagory, but Top Cat would top my list.

IMO Top Cat was the most underrated show of all time. It was ahead of it's time with TC's advanced vocab and brilliant schemes. It's aged well too, as it's just as funny today as it was decades ago. Granted, I wasn't born when it debuted in 1961, but I first saw it in the 80's and thought it was funny then and STILL think it's great. TC should have at least gotten a revival. One of the best toons of all time IMO, and the theme song was awesome as well.
 
Yeah man, I still watch the reruns on Boomerang every now and then.

It baffles me how a show that hilarious only had 30 episodes. I'd say it was on par with anything Hanna-Barbera had on in that era except for The Flintstones and Scooby-Doo (which debuted 8 years later)
 
I know I know, I'm sorry. I mention this show every time one of these threads comes up. The 2002 He-Man should've lasted at least one more season. I've read that Hordak and She-Ra were going to appear if there would've been a third season!
 
The Secret Saturdays - It had 36 episodes and it did manage to wrap up it's main story arc, but I know Jay Stephens (who is registered as a rabroad forum member) expressed his interest in doing another season. Unfortunately, that's never gonna happen seeing how CN mistreated the show. I can accept the fact that the show simply didn't get the ratings CN must've wanted, but that doesn't excuse all the stupid scheduling choices they made which only hurt the show's chances at success even more.

Evil Con Carne - So am I the only one who always preferred this to Billy & Mandy? I never watched the ECC spin-off series, but I know it only lasted a single season.
 
I personally think Disney's Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers could've lasted at least another season. Also, I think Cartoon Network's Chowder could've at least made the 65 episode mark, but apparently Cartoon Network doesn't think Chowder deserves more. I am also at the agreement of Cartoon Network's The Secret Saturdays, it should've lasted longer than two years, but with bad ratings comes bad news, the cancellation of the show. Another show that was pulled when it could've at least had another season (even if it was really short) was 6teen. Teletoon pulled the plug on one of it's most successful show's, 6teen. Teletoon believes that 93 episodes is good enough for a show. I say they should've at least gave it episodes so the total could equal 100.
 
Back
Top