10 Times Us Humble Fans Were Able To Save A TV Show From The Bin, And Six Other Times Our Attempts Were Futile

Fans sent eight million peanuts to CBS...

TV shows can garner the most loyal of fanbases, and when their fave show gets cancelled, they take it personally. But a lot of the time, they don't sfit there and accept defeat, they rally and campaign to save their show.

NBC

So, here are 10 extreme fan campaigns that saved TV shows, and six equally wild movements that failed:

1. Chuck

NBC

The spy comedy would end up running for five seasons, but things were almost cut short after season two. The ratings weren't strong enough for renewal, but the fanbase was committed as any other and took to social media to begin their efforts to save their favourite show. 

Fans also took their cause into Subway stores, as it was one of the show's sponsors. On the day of season two's finale, fans flocked to Subways to order a footlong sandwich. The show's star Zachary Levi also got involved, and when he was in England he led a procession of fans to a Subway store, where he proceeded to get behind the counter to make sandwiches for the fans. 

The sponsor, and ultimately, the network, heard the call, and after a sponsorship deal was struck, the show was renewed!

2. Jericho

CBS

When ratings dropped after the second half of the first season, CBS took the decision to cancel the show, as, due to their scheduling mishap, it had lost millions of viewers. 

Fans certainly hadn't had enough of the series, however, and an online campaign to send shipments of peanuts to the offices of CBS network executives took off. It was calculated that around eight million peanuts were sent, in an effort to get their show back on air (peanuts were because of one character saying "nuts".)

The nuts worked! Jericho was recommissioned for another season, but sadly, it didn't make it any further than that. 

3. The OA

Netflix

When it comes to fan movements to save TV shows, The OA fans are right up there with the most committed. Fans of the show devastated by its cancellation by Netflix have pulled out all the stops to reverse the company's decision. Not only have they gone down the online-petition route, securing thousands of signatures, but they've also done their own fair share of stunts. 

Like fandoms before them, they've sent letters to the studio and also bombarded Netflix with feathers and mustard packets. They've also crowdfunded a billboard on Time Square to get Netflix's attention, and organised flashmobs in support of the show's renewal. 

Despite the fan's die-hard response to its cancellation, it seems as though no third season of The OA is in the works. 

4. The Expanse

Syfy Channel / Amazon Prime Video

When the Syfy Channel cut the show after just three seasons, it's safe to say the fans were NOT happy. But instead of sitting around and wallowing in the loss of their fave TV show, they got active. 

Not only did an online petition garner over 132,000 signatures, but they also created a GoFundMe which raised enough money to fly a banner reading "#SAVE THE EXPANSE" above Amazon Studios’ headquarters. This was part of their plea to get Amazon or Netflix to pick up the show, and, thankfully for them, Amazon eventually did. 

While it ran for three more seasons, The Expanse was sadly cancelled again after season six. 

5. Roswell

The WB

Back in the year 2000, exects at WB were considering axing the show, when ratings weren't looking too great. In stepped a committed group of fans, who began their campaign to save the show by sending 22,000 e-mails to Warner Bros exects. 

The fan groups stepped up the heat, literally, by sending 6000 bottles of Tabasco sauce to the studio directly, in a campaign called "Roswell is Hot." The bombardment worked, and lead Warner Bros to commission the show for two more seasons. 

6. First Kill

Netflix

Netflix has been under fire a fair amount when the seemingly random cancellation and renewal decisions occur. They often suggest that these decisions are made for "a matter of viewing numbers versus cost,” something that was also cited in the reasoning for cancelling Fist Kill. 

Fans, however, were quick to point out that the show was actually very popular, with 30.34 million hours watched in its first three days, and over 100 million soon after. With higher ratings than a lot of other renewed shows, fans gave their opinion, and shared their disappointment with Netflix, with TV journalist Nora Dominick saying: “First Kill deserved season 2 for numerous reasons and it’s just so incredibly sad that these LGBTQ+ Netflix shows aren’t given a chance."

The devoted fanbase also created a petition to reverse Netflix's decision, but unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be working as of yet. 

7. Timeless

NBC

Sometimes a show that isn't even performing that well can get its revival from a strong fan response. This is what happened with Timeless when it was cancelled by NBC in 2017, fan pressure ensured that viewers would get to see more of their beloved show.  

On the support of the fans, star Matt Lanter called them "special," saying "I don’t know if I’ve ever been part of another project that has so much fan passion, where people are spending their own hard-earned money to fly banners and (put up) billboards in Times Square. It’s wild. It’s humbling.”

8. Pushing Daisies

ABC

We've had Tabasco sauce and peanuts sent to studio execs and networks, which did help fans to save their fave shows, but when Pushing Daisies fans organised to help save the show, it didn't have the same effect. Along with thousands signing an online petition, fans of the show sent daisies, flowers, and seeds to ABC, in order to show their support for the show. 

Despite their best efforts, Pushing Daisies never got renewed for a third season, and it still remains a bone of contention for its fans – perhaps some sort of foodstuff is the way to go when sending things to a network. 

9. Brooklyn Nine-Nine

Fox / NBC

The outcry from fans was so strong that it took only one day after Fox's cancellation for NBC to revive the show that they once sold to Fox, with NBC Entertainment chairman, Robert Greenblatt, stating: “Ever since we sold this show to Fox I’ve regretted letting it get away, and it’s high time it came back to its rightful home."

Stars of the show immediately came out to thank the fans for their superb support, with Melissa Fumero saying, “You got loud and you were heard and you saved our show.”

10. Anne With an E

Netflix / CBS

Surprise surprise, another Netflix cancellation that angered the masses. Fans grouped together with the usual online petitions (amassing 1.5 million signatures), and letter writing. The committed group of fans even rented our five billboards in Toronto in order to gain support for renewing the series. 

Despite all this effort, and support from famous names such as Ryan Reynolds, no renewal for Anne with an E has been announced. 

11. Cagney and Lacey

CBS

When talking about fan involvement in saving TV shows, there's one name we cannot ignore, Dorothy Swanson. It all started in the '80s when Dorothy, who was a teacher at the time, fell in love with the show Cagney and Lacey. So, when it was cancelled, she couldn't just sit there and take it. 

Dorothy started to write letters to CBS and eventually convinced friends and others to do the same. The movement gathered momentum when a TV columnist for the Detroit Free Press picked up the story, with other publications following suit. With the stories, and the deluge of letters, the network put re-runs back on TV, and thanks to Dorothy's movement, it quickly jumped to number one in the rating. 

The show was quickly back in production and would end up getting 38 Emmy nominations and a lot of wins too. Dorothy, spurred on by the success of her campaign, then launched the Viewers For Quality Television, which brought together thousands of TV fans to help mount campaigns for shows worth saving. 

12. Moonlight

CBS

In terms of organising a movement to save a TV show, the method that Moonlight fans took to draw attention to the love for the show, was a new and admirable way to go about things. Instead of sending things to the network, they decided to sacrifice their own blood for the vampire show, by organising a blood drive. 

Fans quickly pledged to give blood to save their show, and soon they had 3,000 pledges – but, alas, the work, albeit for a good cause, failed to save Moonlight, and the show ended after one season. 

13. Family Guy

Fox

Seth Macfarlane's show had some seriously rocky beginnings. Up against a series of hugely popular shows, it was actually cancelled after its second season, brought back for a third, and then cancelled again after that. 

Fox did, however, decide to cut a deal with Cartoon Network, to run episodes of the show in syndication, and it was this move that saw ratings skyrocket. But it was the release of DVDs that really made Fox start paying attention.

Steve Feldstein, who was a Fox Home Entertainment executive at the time, talked about how fans buying DVD copies made the network reconsider the cancellation, saying: "There was this fan base that was lying dormant. That base brought a whole new group with it. [It] led the network to take a second look.''

Family Guy became the first show that was revived from cancellation mostly due to huge DVD sales, and it wouldn't be the only one. 

14. Futurama

Fox / Comedy Central

After four years on the air, in 2003 Fox decided to no longer buy any episodes and simply stopped airing the show, to the great disappointment of creator Matt Groening and, of course, the fans. Just like Family Guy, though, a series of straight-to-DVD movies, and the fans buying them up, brought Futurama back to TV on Comedy Central. 

However, its second run came to an end in 2013, with Comedy Central cancelling future projects, and leaving fans rattled by the cancellation. It's evident that, for Futurama, cancelled doesn't mean over. Because only last year Hulu made the decision to revive the show once again, with Craig Erwich, president of originals at Hulu and ABC Entertainment, saying: “When presented with the opportunity to bring fans and viewers new episodes of Futurama, we couldn’t wait to dive in."

15. Star Trek: Enterprise

UPN

Usually, when trying to save a TV show, it's the money that talks. So, when TrekUnited, a fan group trying to save the show, received a hefty donation of $3, they'd have been hoping fairly optimistic. 

The huge donation came from "some of the main entrepreneurs in the commercial space flight industry," who wanted to remain nameless. They did, however, give their reasoning for such a donation, saying:  

"Enterprise needs to be renewed for the sake of fan loyalty, for being quality TV, for bringing imagination and hope for a better future to our homes."

Sadly though, even the huge donation couldn't convince the network to renew the series, and Enterprise never got a fifth season. 

16. Manifest

NBC / Netflix

After three successful seasons on NBC, and with the third season's cliffhanger finale being well-received, showrunner Jeff Rake should have been having positive talks with the network about the next season, but he wasn't. Instead, he had a pretty bad feeling about the fate of his show with NBC. According to Jeff, despite them liking the show, the network couldn't keep it on for financial reasons. 

So then, the next move for Jeff and the team would be to try and find a new home for the show, but before they could even write up a plan, the fans jumped in, as Jeff recalls:

"So before we even had a chance to lift a finger to figure out if we need a PR campaign to help save us, the fans rose up and created this campaign and spread the word — which was incredibly rewarding and heartening.”

So, the show moved over to Netflix, but there wasn't a fourth season confirmed. The fans sent letters, were active on social media, and even bought a billboard outside Netflix's offices. While these were all shows of faith in the show, what really made Netflix commit to another season was the wave of new fans that had started to watch from the beginning when it arrived on the streaming site. 

What's a show you wish you could help revive? Let us know in the comments below!