Terminator Salvation is almost here which means that my series of Terminator-related posts is soon coming to a close, but not before I whine about…

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles Cancelled by Fox

Help me understand this timeline:

1. Fox decides to resurrect the Terminator franchise with a show called Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.
2. The show premieres with 4.1 million people watching. Not a bad start for a sci-fi show.
3. After the first season, Fox brings the show back for a second but dooms it to the Friday night slot – a ratings black hole.
4. Meanwhile, a fourth Terminator film, Terminator Salvation, is produced and scheduled to be released to theaters just a couple of months after the second season of Fox’s show ends. The film is heavily marketed with toys, promotional partnerships, and plenty of television commercials.
5. Rather than capitalizing on the hype from the first Terminator film in six years, Fox decides to pull the plug on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

I don’t get it. Fox decided to renew Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse, which had comparably low ratings as Terminator. The network’s president of entertainment attempted to explain why one show was renewed while the other was cancelled, though none of it really makes a whole lot sense.

I really enjoyed Fox’s Terminator series. It had a few dull episodes, but I thought that they did a good job of exploring aspects of the characters that had not been seen in the films.

In the end, no real reason is given other than they felt Terminator had run its course and didn’t have a future. As Sarah Connor often said, there is no fate but what we make for ourselves. In this case, Fox appears to have decided the Connors’ fate for them instead.