“Only the good die young,” so the saying goes. This is particularly true for television shows that, despite gaining critical acclaim, often end up canceled. Throughout the years, countless TV programs have been cut short long before their intended time, with some even getting the axe after receiving an outpouring of publicity suggesting they’d be on air for years to come. While many shows quietly fade away, the following prominent projects met their end in a very public manner. Despite all the pre-release buzz, series like “Firefly” and “The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance” faced an untimely demise.

Although they shared elements such as extensive pre-premiere marketing and garnering cult followings, the reasons behind these shows being axed aren’t consistent. Some were discontinued due to ratings that couldn’t justify their high production costs. Others fell victim to shifting priorities within networks or streaming platforms. Still, others were affected by perplexing scheduling choices made by network executives. Even the COVID-19 pandemic played a role in prematurely ending some shows. Ultimately, there are numerous reasons why heavily anticipated TV shows often conclude sooner than expected.

Prior to “Terra Nova” making its debut, a significant portion of the excitement centered on the show’s enormous expenses. This ambitious Fox series, which tells the story of a family—along with other humans—from the distant future transported back to prehistoric times to begin anew, came with an enormous budget right from the start. Crafting a story that seamlessly integrated digital dinosaurs with human actors was never going to be an inexpensive venture. Nevertheless, Fox had great faith in the show, particularly with Steven Spielberg serving as the executive producer and featuring Stephen Lang, known for his villainous role in “Avatar,” as a leading character.

The network initially planned to debut “Terra Nova” with a May 2011 sneak preview before launching the rest of the show the following fall, a release strategy mimicking “Glee’s” initial debut. Those ambitions never worked out; “Terra Nova” instead debuted in the final days of September 2011, and its ratings never took off. Due to its staggering costs, Fox canned the show after a single season after pouring so many resources into it, despite reception to the show gradually improving as it went on. If “Terra Nova” had been given a little more breathing room, perhaps it could’ve secured a cultural legacy greater than a trivia question about its price tag.

The granddaddy of all 21st-century TV shows cut short in their prime, “Firefly” debuted on Fox in the fall of 2002. The project was Joss Whedon’s big TV follow-up to “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “Angel,” meaning all eyes were on the sci-fi Western. While Whedon’s signature style of dialogue endured, the setting was now the farthest reaches of outer space. Alas, cosmic TV shows that aren’t “Star Trek” can be a tough sell to the general public; even the now-beloved and unkillable “Futurama” struggled to build an audience in its initial Fox run in the early 2000s. Thus, “Firefly” had a tough road of it despite debuting under the best of conditions with Whedon’s post-“Buffy” clout in full effect.

Hindering “Firefly’s” chances at ratings success was Fox’s bizarre approach in promoting the show, including tonally misleading advertisements and airing “Firefly” installments out of order. Key character arcs and storylines were rendered incoherent through the network’s shenanigans. While “Buffy” and “Angel” ran for multiple seasons, “Firefly” was dead in the water just months after the premiere. Positive reviews weren’t enough to keep the show afloat, though strong DVD sales allowed the property to return and tie up some loose ends as the film “Serenity.” Such an outcome was far from “shiny,” as “Firefly’s” characters would put it.

A little over a decade into the 21st century, Bad Robot Television had developed a tremendous reputation for producing hit mind-bending genre shows like “Alias,” “Lost,” and “Fringe.” In early 2012, Bad Robot’s next hopeful hit, “Alcatraz,” started airing on Fox. This show’s gimmick was that hundreds of prisoners and guards who vanished from the prison in 1963 began to suddenly pop back up in the modern world, and a ragtag group of government agents must find them. It was a weighty concept, and the program had some major star power in its cast. Not only was “Lost” veteran Jorge Garcia among the leads, but beloved film actors Sam Neill and Robert Forster were also series regulars, lending some gravitas to all the silly mayhem.

“Alcatraz” had its detractors, but its fans appreciated its breezy mixture of standalone weekly thrills and hints at a larger, compelling mythos. Other Bad Robot projects like “Fringe” and “Lost” fascinatingly transformed into entirely different shows over multiple seasons, but “Alcatraz” never got the chance to evolve or build on its cult fanbase. After just 13 episodes, the show, rife with narrative potential, was cut short. Unlike other one-season sci-fi series, there were never any whispers of “Alcatraz” getting picked up by another network. The gates had closed on this promising Bad Robot Television endeavor, and there was no way for it to escape its cancelation prison cell.

Modern entertainment is full of continuations of 1980s pop culture, but “The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance” is the rare example where the continuation improves significantly on its predecessor. The stuffy, sometimes lethargic world of Jim Henson’s “Dark Crystal” was deepened and expanded upon by “Age of Resistance’s” propulsive creative sensibilities. Director Louis Leterrier committed 100% to realizing the Gelflings and assorted fantasy puppets as real people with complex problems rather than just hand-manipulated vessels used to explain lore. This gargantuan 10-episode labor of love launched on Netflix in August 2019 and ended on a cliffhanger teasing further adventures set between the show’s Season 1 and the original “Dark Crystal” movie.

Despite Netflix spending $97.7 million on the project, not to mention all the hype surrounding a new piece of “Dark Crystal” media, a second season never materialized. While other Netflix-exclusive shows like “The Ranch” and “Big Mouth” have run for multiple seasons, 13 months after its debut, “Age of Resistance” was canned by the streamer. This devastating blow to “Dark Crystal’s” fanbase ensured that the plans for the show’s second season will forever be gathering dust. Given “Age of Resistance’s” immense artistry and all of the exciting storytelling possibilities in potential further seasons, it’s an outright crime that Netflix didn’t give this show more support.

News reports about “Russian Doll” mastermind Leslye Headland conjuring up her own “Star Wars” TV show had been floating around for months when “The Acolyte” was officially announced in December 2020. From there, it took nearly four years for the show to finally reach Disney+, and in the months leading up to “The Acolyte’s” debut, the studio pulled out all the stops to promote the project. Widely viewed trailers hit the internet, and a sneak peek of the show was added to the 2024 theatrical re-release of “The Phantom Menace.” Meanwhile, the very existence of a live-action show set in the High Republic era of “Star Wars” was enough to ensure die-hard franchise fans were aware of “The Acolyte’s” existence. All this hype, though, failed to translate into success for the prequel series.

Despite scoring a sizable series premiere viewership and developing a loyal cult following, “The Acolyte” struggled to secure a solid week-to-week audience, a victim of the changing streaming landscape. When the show was announced in late 2020, outfits like Disney+ prided themselves on costly franchise fare; four years later, streamers were leaving expensive genre shows behind. Considering the deaths of other pricey series like “Tokyo Vice,” “Halo,” and “Time Bandits,” it’s no surprise Disney jettisoned “The Acolyte” despite its creators having concrete plans for further seasons. It’s a shame the show didn’t get any more seasons, especially considering the current dearth of original “Star Wars” programs.

By the late 2000s, everybody wanted in on the “Lost” action. ABC’s hit show may have divided some viewers with its final seasons, but it generated the kind of buzz and viewership that’s incredibly rare in the television landscape. ABC tried launching another serialized mystery sci-fi show, “FlashForward,” in 2009. The hook of this program (adapted from the 1999 Robert J. Sawyer novel of the same name) was that it took place in a world where everyone blacked out for two minutes and seventeen seconds in October 2009. During their unconsciousness, people witnessed visions of what was to come six months in the future. The drama then came from a group of characters trying to unpack what on Earth happened and whether or not more blackouts were coming.

As “FlashForward’s” September 2009 premiere drew closer and closer, outlets like The Guardian and The Los Angeles Times recognized the massive hype ABC had generated around the show. The network really wanted this high-concept outing to take off as a “Lost” replacement, since that show was ending in May 2010. However, while the new series had its devoted, lore-obsessed followers, increasingly poor ratings for Season 1’s final episodes made it clear that “FlashForward” would have no future. Though it lasted only 22 episodes, it at least left its mark on pop culture by forever changing how people viewed the phrase “because I was loaded.”

Before it became the home of “Reacher” and “Fallout,” Amazon’s original streaming programming was focused on prestige shows like “Transparent” and “Mozart in the Jungle.” “Cortes,” a miniseries chronicling explorer Hernan Cortes, would’ve continued this trend with an exceptionally high-profile cast and crew. Steven Spielberg produced the project while “Schindler’s List” screenwriter Steven Zaillian penned its scripts, and no less than Javier Bardem was set to play the titular role in what was planned to be a grand historical epic. The ambitious project was just a few weeks into shooting under the direction of Ciro Guerra and Cristina Gallego when COVID-19 forced “Cortes” to shut down. Six months later, Amazon dropped the project thanks to how costly it would be to restart and execute it under COVID protocols.

Three months before this news broke, a separate problem emerged for the project in the form of several sexual harassment allegations against Guerra. Based on these accusations alone, it’s difficult to imagine “Cortes” would’ve continued with Guerra behind the camera, exacerbating the problems for a venture that only had a few weeks of footage in the can. On top of all that, two years after “Cortes” was first announced, Amazon had begun developing more commercially friendly projects like “The Terminal List” and “Fallout.” The days of Amazon focusing on critical darlings were over, and the streamer’s changing priorities sealed the fate of this once-promising miniseries that started life with so much potential and oodles of behind-the-scenes talent.

When Disney+ started, the streamer was determined to milk every pre-existing brand in the Disney catalog. Even “Turner & Hooch” was dragged up from the Touchstone Pictures archive to support the new outfit’s slate. Inevitably, beloved Disney Channel show “Lizzie McGuire” was called up to bat, and a revival series began shooting in October 2019, just a few weeks before Disney+’s launch. Hillary Duff was back headlining the show, a development that sent shockwaves across the entertainment world given the infamous fallout Duff had with the Mouse House decades earlier. All of that was apparently water under the bridge, though, and the prospect of streaming lending new life to “Lizzie McGuire” was impossible for both parties to resist. The project was poised to rev up the nostalgia of Disney Channel fans everywhere — and then, chaos got in the way.

Only two episodes of the revival were filmed before the show lost its showrunner and was subsequently put on ice. Duff posted cryptic social media comments in February 2020 signifying that problems related to the new “Lizzie McGuire” show’s mature content led to the disruptions. Just a few weeks later, COVID-19 turned the entertainment industry upside down, throwing countless projects into disarray. An already tormented project like “Lizzie McGuire” was bound to get massacred, and, by the end of the year, the highly anticipated revival was dead. Not even Disney+’s determination to exploit every Mouse House property could keep it alive.

Six years before he started anchoring “The Boys,” Karl Urban headlined another sci-fi TV show in the form of “Almost Human.” This Fox program chronicled a world where human police officers are forced to work with robotic cops to save a society overrun with crime. Urban plays a flesh-and-blood cop who must learn to work with an automaton portrayed by Michael Ealy. Due to it being a title from Bad Robot Productions and its status as a splashy, costly endeavor, the expectation was that “Almost Human” would secure passionate support from sci-fi geeks and general audiences alike. However, the show lasted only 13 episodes and was confirmed dead by April 2014. On the upside, that at least opened up Urban’s schedule to take on other projects like “Pete’s Dragon,” “Thor: Ragnarok,” and “The Boys.”

For “Almost Human” fans, though, this development was devastating. The near-future take on a cop show was able to secure its share of loyal followers who viewed the show’s mythology as just getting warmed up before the first season ended. With more seasons, “Almost Human” could’ve really stretched its wings and taken on whole new levels of depth. Instead, it was just one of many one-and-done sci-fi shows to air on Fox, and Urban would have to wait for “The Boys” to anchor a TV show with any longevity.

Even in an age where Meryl Streep stars in multiple seasons of a Hulu comedy show, the prospect of Kirsten Dunst anchoring a program like “On Becoming a God in Central Florida” is still a massive deal. The show cast Dunst as a down-on-her-luck Orlando resident who decides to procure money and stability by taking part in a skeevy pyramid scheme operation. The excitement over seeing Dunst headline a TV show was exacerbated, however, by the rocky road the show experienced on the way to being aired. Though it was touch and go for a while with regard to where the show would wind up airing (it was set up at both AMC and YouTube Premium before ultimately ending up on Showtime), “On Becoming a God in Central Florida” finally debuted in August 2019. Shortly afterward, it scored a second season renewal.

All seemed sunny for this Sunshine State production until, like so many other TV shows, “On Becoming a God in Central Florida” was capsized by the COVID-19 pandemic. In the fall of 2020, Showtime confirmed that it would no longer pursue a second season thanks to complications arising from the global health crisis. Not even Dunst’s star power and overwhelmingly positive reviews could help “Central Florida” stick around for multiple seasons.

One of Amazon’s first forays into more mainstream, entertainment-driven TV programming came with “The Tick,” which debuted in August 2017. The latest adaptation of Ben Edlund’s beloved cult-favorite comic book character, thanks to the popularity of previous “Tick” television shows, both animated and live-action, this show was a highly anticipated undertaking.

The series, about wacky superhero Tick (Peter Serafinowicz), who recruits ordinary soul Arthur (Griffin Newman) as his crime-fighting sidekick, was preceded by a massive promotional campaign, including a huge “takeover” of 2017’s San Diego Comic-Con. Excitement for the show was only eclipsed by its high costs, which reportedly reached as much as $5 million an episode. Amazon was starting to spend “Game of Thrones” money on “The Tick,” and that meant all eyes were on how the show would perform in the long run.

After just two seasons, though, “The Tick” was squashed. Amazon canceled the show, and ambitions to have the program continue on another platform ended up going nowhere. As you would assume, this ignited frustration among the show’s fanbase, irritation that was exacerbated by the praise “The Tick” received for how it handled mental health issues via Arthur’s personal story and his fluid grasp on reality. Given the show’s depth, as well as how many adventures the program’s titular superhero has experienced in other mediums, “The Tick” getting cut so short is still a sore spot for many.

While Batman and Superman have been everywhere in 21st-century media, fellow DC Comics legend Swamp Thing hasn’t been as lucky. After being the subject of two live-action movies and a TV show in the ’80s and ’90s, he was M.I.A. once Y2K came and went. 2019’s DC Universe “Swamp Thing” show sought to correct that by giving the character a lavish, horror-soaked TV program.

The dearth of other modern adaptations featuring the character, not to mention the endeavor’s high production value, inspired lofty pre-release expectations that the final product actually soared above. While some late 2010s DC programming, like fellow DC Universe program “Titans,” received divisive marks from fans, “Swamp Thing” was widely praised thanks to its evocative atmosphere, solid visual effects, and commitment to creating a genuinely haunting ambiance. That reputation has only been heightened thanks to how poorly “Swamp Thing” was treated by WarnerMedia; less than a week after “Swamp Thing’s” first episode aired, the show was canceled.

“Swamp Thing’s” bizarre fate was attributed to issues related to the show’s budget, tax rebates, and shifting priorities for the DC Universe platform. “Swamp Thing” leading man Derek Mears expressed his anguish over the cancelation, especially since the people involved in the program were initially not let in on why it ended so soon. Under any circumstances, this exercise would’ve garnered disapproval from Swamp Thing devotees, but with this unjust cancelation, the show’s loyal cult following, much like the transformed scientist Alec Holland, refuses to die.