After two seasons, the queer pirate romcom starring Taika Waititi and Rhys Darby was cancelled by HBO’s Max earlier this month – and its fans quickly mobilised. They raised more than US$21,000 for the campaign, which was used to purchase a billboard in Times Square and have a plane fly over Hollywood with a banner reading “Save Our Flag Means Death”. They also flooded Max’s social media, phone lines and customer feedback inboxes en masse, and launched a petition that has just under 80,000 signatures at time of writing.
Not just because they’re shorter.
The production schedule on scripted US shows is often absolutely insane. Ridiculously long hours, multiple episodes per week, sometimes even writing the scripts and plot as the show airs on network television, which is why you’ll have breaks or bottle episodes, to allow the writers to catch up.
From what I understand, a lot of the good UK tv shows, they have far more time to make it. Not the lower tier stuff (soaps, etc.) obviously, but that stuff doesn’t really get much of an audience outside of the UK.