The Wil Wheaton Project–which was a sci fi/geek take on E!’s The Soup–has been cancelled by Syfy according to Wheaton’s blog. The series premiered in late May and has run throughout the Summer generating several viral videos from his snarky takes on the genre (one of the best being the Brady Bunch intro to Game of Thrones).
Wheaton said in the blog article that he received a call from a Syfy exec who informed him that he was “about to make [his] day less great” because the network was not ordering additional episodes of the series. Following is an excerpt from the blog piece:
Ultimately, he told me, the executives in New York just didn’t think we had enough viewers to justify more episodes. I didn’t say anything about the total lack of promotion off the network, or point out that our ratings were on par with The Soup, or that ratings are always lower in summer than the fall. I didn’t bother saying any of that, because I know he knows that. I was reasonably confident that he made those arguments with New York when he was trying to get the show renewed. I presume he fought hard for us, but ultimately couldn’t sway executives in New York who never seemed — in my opinion — to really understand what kind of show we were doing, who I was and why I was hosting it, and how to engage with and promote to the audience who would like it.
Wheaton still had good things to say about the particular exec that called him mentioning that “He’s a good guy in an industry full of bad guys, and I genuinely enjoyed working with him”. He also said that he had come to terms with the decision but that he was “super sad that I won’t get to work with my writers and producers, and I’m sad that we don’t get to keep writing jokes, but I did everything I could to help the show succeed”.
The Wil Wheaton Project was actually a fun little show and gave the sci fi genre a rare opportunity to make fun of itself. I personally will miss it and the viral videos it spawned most weeks. Perhaps it’s time to start up the #SaveTheWilWheatonProject campaign?
