“Channel Zero” was canceled by Syfy in January 2019, just a couple of months after the show’s fourth season, titled “The Dream Door,” wrapped up its run. The network didn’t take long to make its decision. But why did they cancel the acclaimed show when the endless string of creepypasta lore could have paved the way for endless seasons? As always, it comes down to the juice being worth the squeeze. In this case, Syfy — or more importantly, the network’s parent company NBCUniversal — just wasn’t making enough from its investment to press forth.
At the time, NBCUniversal was hatching plans to launch its own streaming service, which we would come to know as Peacock. It debuted in July 2020 at the height of the pandemic. The pandemic wasn’t even a concern when “Channel Zero” was canceled, though. What was a concern was the billions that NBCU was going to have to invest in Peacock to compete with the likes of Netflix, Disney+, HBO Max, and others in the marketplace. Peacock lost billions and billions of dollars in its first few years of operation.
More to the point, “Channel Zero” had a deal in place to stream exclusively on Shudder. That was good for horror fans as the service caters very well to genre lovers. But it wasn’t doing anything to help NBCU out in the streaming game, as Shudder is owned by AMC Networks. The streaming-focused future of Hollywood forced companies to think in terms of exclusive content, and that was undoubtedly a consideration with this show.
