10 TV Shows Cancelled Before Their Time

10. Nikita

A little-known show that burst onto The CW in the early 2010s, Nikita was a rare example of a movie concept (in this case Luc Besson’s La Femme Nikita) being altered and updated for television with great success.

Headed up by Maggie Q as the titular Nikita, the series was one of few then - or since - to feature an Asian female lead, let alone portraying a role as strong, capable, and multifaceted as Nikita.

Focusing on Nikita’s life following her escape from secret U.S. government organisation Division, the narrative sees her training Lyndsey Fonseca’s Alex to infiltrate them as a new recruit and take Division down from the inside, surrounded by an ensemble cast of shifting allegiances as the story progresses.

Unfortunately, despite good critical reception and decent ratings, viewing figures for the spy thriller steadily dropped as the seasons went on. While successfully renewed for a fourth and final season to wrap up the plot - which is admittedly more than a lot of the shows on this list got - the series order was reduced to a paltry 6 episodes, compared to the previous 20+ episode full seasons.

Fans felt this wasn’t nearly enough to properly resolve the story and character arcs that had been set up over the past few years, and rightly so. The final season ended up a squashed, stilted affair that killed off a core character for pure shock value and failed to offer the true, fleshed out conclusion that the show deserved.