Space: 1999 - Broadcast and Reception of Series Two

Broadcast and Reception of Series Two

Year Two did nevertheless fare admirably on CBC Television in Canada, airing in English in a family viewing period, late Saturday afternoons before the hockey broadcasts, with a mostly undisrupted run and rerun of all 24 episodes from September 1976 through September 1977. And Year Two episodes ran in French Canada-wide during the same broadcast year, in early evening on Saturdays. Ratings were sufficient for a full additional year's transmission of Year One in the English CBC Saturday programming slot in 1977-1978. Episodes of both Year One and Year Two were repeated regionally in Canada in English and French through the early-to-mid-1980s. YTV Canada broadcast both seasons with reportedly good ratings in 1990-1992, in a late Saturday afternoon airtime closely matching that of the CBC English network in the 1970s.

In contrast to its airing on the CBC, the presentation of Year Two was not as consistent elsewhere in the world. In certain UK regions, some Year Two episodes did not air until nearly two years after they were produced, while the regional ITV station HTV (serving Wales and West of England) did not pick the series up until 1984, and then only showed nineteen out of the twenty-four episodes from series two (the last episodes were not screened in Wales until the series was broadcast by Bravo on the Sky Satellite network in the mid 1990s). Plans were nevertheless put in place for a third season, but still dropping ratings and fewer syndication and commercial sponsor sales contributed to the series' cancellation. Landau faulted Lew Grade's foray into film production; the projected budget for the third season was, coincidentally, equivalent to the advertising budget for Raise the Titanic, and some commentators have suggested that it came down to one or the other. However, since Raise the Titanic did not start principal photography until 1979 (and was not advertised or released until the following year), it is more likely that money which ITC might have allocated to a third season of Space: 1999 instead paid for the production of the company's Return of the Saint television series.

Fan and critics' responses to the new series varied. Some missed the mystical plotlines, feature-film ambiance and the "British-ness" of the first series. Others embraced the new characters, down-to-earth characterisations and pulsing action beats. Comparisons with Star Trek were inevitable and used by both camps to show how the series had been either saved or destroyed by the format change.