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Nine axes Days of our Lives after 45 years

Time runs out for iconic daytime soap, axed from Nine's schedule after 45 years.

2013-04-14_1738“Like sands through the hour-glass, so are the Days of Our Lives…”

Time has run out for the long-running US soap, set to be dumped by Nine after 45 years on the network.

First broadcast on Nine in 1968, the daytime drama will have its last-ever episode on Friday April 26.

Nine is revamping the timeslot. A Nine spokesperson told TV Tonight, “We made a commercial decision not to renew Days Of Our Lives.”

Yet last week it won its 2pm timeslot, averaging 126,000 viewers and pipping  TEN’s Ready Steady Cook (124,000) and Seven’s Dr. Oz (118,000). It ranked second the week before.

In 2007 Nine dropped The Young and the Restless after 31 years for the short-lived panel show The Catch-Up. Fans flooded Nine’s online forums at the time. Foxtel wasted no time in snapping up the show, which now airs on Arena.

The last few years have been tough for US daytime soaps with  The Guiding Light, As the World Turns, Passions, All My Children and One Life to Live all axed before the latter two received a lifeline to be produced for online.

Days is still one of the longest-running scripted shows in the world and one of the longest-running television shows in Australia.

It was recently renewed by NBC until September 2014.

Sony Pictures Television is understood to be pursuing other broadcasting opportunities in Australia.

Nine is yet to announce a replacement show.

www.facebook.com/DaysOfOurLivesAustralia

89 Responses

  1. I’m not a fan of Will being Gay, but there are more shows than Days that have this, and he has not come out as yet on the show. It was just getting interesting with John going to be found innocent.

  2. LOL trustno1, how much more news do we need. Free to air tv. is rubbish anyway, and I’m sure Days will be on Foxtel, just like The Young and The Restless, less ads. 🙂

  3. I cannot believe channel 9 has axed this show, now where is it going. Like the young and the restless I gather this show will go on foxtel, I sure hope it does.

    They are wrong when they say it was aired in 1968, I was about 12 / 13 when I first saw it, and that was in 64/65.

    I can’t understand channel 9 axing a show that has been so popular for so long, well it is channel 9’s loss. I think free to air telly has way to many reality shows anyway, and I very rarely watch free to air rubbish.

  4. Been watching this show for 40 years…absolutely disgusted that Channel 9 has taken such a decision. What are the “commercial reasons”? Please do not treat the customers in such a cavalier manner….tell us the reasons that are not full of “PR spin and PR speak”….

  5. I wish to register my objection to the decision to axe Days.

    I doubt Day’s audience is homogenous and Nine will pay for treating this audience as ignorant.

    My gripe is that I cannot view the series online at NBC site because Nine owns the rights. What will happen now, I wonder.

  6. Wow I can’t believe that a soap opera got 81 responses and people say they don’t watch soaps.. We all love watching soaps
    And this just proved it
    We need a soap channel on foxtel
    Where they can put all the soaps on
    All my children
    One life to live
    General Hospital
    The young and the restless
    The bold and the beautiful
    All would be in one place

  7. I really hope you are right David, was just putting it out there as something that needed further investigation due to Days’ conservative audience, although neither Nine nor Sony would admit it if it were true.

    Although personally not a fan of the storyline, it would be a great shame that it would be pulled for such narrow-mindedness.

    P.S Thanks for taking the time to break the story but I guess you always knew such news would arouse much passionate debate.

  8. Alex: A kiss and lovemaking are different regardless of sexuality. It may well be an issue with the production and fans, but it has nothing to do with Nine’s motives. I have spoken to both Nine and Sony (in addition to breaking the story in the first place) but if you are certain a storyline is the reason then so be it.

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