TEN: Rush will end “with a bang.”
TEN drama exec confirms the end for Rush, as a series which put the network back on the drama map.
- Published by David Knox
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TEN has confirmed the end of Rush, as previously reported by TV Tonight.
In a statement on the show’s Facebook page Executive Producer of Drama and Production, Rick Maier said:
“Rush remains one of the most successful and loved drama series on TEN. We could not be more proud of all that Rush has achieved to put TEN back on the drama map, including winning the AFI Award for Best Television Drama series in 2010. You can only have praise for any drama series successfully completing four seasons. While we don’t discount a return series it is not on the cards at this stage – but we do intend to finish season four with a bang, literally.”
Series Producer, John Edwards, added: “It’s a sad fact in Australia commercial realities come in to play with all series after 65 episodes. You don’t get the tax rebate, and as a consequence producing shows of this high calibre become cost prohibitive. That said we are all incredibly proud of the series.”
In August Associate Producer Mimi Butler told TV Tonight a renewal would be tough.
“It’s very difficult with financing because we’ve hit our 65 mark,” she said.
“Funding plays part of it because you can only get the tax rebate up to 65 episodes, and we’ll get to 70. So after 65 every episode is 20% more expensive which will be the case for our last 5 episodes.”
Last week Southern Star also confirmed it had delivered 13 episodes as per the series order but a fifth season was not commissioned.
Nine’s Sea Patrol exited after 68 episodes, while Rescue Special Ops wrapped at 48. City Homicide folded with 79 but was not funded by Screen Australia. Yesterday Seven announced Wild Boys would end after just 13 episodes.
TEN Network’s remaining dramas include Offspring and Neighbours with Bikie Wars, Reef Doctors, Puberty Blues and Underground: The Julian Assange Story due in 2012.
The final episode for Rush airs 8:30pm Thursday November 17.
49 Responses
I hope the “ending with a bang” they refer to is not going to mean a cliff hanger.
Could they make a spin-off show to circumvent the tax rebate issue? Like the next season could be something like “Rush:urban wars” ?
Bummer. Great show.
It is amazing that Rush’s producer is relying upon the government’s Producer Offset as one of the reasons for the demise of this show. The Offset allows a tax rebate of 20% of defined production costs up to 65 episodes. But it has only been in existence for 4 years. Prior to that series such as Rush were fully financed by the networks and often with a distribution advance against rest of world territories paid for by the distributor. This created shows such as All Saints, Blue Heelers, McLeod’s Daughters, Water Rats..and the list goes on. Even now Seven’s most successful show, Packed To The Rafters is fully financed by the network and has past the 65 episode limit. So the reality is that Ten is simply not prepared to stump up the cash and looks to all and sundry for subsidy while its competitors succeed with shows that rate. Rush never got near breaking the million viewer mark and lost viewers with every new series. Wild Boys was not renewed even with a million viewers last week. The reality is that Seven has exceeded its minimum drama quota for years and didn’t need Wild Boys to achieve it. Ten in contrast has bought cheap New Zealand drama, which gets Australian drama quota points to reach the bare minimum. The difficulty for Ten with its drama is that in going for a younger demographic it is chasing a fickle and multi platform interested young demographic. You need to spend more money, accept more failures and take more risks before you find a show which might succeed for many years. Ten has consistently refused to do this even when its profits were high.
I thought that for a very long time procedural (crime/med drama) programs sold well overseas. Is this still the case? If so, does that mean that even after overseas sales, it’s not affordable?
Funny how at one stage shows went for 8 season now there all greedy. Wish the tax rebate never existed.
What the point in watching any show knowing it iwill only last a few seasons.
The channels should realize that with digital coming in and foxtel there is a choice now.
None of those shows sound great, doubt i will ne watching. Can now do other things instead,
So does that mean shows like Blue Heelers and A Country Practice that ran all year long and passed the 65 episode mark will never be produced again?
Who made up this silly rule and when did it come into existance anyway?
… all good things must come to an end! 🙁
Really think it should do well at the awards for it’s last season – it’s been an absolute compelling season, and congratulations to the writers for nailing the complexities of an ongoing arc over the season, and intertwining that arc with the effects it had on it’s characters.
BTW, Nicole Da Silva – she is one to watch! Incredible talent.
It’s a sad thing. Will definitely miss the characters, I thought they all had great chemistry with each other. Hope to see the actors in more things in the future (that can be seen on free to air ) as i did really like all the main ones – Nicole Da Silva, Samuel Johnson, Ashley Zukerman, Jolene Anderson, Callan Mulvey and Rodger Corser.
Yeah can’t they claim it as a new mini-series each season and get the tax rebate? Rush shouldn’t end now. It’s too good. And with City Homicide gone, there is now no decent Aussie cop show on tv. People complained there were too many Aussie cop shows, well now there’s none.
How come US shows can go on forever? Law & Order went for 20 years, doesn’t look like NCIS is gonna stop anytime soon and it’s at season 9. But in Australia, you make it to season 4 it’s a miracle and it’s probably the last season. Gone are the days of All Saints, A Country Practice, Blue Heelers which ran for more than 10 years. Rafters is probably the only Aussie show with any chance of getting to at least 6 seasons.
Rush was consistently really well written and produced drama that found a committed following, and it did rate. It just didn’t out-rate everything else. Last week The Slap had a 30% share of the top 4 with the remaining 3 separated by just 3%. Nine’s Unforgettable had 25%, Seven took 23% with The Amazing Race, and against that Rush took 22%. That’s hardly a failure or reason to cancel it, and it’s not why it was cancelled.
The rebate limit of 65 episodes makes sense. If a programme is successful at the point the offset rebate is lost, a good distributor should be able to find enough pre-sale acquisition finance to “offset” that 20% difference so the program can continue to be produced. If a program can’t stand on it’s own two feet, it’s fate is not a hard decision to make.
Just because Rush ends doesn’t mean the end to drama on Ten, obviously. There’s nothing wrong with a churn rate that will see new projects tried, and good crews will just move on to work with some new producers, or the same old ones!
Sad to see Rush go because it was so very good, but bring on the new shows!
Such a shame this has been axed. It is a great drama and has kept me intrigues through all four seasons.
Just a question about the tax break, does Underbelly get to reset its count every year being a mini series with a different cast each time even though its the same producers and concept and called Underbelly something each year?
Is that code for “A cliffhanger that won’t be resolved”?
Why doen’t the Government give a tax rebate to all Australian dramas regardless of number of episodes? Considering they have a shiny new (dispised by everyone except the Green Eco-feminists aka. Bob Brown) tax, I would expect their to be quite a few money showers being purchased in Canberra right now…
If they change to being a mini series are their tax breaks available?
Criminal….for those who never watched this great drama series, I will forever remember it for being a raw insight into the lives of some of our boys (and girls) in blue. Coping with death, job pressures, bosses, politics….I salute all who have worked on the show.
Honestly, people who bag out Rush obviously don’t watch it every week. It’s a brilliant show.
The Slap may be the rage at the moment (and aired the same time), but it shouldn’t discount what Rush has achieved this year and over the last 3 seasons. As a police drama, I think it’s one of the best of its kind!
This must be one of the worst kept ‘secrets’ around lately.
Wish it didn’t have to go!
Producing shows of this calibre” and “Rush has put Ten back on the drama map” ??? Man, some people need a reality check, what planet are they living on? Who are they kidding? Oh, now I realise the people that are making such statements are the producers of the show and the network on which it aired. Blowing their own trumpet it seems despite the fact that audience numbers ever since its inception have proved otherwise.
It’s never rated and that’s why it was axed, because no one watched. Hopefully now they can invest in something a little bit more desirable and that has the capacity to get at least a decent amount of eyeballs tuning in.
James: I take it you’re not in agreement with the peer-voted AFIs. Firstly if you look at the failures of shows like The Cooks, CrashBurn, then TEN was trading off Neighbours for too long. Secret Life of US had ended many years before Rush was able to demonstrate TEN could do primetime drama again. That has now led to Offspring. It has also performed well in demos across most of its run. If it never rated it would have been gone after S1.
Why is there the 65 episode rule? It seems silly to essentially end people’s jobs for the sake of funding new product when they could continue on a successful series.
Crap decision to all involved, would there be a chance of it being picked up by another network? And if it did would the tax rebates start over again being on a different network?
Put simply: no.
If it costs so much money to continue shows after the 65 ep planning rebate then why don’t they plan for the series t end at this time so there is a proper ending and not so many axings…
Another good aussie drama gone probably gunna be replaced with more american crap.
TEN definately shouldn’t make statements about a return when they’re announcing the end; if they had something like telemovies planned then let that play out by itself.
Rush has been a fantastic program and I’m glad we got 4 seasons out of it!
Has been my favourite aussie program for 4 years now (Offspring takes over) This season has been amazing, a good well done to all involved!
“While we don’t discount a return series it is not on the cards at this stage”
I don’t think it’s right to give any false hope like that to the show’s die hard fans. It’s been a great season and at least there was some consistency with the timeslots ect. Let it bow out gracefully…
This is wrong! Rush was awesome. I’d watch a 5th series of it for sure. What the hell am I going to do on a Thursday night now??