“The Following” had a good run during its first three seasons, but the show had to come to an end as it couldn’t keep up with the competition it had from all sides. Various other productions were causing problems for the series and stealing viewers from it, and in the end the network made the decision to pull the plug for good and end the show before it got to season 4.
Many fans were hopeful that they would at least see this fourth season, and there were some high expectations for what it might bring to the table, but in the end that wasn’t enough to convince the network that the show had to be continued. It’s particularly disappointing to find out that the producers themselves apparently already had plans for how they wanted to continue the show and what kinds of developments we would have seen in season 4, and it might sting for some fans to know what might have happened and yet also know that it’s never actually going to become reality.
The main issue was that the severe competition from other shows was continuously dragging down the ratings for “The Following” itself. It started out with a relatively original premise, but other producers seemed to notice its popularity and found it exciting, so they wanted to get in on the action and decided to take various ideas from that show. As a result, viewers who were once attracted to “The Following” started flocking to other productions instead, and the ratings of the original show started to go down.
There might have been a lot of potential for a fourth season too, especially with all that was rumored to have been planned for that season. Of course, many of those rumors were unconfirmed and coming from various suspicious sources that should have probably been taken with a grain of salt, but even then it was interesting to see what people were talking about with regards to “The Following”, and what kinds of ideas the community had for the show’s future.
Fans even started a petition for the revival of the production, but that didn’t work out as expected, and the signatures that they collected weren’t even that impressive in the end. Still, various people attached to the production seemed grateful to everyone who had participated, and expressed their delight that the show has such an audience. This included Kevin Bacon, one of the most prominent stars on the show, who went on his official Twitter account to thank fans.
Now, there are some rumors that the next season of “The Following” might actually make its way to TV one way or another, as there have apparently been some attempts to sell it as a concept for a different show. Even if that doesn’t work out completely, we might still see elements from that season make their way to another production, and that should still be some consolation to fans of “The Following”.
Of course, that would also require fans to know that the production in question took its inspiration from “The Following” and its cancelled fourth season, but we have no doubt that the producers of the show will find a way to make that known if they decided to go down this path sooner or later. They seem to enjoy their popularity among fans, and even though the show’s ratings have been somewhat disappointing towards the end of season 3, it was still obviously loved by a lot of people.