When he learned that series two of Utopia would be airing in July of 2014, Dennis Kelly knew the end was nigh. “I remember us going ‘summer’s terrible isn’t it?’”, the writer says. “And they were going: ‘No! Summer’s the new winter!’ … Never believe anyone when they say this shit to you.” By October, the cult Channel 4 thriller had been axed. For Kelly, who had a third series mapped out, it was “heartbreaking” to bid farewell before he had planned to. “But I’m quite stoic. I learned a long time ago not to take things personally.”
Today, TV cancellations seem to be a weekly occurrence and this year alone has seen the likes of Kaos, Constellation, The Acolyte, My Lady Jane and Dead Boy Detectives bow out after just one season. But shows being cut off mid-sentence is nothing new. What made Utopia brilliant – its full throttle conspiracy paranoia, highly stylised aesthetic, dark comedy and graphic violence – also made it a challenging sell. But Kelly says that Channel 4 were all in … until they weren’t: “I never want to beat up Channel 4, not because I feel loyalty to them because I don’t, but I feel like they really gave it a go and they never pushed back on anything … If I were to criticise them, I’d say you should be able to see through how many people are watching something now to its value beyond that.”
