After five seasons, Syfy is leaving the town of Haven, announcing the series will not be renewed for a sixth season. The writers and producers were not surprised by the decision as showrunner Gabrielle Stanton revealed in an interview with The Wrap. “We approached as if it was going to be our final season, so we were ready for it story-wise. But you never know. If a million people watch, maybe we can do something about that… But we had an idea that it might be [the final season]. “
Syfy ordered an extended series of twenty-six episodes for Haven’s fifth season and aired the first half in 2014; the final thirteen episodes are scheduled to air this fall. Though nothing official has been said, ordering one extra-long season instead of two separate may have been a way for the network to get around contract re-negotiations for the series’ stars.
Reaction among fans has been mixed, with some commenting on the show’s Facebook and Twitter feeds that the series has lost steam and the writers seemed unsure about how to wrap up the story. Others note that this seems part of a larger trend at Syfy of canceling original dramas after just a few years. Fan favorites Warehouse 13 and Eureka were mothballed after five seasons each and high production costs brought Farscape to an end after just four. TVSeriesFinale.com reports that Haven’s ratings have dropped over 51% year-to-year, with the most recent episodes pulling in about 860,000 viewers. But smaller audiences are common for the niche network, who’s most popular scripted drama Z-Nation is drawing just 1.42 million viewers.
In 2014 Syfy’s head of original programming spoke to Entertainment Weekly about the programming shifts at the network in recent years as they struggled to come back from rebranding and the end of one of the most popular shows, Battlestar Galactica. Just as other networks jumped on the idea of gritty sci-fi and fantasy like The Walking Dead, and Game of Thrones, Syfy jumped on the softer, space-opera aspects of Battlestar and started creating ‘female-friendly’ content with lighthearted procedurals. As years passed Syfy re-dedicated themselves to harder sci-fi and space themed fare, like Helix, 12 Monkeys, Ascension, and upcoming drama The Expanse.
Fans of Haven won’t be left hanging though as the show approached season five looking to give viewers a satisfying ending should the series be cancelled. And we never know what will happen with third-party services like Netflix and Hulu starting to pick up some canceled series. Haven’s last episodes will begin their run on Syfy on October 8, 2015. For a refresher, the show’s midseason finale is currently available for viewing on Syfy’s website.