History Main / CreatorKiller

* New media company Gawker Media was brought down in 2016 after getting into [[http://nymag.com/selectall/2016/08/did-i-kill-gawker.html?mid=twitter_nymag a disastrous tangle]] with Wrestling/HulkHogan and Silicon Valley tech guru Peter Thiel. After Gawker gained and posted clips of a sex tape featuring Hogan and refused to take them down, the wrestler sued the company for damages caused by the release of the clips, which included [[UnPerson getting scrubbed from the WWE's records]]. Thiel, who had long despised Gawker for outing him as gay, eagerly supported Hogan's lawsuit, using his vast financial resources to pay for Hogan's legal team. Instead of trying to defend the clips as newsworthy, Gawker's legal defense was quite flippant, believing that their breach of Hogan's privacy was protected under the First Amendment and that they'd win the case with no major issues. Instead, they were successfully sued for more money than they were worth (and more than Hogan was originally asking for), resulting in the company filing for bankruptcy three weeks later. Gawker's founder, Nick Denton, later filed for bankruptcy himself after a judge ruled that Hogan could start seizing their assets after it was found that Denton lied about their stock value. The company's bankruptcy culminated in its sale to Creator/{{Univision}}, ending its era of independence, and while Univision announced that the other sites under the former Gawker Media umbrella (Deadspin, Gizmodo, Jalopnik, Jezebel, Kotaku, and Lifehacker) would survive, the company's former flagship, Gawker.com itself, would be shut down as a functioning news organization. The site was relaunched by new owners at Bustle Digital Group in 2021, but it otherwise [[InNameOnly has nothing to do with its original incarnation]].

* In the late '00s, the social news website Digg was the front page of the internet, with more traffic than even Website/{{Facebook}} and the power to drive traffic to any websites that made its front page. That changed overnight after the controversial "Digg v4" redesign in 2010, which was [[ObviousBeta extremely buggy]] and removed many popular features. Users fled in droves to the upstart competitor Website/{{Reddit}}, whose founder Alexis Ohanian openly mocked the redesign and suggested that it was driven by venture capital investors playing FollowTheLeader with other websites. Two years later, the site was sold off to Betaworks for just half a million dollars, a tiny fraction of the $200 million it had been valued at just a few years prior. While the site still exists, it is a pale shadow of its former self, little more than a generic news aggregator among many.

* A discussion of this trope in the music world can be seen in WebVideo/ToddInTheShadows' series ''[[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEb6sGT7oD8FQvKJxB5yc170TRAIOOFfA Trainwreckords]]'', which discusses albums that, for whatever reason (from poor quality to [[TheyChangedItNowItSucks an unpopular change in sound]] to a TroubledProduction), destroyed the careers of the musicians who made them.

* New media company Gawker Media was brought down in 2016 after getting into [[http://nymag.com/selectall/2016/08/did-i-kill-gawker.html?mid=twitter_nymag a disastrous tangle]] with Wrestling/HulkHogan and Silicon Valley tech guru Peter Thiel. After Gawker gained and posted clips of a sex tape featuring Hogan and refused to take them down, the wrestler sued the company for damages caused by the release of the clips, which included [[UnPerson getting scrubbed from the WWE's records]]. Thiel, who had long despised Gawker for outing him as gay, eagerly supported Hogan's lawsuit, using his vast financial resources to pay for Hogan's legal team. Instead of trying to defend the clips as newsworthy, Gawker's legal defense was quite flippant, believing that their breach of Hogan's privacy was protected under the First Amendment and that they'd win the case with no major issues. Instead, they were successfully sued for more money than they were worth (and more than Hogan was originally asking for), resulting in the company filing for bankruptcy three weeks later. Gawker's founder, Nick Denton, later filed for bankruptcy himself after a judge ruled that Hogan could start seizing their assets after it was found that Denton lied about their stock value. The company's bankruptcy culminated in its sale to Creator/{{Univision}}, ending its era of independence, and while Univision announced that the other sites under the former Gawker Media umbrella (Deadspin, Gizmodo, Jalopnik, Jezebel, Kotaku, and Lifehacker) would survive, the company's former flagship, Gawker.com itself, would be shut down as a functioning news organization. As of this writing, it exists solely as an archive site, its fate up in the air.

[[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Do not confuse]] with AIIsACrapshoot or for when an author [[TorchTheFranchiseAndRun wants to kill their own work]]. Has nothing to do with [[KillTheGod killing God]], nor does it have anything to do with the creator dying for a different reason. Also has nothing to do with the God Killer awakening from VideoGame/PuzzleAndDragons.

* Andrew Dobson, author of ''Webcomic/SoYoureACartoonist'' and also known as Tom Preston, has always been a highly controversial artist for a large number of reasons, but for the most part of his career, had a significant fanbase along with a significant hatedom. Many times, he dealt with this by mocking his critics within his work. However, this did not work out for the better when he released the comic strip named ''BINGO'', where he went into further detail about things that his haters loved to bring up. The reason this backfired horribly at him was that he brought up things that the vast majority of his fanbase was never aware of, leading to them going outside of Website/DeviantArt for answers or to have the ''many'' critics, trolls and detractors provide the info for them. This eventually kickstarted a series of events that made Dobson lose a massive chunk of his fanbase, have dozens of parodies made against him to this day, and lose a great amount of respect amongst his peers. As a result, he departed from his Website/DeviantArt site, got his Twitter account suspended due to multiple factors (involving hate speech) and disappeared from social media in 2020. Even his comics [[KeepCirculatingTheTapes have been getting harder to track]].

Compare GenreKiller and FranchiseKiller. [[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Not to be confused]] with DiedDuringProduction (where the creator dies before their work is completed), RageAgainstTheAuthor (where the creator can ''literally'' be killed by his/her work) or TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou (same). See StarDerailingRole when it happens to the performers. See CreatorBacklash for when a creator turns against their work and BuryYourArt if they refuse to let it see the light of day, regardless if the work itself destroys their credibility. See ToughActToFollow when one's career was not killed by a flop but the inability to follow-up a massive success. A RoleEndingMisdemeanor is when this trope is caused by [[OvershadowedByControversy personal scandal]] rather than a failed work. Contrast BreakthroughHit (when the work makes the creator a big name), CareerResurrection (when the work makes the creator a big name again after a Creator Killer) and WinBackTheCrowd (same). For understandable reasons, many of these overlap with TroubledProduction. If it literally, and directly, kills them, then it's probably an example of FatalMethodActing.

* Longtime producer Allan Carr was a major presence in the film industry during the '70s and '80s. His biggest success was the film adaptation of ''Film/{{Grease}}''. In 1988, Carr was given complete creative control of the 1989 UsefulNotes/{{Academy Award}}s telecast - which meant that he promised "the most beautiful Academy Awards of all time" and replicate his successes in Broadway musicals with a production number involving [[WesternAnimation/SnowWhiteAndTheSevenDwarfs Snow White]] and Creator/RobLowe performing a duet of "Proud Mary". But the attempt didn't work as well and the resulting show was cringe-inducing to watch. [[note]] That's not to say it was ''all'' bad- he was the one responsible for changing the award winner announcement from "And the winner is..." to "And the Oscar goes to...", a changeover that still remains as of 2021.[[/note]] The Academy also used Snow White without Creator/{{Disney}}'s permission and they were sued for copyright infringement. This opening show is in the book ''Literature/WhatWereTheyThinkingThe100DumbestEventsInTelevisionHistory''. As for Carr, he continued to work as a theatre producer before dying of liver cancer in 1999.

* Canadian animation studio Cinar went out of business in 2004 after a financial scandal and a plagiarism lawsuit (''WesternAnimation/RobinsonSucroe''). The company later resurfaced as Creator/CookieJarEntertainment. In 2013, Cookie Jar was absorbed into Creator/DHXMedia. ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'' survived for a few more years after production moved to two other studios.

A Creator Killer is a rather unpredictable phenomenon when one or more works flop badly enough to take down or badly damage the publishers, the reputation of creative talents behind it, or both. Though there are usually many factors needed to cause the death of a publisher or a creator, some high-profile flops are linked (rightfully or not) to the death of the organization working on it. They will NeverLiveItDown.

Compare GenreKiller and FranchiseKiller. [[JustForFun/IThoughtItMeant Not to be confused]] with DiedDuringProduction (where the creator dies before their work is completed), RageAgainstTheAuthor (where the creator can ''literally'' be killed by his/her work) or TheFourthWallWillNotProtectYou (same). See StarDerailingRole when it happens to the performers. See OldShame for an old work which a creator turns against later (or refuses to let see the light of day), but which by itself probably won't destroy their credibility. See ToughActToFollow when one's career was not killed by a flop but the inability to follow-up a massive success. A RoleEndingMisdemeanor is when this trope is caused by [[OvershadowedByControversy personal scandal]] rather than a failed work. Contrast BreakthroughHit (when the work makes the creator a big name), CareerResurrection (when the work makes the creator a big name again after a Creator Killer) and WinBackTheCrowd (same). For understandable reasons, many of these overlap with TroubledProduction. If it literally, and directly, kills them, then it's probably an example of FatalMethodActing.

* Radio/ChrisEvans was a pretty popular radio DJ at Creator/TheBBC. However, when time came for Evans to be the new lead host of ''Series/{{Top Gear|UK}}'' following the firing of Creator/JeremyClarkson in 2015 and the retirement of his co-hosts Creator/RichardHammond and Creator/JamesMay from the program, it marked the beginning of the show's AudienceAlienatingEra. Evans' tenure on ''Top Gear'' was widely disliked, and led to the show's decline in ratings. Chris Evans quit the show after a single season, being replaced by Creator/MattLeBlanc. Coupled with sexual harrasment allegations over the next few years, Evans' stint as a ''Top Gear'' host ended up killing his career.

* ''Anime/{{Fractale}}'' was conceived as a way for its director, Yutaka "Yamakan" Yamamoto, to make Creator/KyotoAnimation regret firing him, with all the resources put into it that you'd expect with a goal like that. He was so sure of its success that he said he'd step down if it did poorly. The end result was said to be good, if not great, by most people who watched it to the end, [[AcclaimedFlop but not many people did.]] Yamakan probably would have had to step down even if he hadn't explicitly staked his career on it doing well. It also garnered some of the worst ratings for the Creator/{{Noitamina}} animation block. Although the 2011 Sendai Earthquake didn't help matters, the show's ratings prior to the earthquake were noticeably behind the average ratings for all other series in the block. The main problem was the competition; ''Fractale'' was billed as the "moe-killer" series by the director himself, and as if to prove this it was released at the same time as a cutesy-looking MagicalGirl show. Unfortunately for ''Fractale'' that show was ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica'', which was not only ''the'' anime for the Winter 2011 season, but also one of the most popular anime of the entire decade.

* Karl Bollers is most famous for his run on ''ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogArchieComics''. Unfortunately, it wasn't well-received and is pretty much the reason why he hasn't done much else.

* Announced way back in 1964, RCA's [[UsefulNotes/{{CED}} SelectaVision]] video system was intended to be the "next big thing" after color television, but intra-corporate rivalries and mismanagement after David Sarnoff stepped down and was replaced by his son, Robert, in 1965, stalled progress on it for over a decade. It took not one, not two, but ''three'' false starts [[note]]the holographic [=HoloPix=]/[=HoloTape=], the film-based [=PhotoPix=], and a half-hearted attempt at a magnetic system called [=MagTape=], all of which were killed either due to quality issues or because of RCA's losses in their side businesses, particularly their disastrous exit from the computer industry in 1971[[/note]], and had to survive numerous attempts by upper management at killing the project as interest waxed and waned, as well as a compromise deal with RCA's management, dealers and Panasonic in 1976 that saw the [=SelectaVision=] name applied to the first VHS UsefulNotes/{{VCR}} marketed in the [[UsefulNotes/UnitedStates US]] [[note]]the Panasonic-designed RCA VBT-200, which hit shelves in the fall of 1977[[/note]], and a soft reboot in 1977 after it was discovered that JVC had poached the disc system and had started recruiting for ''its'' version (which eventually became VHD). (RCA also deliberately avoided magnetic tape until they were basically forced to, since [[ItWillNeverCatchOn they believed it would never be cheap enough for home use.]]) All of this meant it was delayed until spring of '''''1981''''' -- well into the UsefulNotes/{{VCR}} era, and long after Philips' and Creator/{{MCA}}'s competing UsefulNotes/LaserDisc system was introduced. While the format did have some advantages at the time[[note]][=SelectaVision=] movies were significantly cheaper to buy than movies on videocassette or UsefulNotes/LaserDisc, and since RCA massively overproduced them, [=SelectaVision=] discs are still relatively easy to find in TheNewTwenties, decades after the format was discontinued[[/note]], and a factory-fresh disc with a good needle compared quite favorably with [=LaserDisc=], the format had massive durability issues; video quality on repeated plays was plagued with skipping and dropouts, degrading into an unwatchable mess after only a few hundred plays (RCA rated the discs at around 500 plays). More importantly, it didn't offer the recording capability of VHS/Beta; while the discs were cheap to buy, people were still far more interested at the time in recording things they could see for free on TV and watching them later, and video rental was still several years away -- and unlike VHS or Beta, [=SelectaVision=] was a purchase-only format controlled entirely by RCA, meaning that some content was simply not available. After all of the delays and the massive amount of R&D put into it, RCA needed [=SelectaVision=] to be a hit, but the format failed to take off, resulting in RCA finally killing the project in 1984, and its subsequent acquisition and breakup by its former parent General Electric. WebVideo/TechnologyConnections produced a 5-part series about the format's infamously TroubledProduction that [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnpX8d8zRIA&list=PLv0jwu7G_DFVP0SGNlBiBtFVkV5LZ7SOU starts here,]] also covered by the WebVideo/{{Oddity Archive}} [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1f9J2q_fOk here]] along with WebVideo/{{Techmoan}} [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LrPe0rwXOU here.]]

* Like The Sharper Image, Creator/{{LJN|Toys}}'s "breakthrough" product ended up being their death knell instead. After impressive licensing deals that brought toys based off properties such as ''WesternAnimation/ThunderCats1985'' and ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheTempleOfDoom'', LJN used their newfound fame to create a line of water guns called "Entertech". The toys were revolutionary on the fact that they could fire water like an automatic firearm, and even have its water supply come from detachable magazines. Add that to their almost completely realistic look to a real firearm, and it seemed that the brand would turn LJN into a major toy competitor to Creator/{{Hasbro}} and Creator/{{Mattel}}. That dream was never realized, however, as on the peak of Entertech's popularity, it became the center of massive media attention after several high-profile incidents of children playing with the water guns getting shot and killed by police officers who were unable to distinguish the toys with the real thing. Even more shocking were that the toy guns had been commonly used in robberies at banks and retailers. As a result of the controversy surrounding Entertech, LJN's then-parent company Creator/{{MCA}} sold the toy manufacturer in 1990 to Creator/{{Acclaim}}. Acclaim then shut down LJN's toy division in 1990 to focus more on its video game division (see the "Video Games" section for more).

* Most American manufacturers of analog synthesizers that were around in TheSeventies shut down because they couldn't keep up with the technological advancement of TheEighties. Moog died trying to keep up: The six-voice flagship polysynth Memorymoog came too late (the target audience already had Jupiters, Oberheims etc.), it was quite unreliable at first, even adding MIDI didn't save it, and Moog failed to earn back the money it cost to develop it (also because they were dumb enough to discontinue the Minimoog in 1981). The Memorymoog required a third-party upgrade to become somewhat reliable. Oberheim and Sequential Circuits were pretty much killed off by digital synths that suddenly came from UsefulNotes/{{Japan}}. At least E-mu was in the right place at the right time with the Emulator, the first halfway affordable sampler for those musicians and producers who couldn't afford Fairlights, and introduced their first Proteus [=ROMpler=] the same year as the Korg [=M1=].\\
ARP Instruments, on the other hand, succumbed to the consequences of trying to be ahead of everyone else and explore a new market at the same time by offering a synthesizer for guitarists. In 1974, the development of a monstrous polyphonic multi-section synthesizer named Centaur VI commenced. It bound all of ARP's engineers and ate up pretty much the company's entire budget for a whole of two years during which ARP was unable to come up with anything new. At the end, they had two prototypes of a synth that would have been way too expensive even if mass-produced. Not only that, it would have been the first guitar synth, but the pickup failed to separate the signals from the six strings cleanly. Two years of development for nothing. Mind you, ARP was so far ahead of its time that they could have had a normal polysynth with patch memory ready for production in 1976, even before the Yamaha [=CS-80=]. ARP never fully recovered from this, also due to a few more bad decisions. By the end of the decade, they started developing a normal polysynth named Chroma to keep up with the likes of the [=CS-80=] and the Prophet-5, but in 1981, when they were done, they didn't have any money anymore to build it and ceased their operations. The Chroma was eventually produced under the Rhodes flag.

* ''Film/HeavensGate'' destroyed the career of Creator/MichaelCimino (the director of ''Film/TheDeerHunter''), contributed to the collapse of the Creator/UnitedArtists studio and its sale to [[Creator/MetroGoldwynMayer MGM]], and ended the "UsefulNotes/NewHollywood" [[UsefulNotes/FallOfTheStudioSystem post-studio-system]] era in which director/auteurs were [[ProtectionFromEditors given complete creative control over their projects]]. Thus, it not only destroyed the careers of the people who created it but ended an era that produced many of the best films in history. Cimino's directing career didn't immediately end after that, but all of his post-''Heaven's Gate'' outings were commercial failures. He had a chance of recovery, however, as not long after ''Heaven's Gate'' Cimino was offered a chance to direct ''Film/{{Footloose}}'' of all films, under the condition that he won't exceed the budget and schedule by a single day or dollar. However, his [[ThePrimaDonna Prima Donna]] behavior started again during pre-production, [[FromBadToWorse and when weeks before the shooting was scheduled to begin, he demanded to delay it until he rewrote the script and get $250,000 for it]]; Creator/{{Paramount}} quickly replaced him. Cimino's final film was 1996's ''Sunchaser''; its failure to get a wide theatrical release due to poor test screenings made him stop working on any more projects, as he died twenty years later.

* ''Film/CutthroatIsland'', one of the biggest box office flops of all time, was the final straw for Creator/CarolcoPictures, which went bankrupt a month prior to the film's release due to its lavish overspending on other projects. It also destroyed Creator/RennyHarlin's respectability as a director, and the careers of pretty much everyone else involved (only the film's composer Music/JohnDebney and distributor Creator/MetroGoldwynMayer came out relatively unscathed. It also [[GenreKiller killed off]] the pirate movie genre until ''Franchise/PiratesOfTheCaribbean'' came along, and even now there are no successful pirate movies outside of that franchise.

* In what was possibly the most egregious vanity project of the independent scene, mortgagee Daniel Sadek conceived ''Redline'' as a starring [[{{Pun}} vehicle]] for his girlfriend Nadia Björlin and his valuable cars. Along with producing and co-writing this flick, Sadek sunk in $55 million for the production and distribution both through his own companies, Quick Loan Funding (which was a subprime mortgage service) and Chicago Pictures respectably. While [[NotScreenedForCritics critics couldn't tear it to shreds in advance]], that embargo didn't stop ''Redline'' from [[BoxOfficeBomb bombing hard at the box office]]. The disaster was so great, it not only spelled death for Chicago Pictures and fry Quick Loan, but it also took a huge financial toll on Sadek himself. He ended up bankrupt with the dubious distinction of being "[[MedalOfDishonor Predator Zero in the subprime-mortgage game]]".

* Much like ''Literature/MobyDick'' above, while [[VindicatedByHistory now regarded]] as one of the UsefulNotes/{{great American novel}}s, ''Literature/TheGreatGatsby'' was a flop upon release, selling less than half of what Creator/FScottFitzgerald's previous novels sold and leaving many copies on the shelves. Fitzgerald himself believed he only made $2000 off the book. The problem was believed by Fitzgerald to be a problem of audience: most novel readers at the time of release were women, and ''The Great Gatsby'' did not have an admirable female character. The book's failure likely contributed to Fitzgerald's drinking issues and poor finances during the 1930s. His fourth and final novel was also a flop, and Fitzgerald died in 1940 believing himself a failure as a writer - just two years before the [[UsefulNotes/YanksWithTanks United States military]] included the book for distribution to soldiers serving overseas, where its 1920s nostalgia caught on with the troops and ensured it massive postwar popularity.

** The [[UsefulNotes/OlympicGames 1980 Summer Olympics]]. To be fair, this one wasn't Silverman's fault, though it did compound the network's woes. Thanks to President UsefulNotes/JimmyCarter's announcement that the UsefulNotes/UnitedStates would be boycotting the 1980 Summer Games in UsefulNotes/{{Moscow}} due to the UsefulNotes/SovietInvasionOfAfghanistan the previous year, NBC was left showing little more than a ClipShow of the events without an American team for viewers to root for. The boycott cost NBC millions in desperately needed advertising revenue, and it, along with the failure of ''Series/{{Supertrain}}'', would nearly undo the United States' oldest television network and ended Silverman's career with the firm.
** Another factor in Silverman's departure from NBC was ''[[Creator/DavidLetterman The David Letterman Show]]''. This was his attempt to usher comedy in a daytime environment dominated by soap operas, game shows, sitcom reruns, and syndicated talk fare hosted by Phil Donahue and Creator/MervGriffin. It didn't go over well as the piss-poor ratings proved that daytime television was not yet ready for that sort of thing. Still, Silverman pressed on with it, cutting its run time from 90 minutes to 60 after a few weeks before it was mercifully canned after ''four months'' on the air. Silverman originally axed three modestly performing game shows to make room: ''Series/ChainReaction'' (which ironically recycled a music cue from the above-mentioned ''Supertrain'' as its theme), ''Series/HighRollers'', and ''Series/TheHollywoodSquares'' (''Series/WheelOfFortune'' narrowly avoided this fate as well; it escaped cancellation twice during this span and ''Series/AnotherWorld'' had its run time cut back to make room for the spin-off soap ''Texas''). All things considered, Silverman openly hated game shows, feeling that they were a waste of time and not as entertaining as scripted programming. Never mind that game shows are generally cheaper to produce than scripted programming and might have helped NBC while Silverman nearly ran the network dry (case in point, ''Squares'' still pulled in successful ratings at the time of its cancellation). Letterman himself would move onto a successful career in late-night television in 1982.

* The infamous "FingerpokeOfDoom" event during a 1999 episode of ''Wrestling/WCWMondayNitro'' is often cited as the beginning of the end for Wrestling/{{WCW}},[[note]]If it wasn't this, then Creator/DavidArquette's ill-fated world title run did it for sure.[[/note]] but the event that truly sent the promotion to the point of no return was when all WCW programming was canceled by order of parent company [[Creator/TedTurner Turner Broadcasting]]'s then-chairman-and-CEO Jamie Kellner, who was seeking to sell the promotion off after Turner's parent company, [[Creator/WarnerBrosDiscovery Time Warner]], merged with AOL and wanted to rid the conglomerate of assets costing them millions. Wrestling/VinceMcMahon's [[Wrestling/{{WWE}} World Wrestling Federation]], WCW's rivals, bought the promotion's remaining assets and programming library for ''$4 million'' (bear in mind that WCW was worth over '''$500 million''' at one time) just so that AOL Time Warner can desperately rid their portfolio of professional wrestling. An extreme example of an entire ''company'' being ScrewedByTheNetwork.[[note]]Well, not exactly. Keep in mind that over the 18 months or so before this WCW had posted a loss somewhere in the neighborhood of ''$120 million''. We'll never know if AOL-Time Warner would have kept WCW around had they been profitable or even kept losses in the single digit millions range (Kellner absolutely hated pro wrestling), but the massive amount of red ink made the decision to put it down for the 3 count once and for all a lot easier.[[/note]]

* Two examples from the territory days: The original Sheik and Nick Gulas. Both promotions died due to fan backlash. In the Sheik's case, he kept himself on top of his own territory for too long, and the fans got sick of the same act after twenty years. Gulas tried to push his son George into the main events, effectively killing the towns he promoted in[[note]]Verne Gange did pretty much the same thing in the AWA with his son Greg, though that was really the least of the AWA's problems at that point.[[/note]]. This led to the split with Jerry Jarrett when Jarrett refused to allow George to work on top in the towns Jerry controlled. Coincidentally, The Sheik was one of the few promoters to back Gulas in the ensuing war between Gulas and Jarrett.

** Robin Cruddace was widely praised for his handling of the 5th edition Imperial Guard book, which saw a once joke-level army being turned into one of the strongest forces on the tabletop until he got his hands on the Tyranids... and promptly got labeled as a treadhead. It's widely considered by the fandom that Cruddace excels at balancing vehicle-based armies, but when given the Tyranids, the only army in the entire game to not use vehicles in any way or form, his only reaction was to make them bland and passable while ensuring that any real threats to vehicles in the codex were eliminated (the sole exception being the Hive Guards) by raising their prices or reducing their effectiveness. Combined with Matt Ward's "accomplishments" above, this resulted in Games Workshop instead not naming any specific writer on any of their codexes since the 6th edition release of the Tyranids due to the internet backlash that ensues. Remember that Games Workshop is a firm that doesn't '''read''' internet feedback, which should give you an idea of how serious this is.

* Creator/WhiteWolf was purchased by Creator/ParadoxInteractive in 2015, but continued to operate on its own, writing and publishing its own books, until 2018. That was when it published the 5th edition ''Camarilla'' sourcebook for ''TabletopGame/VampireTheMasqueradeFifthEdition'', where the RealLife persecution and genocide of Chechnya's LGBTQ+ population [[UnfortunateImplications was used as set-dressing for, and held secondary to, a vampire conspiracy]], and the real-life Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov (referred to as "Sultan Ramzan") was portrayed as the leader of this conspiracy, turning Chechnya into a vampire haven. The book was deemed so offensive, by both LGBTQ+ people and the government of Chechnya, that it [[https://en.crimerussia.com/gromkie-dela/chechens-hate-vampire-the-masquerade-game-for-sultan-ramzan-character/ caused an international incident,]] and only compounded controversies from earlier 5th edition materials that were criticized for what was seen as catering to people with alt-right leanings. It led Paradox to [[https://www.white-wolf.com/newsblog/a-message-from-white-wolf announce]], among other things, that it would integrate White Wolf into itself with new leadership, ending White Wolf as an independent company.

* Creator/RobertBolt began his career with several successes: ''Flowering Cherry'', ''The Tiger and the Horse'' and especially ''Theatre/AManForAllSeasons'' were all major critical and commercial hits. His next play, ''Gentle Jack'', was a notorious flop which convinced Bolt to focus on screenwriting. While he wrote two modestly successful plays afterward (''Theatre/TheThwartingOfBaronBolligrew'' and ''Vivat! Vivat Regina!'') and proved a successful screenwriter with flicks like ''Film/LawrenceOfArabia'', nothing Bolt wrote for the stage matched his earlier plays in popularity or (arguably) quality.

* New media company Gawker Media was brought down in 2016 after getting into [[http://nymag.com/selectall/2016/08/did-i-kill-gawker.html?mid=twitter_nymag a disastrous tangle]] with Wrestling/HulkHogan and Silicon Valley tech guru Peter Thiel. After Gawker gained and posted clips of a sex tape featuring Hogan and refused to take them down, the wrestler sued the company for damages caused by the release of the clips, which included [[UnPerson getting scrubbed from the WWE's records]]. Thiel, who had long despised Gawker for outing him as gay, eagerly supported Hogan's lawsuit, using his vast financial resources to pay for Hogan's legal team. Instead of trying to defend the clips as newsworthy, Gawker's legal defense was quite flippant, believing that their breach of Hogan's privacy was protected under the First Amendment and that they'd win the case with no major issues. Instead, they were successfully sued for more money than they were worth (and even more than Hogan was originally asking for), resulting in the company filing for bankruptcy three weeks later. Gawker's founder, Nick Denton, later filed for bankruptcy himself after a judge ruled that Hogan could start seizing their assets after it was found that Denton lied about their stock value. The company's bankruptcy culminated in its sale to Creator/{{Univision}}, ending its era of independence, and while Univision announced that the other sites under the former Gawker Media umbrella (Deadspin, Gizmodo, Jalopnik, Jezebel, Kotaku, and Lifehacker) would survive, the company's former flagship, Gawker.com itself, would be shut down as a functioning news organization. As of this writing, it exists solely as an archive site, its fate up in the air.

* Wolf Tracer Studios only made two movies-''WesternAnimation/RapsittieStreetKidsBelieveInSanta'' and ''Wolf Tracer's Dinosaur Island''. However, despite coming first, ''Believe in Santa'' pretty much killed any chance of the studio producing another major project. When it was in production, the special was planned to have a sequel and a soundtrack with songs by Music/WhitneyHouston. It also attracted a high-profile voice cast, including Creator/MarkHamill, Creator/NancyCartwright, Creator/JodiBenson, and Creator/PaigeOHara, and got the privilege on airing on Creator/TheWB. However, after receiving dismal ratings and being criticized for its [[SpecialEffectsFailure animation quality]] and story, the sequel was never produced and the soundtrack was never made. The special has never re-aired on television after 2002 and hasn't been released on home video; resulting in the special [[MissingEpisode being impossible to find]] for the next 13 years. The next --and final-- project did not have any major release, with a returning Mark Hamill being the only high profile actor the studio was able to obtain.

* Can an entire company be killed off by a commercial? If so, Just for Feet certainly fits the bill. In 1999, the fast-growing shoe retailer produced an ad for the UsefulNotes/SuperBowl, which depicted hunters driving a Humvee in the African desert... who turned out to be targeting [[UnfortunateImplications a barefoot Kenyan runner]]. The hunters give the runner a cup of drugged water and then put a pair of shoes on his feet while he's unconscious. [[OvershadowedByControversy It made their name more noticed, alright]]; the company was ''massively'' criticized for the ad's racist undertones, and its failure put a giant fork in the road for their future. The next year, the company filed for bankruptcy before subsequently collapsing.

* Despite ''WesternAnimation/TheRealGhostbusters''' success, Creator/{{ABC}} felt the need to hire a child psychologists group called Q5 to help oversee the production of the second ABC season (the syndicated season did not have such requirements). It was during this time when the writers realized the group had [[CriticalResearchFailure absolutely no evidence to back their research]] as their changes for the show were either hypocritical, nonsensical, or seen as downright insulting by crew members. Needless to say, the ratings dropped afterward and Q5 was reportedly never hired again by any studio. See Phelous's review [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW51PDa_puE here]] for more information about the topic.

* Film producer Dino De Laurentiis' career never fully recovered after opening his own studio in the early/mid-1980s, which he then proceeded to run into the ground within less than five years. The films De Laurentiis produced at his studio were not box office hits (Nor generally well-received, with films like ''Film/RawDeal'', ''Film/KingKongLives'', ''Film/MaximumOverdrive'' and ''WesternAnimation/TheTransformersTheMovie'' being utterly ravaged upon release. Even ''Film/BlueVelvet'' and the first Hannibal Lecter movie, ''Film/{{Manhunter}}'', ended up as {{Acclaimed Flop}}s). Ironically, it didn't end up living long enough to see one of its projects, ''Film/{{Bill And Teds Excellent Adventure}}'', become a hit. His second company had a mixed track record, with films like ''Film/ArmyOfDarkness'' doing well enough to make back their budget, but not much after that. Although De Laurentiis kept producing until his death in 2010, he never had any success outside of the Hannibal movies (he apparently regretted selling the film rights to ''Literature/TheSilenceOfTheLambs'')--and adding insult to injury, the last theatrically-released film he produced, the 2007 film adaptation of the book ''Literature/{{Hannibal Rising}}'', was a critical and financial flop [[FranchiseKiller that ended that franchise]] (not helped by the fact that the only reason both the book and the film existed was because [[FranchiseZombie De Laurentiis wanted to make a prequel Hannibal film]]). To show how desperate his studio was for a hit, in 1987 De Laurentiis teamed up with Glad to release the gimmicky comedy ''Million Dollar Mystery''. Since the movie centered on trying to recover $4 million, they had a contest where if one of the audience members could accurately guess the whereabouts of a hidden million dollars based on clues sprinkled in and on specially marked Glad-Lock bags, he or she would get that amount of money![[note]]In case you were wondering, the winner of said contest turned out to be a 14-year-old girl who managed to figure out that the million bucks were in the Statue of Liberty's nostrils![[/note]] The film was a [[{{Pun}} million dollar misery]] at the box-office, thus it not only poured salt on De Laurentiis' studio's wound, but it also put an end to veteran director Richard Fleischer's career. His late wife and the company bearing his name tried to revive the Hannibal Lecter franchise with the [[Series/{{Hannibal}} cult 2013 TV series]], which despite critical acclaim, running for three seasons, a rapid cult fanbase, and catapulting Creator/MadsMikkelsen to stardom, received low ratings and was cancelled, thus ensuring an ignominious end to the De Laurentiis legacy.[[note]]The TV show was not shown on UsefulNotes/{{Utah}}'s Creator/{{NBC}} affiliate KSL-TV beyond the first four episodes; like most of the shows KSL-TV rejected, this one aired on Utah's local Creator/TheCW affiliate KUCW for the rest of ''Hannibal'''s run. See the BannedInChina/UnitedStates subpage of BannedInChina for more information.[[/note]]

* While not a creator, distributor Upper Deck Entertainment got hit hard during the latter part of the ''[[Anime/YuGiOhGX GX]]'' era of the ''TabletopGame/YuGiOh'' TCG due to their own ExecutiveMeddling; a series of unpopular reshuffling of set cards (including the dismantling of two highly anticipated structure decks to release their new cards as difficult-to-get Secret Rares in the main sets), creation of poorly-received TCG-only cards, and ultimately the publishing of fake cards for third-party distribution ultimately forced Creator/{{Konami}} to pull their contract with UDE and wrangle the game away from them through a legal shitstorm. Even more damning, this incident has apparently caused Creator/{{Blizzard| Entertainment}} to pull ''their'' contract with UDE for the distribution of the ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'' TCG, going so far as to make an entirely new branch specifically for distributing it themselves. No word yet on how this will impact UDE's baseball and hockey card sales, but it's likely that that's going to be the only thing that'll save them from bankruptcy. To make things even more troubling, [[https://web.archive.org/web/20110811103527/http://www.nctimes.com/business/article_526a005b-9676-57f8-b5d9-4eb14f2c43d0.html there's a corporate family civil war brewing as a direct result of the aforementioned Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG scandal.]]

* Relatedly, the one-two-three punch of ''Adult Party Cartoon'', ''WesternAnimation/GaryTheRat'', and ''WesternAnimation/{{Stripperella}}'' resulted in Creator/SpikeTV giving up on any semblance of an animation block less than a year into its existence. (''Stripperella'' was brought down mainly due to a lawsuit filed against a stripper who claimed that Creator/StanLee stole the show's idea from her; unlike the other two shows, it was fairly well-received by critics and fans and became enough of a CultClassic to warrant a DVD release.)

* Though John A. Davis and Keith Alcorn's Creator/DNAProductions (who produced ''WesternAnimation/JimmyNeutronBoyGenius'' and [[WesternAnimation/TheAdventuresOfJimmyNeutronBoyGenius its subsequent television series]] as well as ''WesternAnimation/OliveTheOtherReindeer'') did suffer from ''WesternAnimation/TheAntBully'' becoming a box office disappointment, it was actually a lawsuit filed by Creator/SteveOedekerk's [[Creator/OmationAnimationStudio O Entertainment[=/=]Omation Animation Studios]] (who co-produced ''Jimmy Neutron'' with them) that was the direct cause of the company's closure. After finishing the successful animated series ''WesternAnimation/BackAtTheBarnyard'', Omation's next animated series was the ''Jimmy Neutron'' spin-off ''WesternAnimation/PlanetSheen'', which got extremely negative reviews from critics and fans who called it nonsensical, stupid, and very loosely connected to its parent show. As such, it only lasted for one season with a total of 26 episodes. Since its cancellation, Omation and its parent company have remained dormant.

* Wolf Tracer Studios only made two movies-''WesternAnimation/RapsittieStreetKidsBelieveInSanta'' and ''Wolf Tracer's Dinosaur Island''. However, despite coming first, ''Rapsittie Street Kids: Believe In Santa'' pretty much killed any chance of the studio producing another major project. When it was in production, the special was planned to have a sequel and a soundtrack with songs by Music/WhitneyHouston. It also attracted a high-profile voice cast, including Creator/MarkHamill, Creator/NancyCartwright, Creator/JodiBenson, and Creator/PaigeOHara, and got the privilege on airing on Creator/TheWB. However, after receiving dismal ratings and being criticized for its [[SpecialEffectsFailure animation quality]] and story, the sequel was never produced and the soundtrack was never made. The special has never re-aired on television after 2002 and hasn't been released on home video; resulting in the special [[MissingEpisode being impossible to find]] for the next 13 years. The next --and final-- project did not have any major release, with a returning Mark Hamill being the only high profile actor the studio was able to obtain.

** The studio's only other projects since ''Third Dimension's'' failure were two InNameOnly credits for ''WesternAnimation/VoltronForce'' and ''[[WesternAnimation/VoltronLegendaryDefender Legendary Defender]]''; as WEP licensed the franchise to Creator/ClassicMedia in 2010 before they were bought out and re-branded by Creator/DreamworksAnimation prior to the Latter's debut. WEP's website, while [[http://wep.com/ still running]] as of this article's posting, hasn't been updated since 2012 due to [=DreamWorks=] shifting focus towards [[http://www.voltron.com/ the Voltron website]].

* After the infamous [[ComicBook/TheCloneSaga Clone Saga]], it was decided that the ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'' titles were to be canceled and relaunched with new "[[ContinuityReboot number ones]]" alongside a miniseries written and drawn by Creator/JohnByrne that would [[ComicBook/SpiderManChapterOne retell Spider-Man's origin]]. This reboot was notable in that one writer - Howard Mackie - would be looking after both titles. The reboot was heavily promoted and garnered much anticipation among fans and critics, with Mackie claiming that they would "fix" the books and make things "fun" again. But things soured after the reboot where Mackie had Spider-Man face off against lackluster villains, engage in weird plots like facing off against vampires, supernatural villains, an alien-infested senator who was set up as the BigBad of his arc, and - most notably - "killed" ComicBook/MaryJaneWatson. Fan and critical reaction was sour, and soon Mackie's plans were outright scuttled - he was replaced on one of the books by Paul Jenkins and was given just enough time to wrap up his run and bring back Mary Jane before he was pulled from the title and replaced by Creator/JMichaelStraczynski. Mackie's career never recovered from the debacle. In the decade since then, Mackie rarely worked in comics with his last work being a six-issue mini-series that was to serve as a "reinterpretation" of what was to actually have happened in the initial Clone Saga alongside Tom Defalco.

* While Creator/JephLoeb's stories have always had detractors, ''ComicBook/{{Ultimatum}}'' is the series that truly hurt his career, due to all kinds of research failure, in addition to gratuitous violence and tons of death. While he sort of recovered with the decent ''ComicBook/CaptainAmerica: Fallen Son'' and ''Nova'', the fact that he ruined the Ultimate line means he doesn't get much work writing comics anymore. Loeb was in charge of the television and animation division of the Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse, however, where he has had much better success, though with mixed opinions from fans (particularly on the animation side, where his management style goes right into the AnimationAgeGhetto) until that was taken away from him and handed to Creator/MarvelStudios.

* Creator/KenPenders was a prominent writer for the [[ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogArchieComics Archie Sonic series]], and sued Archie for the rights to his characters after retiring from the series, causing a reboot of the comics (and by proxy causing the license to move to [[ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogIDW IDW]] not long after). He was utterly blacklisted in the industry for this stunt, drew the ire of fans who thought what he did was utterly petty, and hasn't written anything major since, [[CondemnedByHistory with his entire work in the series called out]]. He has tried to do his own comic based on the characters he "acquired", but it's considered a laughing stock in the comics and Sonic fandoms alike, and still hasn't been released in any capacity.
* Ardian Syaf was an up-and-coming artist who was chosen as one of three rotating artists for Marvel's ''ComicBook/XMenGold''. However, he was hit with ''massive'' controversy when ''X-Men: Gold'' #1 was released and it was revealed he snuck in various references to political and religious topics, which could actually be translated as Anti-Christian and Anti-Jewish. Both fans and other creators got angry over this, and Syaf himself proclaimed that his career was over. Marvel fired him the next day.

* Mario Gully was a promising comics creator who wrote and drew the superhero title ''ComicBook/{{Ant}}'' for Image Comics, but his career momentum was derailed with Issue #8, which contained nudity and profanity despite not being rated as a mature title (meaning it quickly fell into the hands of kids and outraged their parents). Despite Gully publicly apologizing for his mistake, Image discontinued ''Ant'' just three issues later and cut him loose, while the fallout affected sales for a ''Literature/TreasureIsland'' adaptation he was making for Marvel and ended his relationship with that publisher as well. Gully briefly took ''Ant'' to Big City Comics and worked sporadically on a few Marvel titles, but in the years since has been more known for being convicted of robbery than any new creative output. Gully has since sold the rights for ''Ant'' to [[ComicBook/SavageDragon Erik Larsen]].

* Announced way back in 1964, RCA's [[UsefulNotes/{{CED}} SelectaVision]] video system was intended to be the "next big thing" after color television, but intra-corporate rivalries and mismanagement after David Sarnoff stepped down and was replaced by his son, Robert, in 1965, stalled progress on it for over a decade. It took not one, not two, but ''three'' false starts [[note]]the holographic [=HoloPix=]/[=HoloTape=], the film-based [=PhotoPix=], and a half-hearted attempt at a magnetic system called [=MagTape=], all of which were killed either due to quality issues or because of RCA's losses in their side businesses, particularly their disastrous exit from the computer industry in 1971[[/note]], and had to survive numerous attempts by upper management at killing the project as interest waxed and waned, as well as a compromise deal with RCA's management, dealers and Panasonic in 1976 that saw the [=SelectaVision=] name applied to the first VHS VCR marketed in the US [[note]]the Panasonic-designed RCA VBT-200, which hit shelves in the fall of 1977[[/note]], and a soft reboot in 1977 after it was discovered that JVC had poached the disc system and had started recruiting for ''its'' version (which eventually became UsefulNotes/{{VHD}}). (RCA also deliberately avoided magnetic tape until they were basically forced to, since [[ItWillNeverCatchOn they believed it would never be cheap enough for home use.]]) All of this meant it was delayed until spring of '''''1981''''' -- well into the UsefulNotes/{{VCR}} era, and long after Philips' and MCA's competing UsefulNotes/LaserDisc system was introduced. While the format did have some advantages at the time[[note]][=SelectaVision=] movies were significantly cheaper to buy than movies on videocassette or UsefulNotes/LaserDisc, and since RCA massively overproduced them, [=SelectaVision=] discs are still relatively easy to find in TheNewTwenties, decades after the format was discontinued[[/note]], and a factory-fresh disc with a good needle compared quite favorably with [=LaserDisc=], the format had massive durability issues; video quality on repeated plays was plagued with skipping and dropouts, degrading into an unwatchable mess after only a few hundred plays (RCA rated the discs at around 500 plays). More importantly, it didn't offer the recording capability of VHS/Beta; while the discs were cheap to buy, people were still far more interested at the time in recording things they could see for free on TV and watching them later, and video rental was still several years away -- and unlike VHS or Beta, [=SelectaVision=] was a purchase-only format controlled entirely by RCA, meaning that some content was simply not available. After all of the delays and the massive amount of R&D put into it, RCA needed [=SelectaVision=] to be a hit, but the format failed to take off, resulting in RCA finally killing the project in 1984, and its subsequent acquisition and breakup by its former parent General Electric. WebVideo/TechnologyConnections produced a 5-part series about the format's infamously TroubledProduction that [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnpX8d8zRIA&list=PLv0jwu7G_DFVP0SGNlBiBtFVkV5LZ7SOU starts here,]] also covered by the WebVideo/{{Oddity Archive}} [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1f9J2q_fOk here]] along with WebVideo/{{Techmoan}} [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LrPe0rwXOU here.]]

* Most American manufacturers of analog synthesizers that were around in TheSeventies shut down because they couldn't keep up with the technological advancement of TheEighties. Moog died trying to keep up: The six-voice flagship polysynth Memorymoog came too late (the target audience already had Jupiters, Oberheims etc.), it was quite unreliable at first, even adding MIDI didn't save it, and Moog failed to earn back the money it cost to develop it (also because they were dumb enough to discontinue the Minimoog in 1981). The Memorymoog required a third-party upgrade to become somewhat reliable. Oberheim and Sequential Circuits were pretty much killed off by digital synths that suddenly came from Japan. At least E-mu was in the right place at the right time with the Emulator, the first halfway affordable sampler for those musicians and producers who couldn't afford Fairlights, and introduced their first Proteus [=ROMpler=] the same year as the Korg [=M1=].\\

* Allied Artists Video thought it would be a good idea to release ''The Babe Ruth Story'' early in their run. After all, they were releasing dozens of other titles simultaneously, so WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong They even placed as the film's blurb a rare positive review for the film, claiming it to be "a sports-action winner featuring the king of swat". Imagine the consumers' shock, then, when what they got was a cheap B-movie cash-in on the Sultan of Swat rushed and released three weeks before his death in 1948. One bad apple, it turns out, ''does'' spoil the whole bunch, and this painted a big red target on the back of Allied Artists Video when new owner Creator/{{Lorimar}} decided to put unprofitable assets on the chopping block in 1980.

* While Gloria Tesch's works were never well-received, her family self-published three ''Literature/MaradoniaSaga'' books between 2008 and 2010, and they had planned to make more sequels -- the last published book ended on a {{cliffhanger}}. Then they started focusing on TheFilmOfTheBook, which languished in DevelopmentHell for a while and was finally released in 2016. It was so expensive to make that it got the Tesches evicted from their house, and they likely recouped extremely little of the money -- if ''anything at all'' -- as the film was only ever shown in one theater, which they had ''rented out''. The film features a WillReturnCaption, but it seemingly didn't even get a DVD release, [[StillbornFranchise let alone a sequel]]. Its failure seems to mark the end of the ''Maradonia'' series, which tainted her reputation to the point where she has evidently given up on it[[note]]As of January 2020: There hasn't been a new ''Maradonia'' release since the film, the websites are down, the ebooks are no longer available for purchase, and the only physical copies on Amazon are used.[[/note]] and is trying to distance herself from it. She released her next book, ''The Secret of Moon Lake'', under the name Sofia Nova and described it as her debut novel, effectively disowning ''Maradonia''.

* In 1994, Creator/ArsenioHall booked Louis Farrakhan, from the Nation of Islam, for an interview. The backlash it got, coupled with the already-slipping ratings (due to Creator/{{CBS}} re-entering the late night game with ''Series/TheLateShow with Creator/DavidLetterman''; many CBS affiliates had picked up ''Arsenio'' in lieu of ''Series/ThePatSajakShow'' and CBS' other meager late-night offerings), killed Hall's career momentum. A revival of ''Series/TheArsenioHallShow'' in 2013 was a complete failure that was cancelled after its first season, and the only other high-profile gig Hall managed to secure was as host of a ''Series/StarSearch'' reboot.

** Though Doumanian claims that she was sabotaged because the mostly male higher-ups at NBC did not feel comfortable having a woman run the show, the TV special ''Lost and Found: SNL in the 1980s'' places the blame of the show's horrid sixth season on Doumanian because of her incompetence and inexperience. She passed up a lot of potentially funny cast members[[note]]Creator/JimCarrey, Creator/JohnGoodman, Creator/PaulReubens, and Creator/RobertTownsend being just a few examples -- and Creator/EddieMurphy ''barely'' made it on. If not for writer Neil Levy intervening, he too would have been rejected.[[/note]], tried to make the sketches more dramatic, had no idea how to make the humor edgy (and when she did try, it ended up being dour, flat, and obvious in an intelligence-insulting way), brought on cast members who weren't seasoned in comedy at all[[note]]save for Eddie Murphy and Creator/JoePiscopo, though Creator/DennyDillon did have some experience in sketch comedy, as she was on a Lorne Michaels-produced Saturday morning kids' show in the late 1970s and Creator/GilbertGottfried did do stand-up before he was hired, but this was years before Gottfried would be known for his loud, obnoxious voice and politically incorrect humor[[/note]], and did nothing to improve the show's quality when the reviews tore her season apart and began to praise ABC's ''Series/{{Fridays}}'' as the new sharp, satirical sketch show (until ABC [[ScrewedByTheNetwork screwed the show over]]).
** After Creator/CharlesRocket's "F-word" debacle on the [[Series/{{Dallas}} Charlene Tilton]]-hosted episode, Doumanian was fired (along with most of her cast, except for cast members Creator/EddieMurphy, Creator/JoePiscopo, Creator/DennyDillon, Gail Matthius - though Dillon and Matthius would be fired later - and writer Creator/BrianDoyleMurray). The season lives on as one of the lowest points in the show's peak-and-valley history (seasons 11[[note]]1985-1986[[/note]] and 20[[note]]1994-1995[[/note]] are the only other seasons that have spelled doom for ''SNL''[[note]]Other seasons, like seasons 18, 19, 23, 27, 28, 29, 30, 35, and 39 have been branded as bad, but it's mostly along the lines of being boring and uneven in quality, not "so bad that NBC wants the show canceled"[[/note]], but those seasons have been VindicatedByHistory, as most modern viewers will claim that the ''Weekend Update'' segments, done by Creator/DennisMiller and Creator/NormMacDonald respectively, are pretty funny). It earned an (dis)honorable mention in ''Literature/WhatWereTheyThinkingThe100DumbestEventsInTelevisionHistory'' and was one of the last straws for NBC regarding Silverman, who was fired for nearly killing the network shortly afterward.

** The [[UsefulNotes/OlympicGames 1980 Summer Olympics]]. To be fair, this one wasn't Silverman's fault, though it did compound the network's woes. Thanks to President UsefulNotes/JimmyCarter's announcement that the United States would be boycotting the 1980 Summer Games in Moscow due to the UsefulNotes/SovietInvasionOfAfghanistan the previous year, NBC was left showing little more than a ClipShow of the events without an American team for viewers to root for. The boycott cost NBC millions in desperately needed advertising revenue, and it, along with the failure of ''Series/{{Supertrain}}'', would nearly undo the United States' oldest television network and ended Silverman's career with the firm.

* ''The Jay Leno Show'' was an attempt by NBC to keep Creator/JayLeno, who had recently retired as [[Series/TheTonightShowWithJayLeno the host of]] ''Series/TheTonightShow'', with the company, as well as air a cheaper alternative to the expensive scripted dramas that, at the height of the RealityTV boom in the 2000s, were seen as aging, overpriced relics. Uniquely, it was the first show on a major US TV network to air in UsefulNotes/PrimeTime five nights a week since Creator/{{ABC}} ran marathons of its megahit ''Series/WhoWantsToBeAMillionaire'' in 1999 -- and in hindsight, perhaps they should have remembered how ABC's [[WolverinePublicity oversaturation]] of ''Millionaire'' killed the hype surrounding it, because ''The Jay Leno Show'', taking up a third of NBC's prime time schedule, turned out to be a massive bomb that signaled the nadir of the network's 2000s AudienceAlienatingEra. Even worse, once ''The Jay Leno Show'' started circling the drain, NBC announced they would move it to a more natural timeslot at 11:35... where ''The Tonight Show'' was still airing [[Series/TheTonightShowWithConanOBrien under Leno's replacement]] Creator/ConanOBrien -- who was ''not'' happy that his show was being bumped back after he was hosting for ''less than a year''. (O'Brien had been subject to ''constant'' uncertainty from NBC executives dating back to the premiere of his version of ''Late Night'' in 1992- at one point, he was reportedly on a ''week-to-week'' contract earlier in his run there.) The resulting "Late Night War" between Leno and O'Brien caused the latter to quit NBC and bring his tenure hosting ''The Tonight Show'' to a premature end, though fortunately, he would soon bounce back with [[Series/{{Conan}} a new show]] on Creator/{{TBS}}. Behind the scenes, heads rolled at NBC after the ''Jay Leno Show'' fiasco. CEO Jeff Zucker was fired by Comcast (NBC's new corporate owner) in the aftermath of the Late Night War, and numerous other executives, including Marc Graboff and network chairman Jeff Gaspin, also left under their own volition. Leno returned to ''The Tonight Show'' in the aftermath of O'Brien's departure, but it was a PyrrhicVictory, as audiences who sympathized with O'Brien tuned in to TBS to watch his new show instead. Leno's return to ''The Tonight Show'', by contrast, left both him and NBC with a lot of ill will from viewers, and for the first time in fifteen years, ''The Tonight Show'' slipped to second place in the ratings behind Creator/{{ABC}}'s late-night news program ''Series/{{Nightline}}''. He would be let go in 2014 to be [[Series/TheTonightShowStarringJimmyFallon replaced by]] Creator/JimmyFallon, and would largely retire from television outside of guest appearances on other late-night shows, though he still works as a stand-up comedian and has a pretty popular car channel on [=YouTube=].

* ''Series/{{Eldorado}}'' was a memetically disastrous attempt by Creator/TheBBC to create an American-style "decadent rich people" SoapOpera set in a community of ex-pats in southern Spain. It destroyed the careers of Julia Smith and Tony Holland, who had previously had a huge success with ''Series/{{Eastenders}}'', a much more traditional British-style kitchen-sink soap, to the point that Smith announced her retirement immediately on its cancellation. It also did non-lethal but permanent damage to the career of Creator/VerityLambert.

* Some players believe that ''Pinball/FlipperFootball'' -- an attempt to realistically portray soccer in a pinball game -- was the straw that broke the back of Creator/CapcomPinball. Other observers, though, believe the division was already on such shaky ground with Capcom management that nothing could've saved it.
* Many pinball enthusiasts argue that ex-Williams designer Creator/JohnPopadiuk -- renowned for games such as ''Pinball/TalesOfTheArabianNights'' and ''Pinball/WorldCupSoccer'' -- crashed and burned along with his independent company, Zidware. He made ambitious plans to release several highly-expensive pinball machines for collectors: ''Pinball/MagicGirl'', ''Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland'', and ''Alice in Wonderland''. However, Popadiuk revealed that, despite the millions of pre-order money he received, he had run out of money and couldn't continue the projects any further. Since then, Popadiuk's reputation has snowballed, and many fans (mainly those who are on the notorious Pinside Forums) refer to him as "Jflop" or "Jpoop" and are pursuing legal action against him.

* The infamous "FingerpokeOfDoom" event during a 1999 episode of ''Wrestling/WCWMondayNitro'' is often cited as the beginning of the end for Wrestling/{{WCW}},[[note]]If it wasn't this, then David Arquette's ill-fated world title run did it for sure.[[/note]] but the event that truly sent the promotion to the point of no return was when all WCW programming was canceled by order of parent company [[Creator/TedTurner Turner Broadcasting]]'s then-chairman-and-CEO Jamie Kellner, who was seeking to sell the promotion off after Turner's parent company, Time Warner, merged with AOL and wanted to rid the conglomerate of assets costing them millions. Wrestling/VinceMcMahon's [[Wrestling/{{WWE}} World Wrestling Federation]], WCW's rivals, bought the promotion's remaining assets and programming library for ''$4 million'' (bear in mind that WCW was worth over '''$500 million''' at one time) just so that AOL Time Warner can desperately rid their portfolio of professional wrestling. An extreme example of an entire ''company'' being ScrewedByTheNetwork.[[note]]Well, not exactly. Keep in mind that over the 18 months or so before this WCW had posted a loss somewhere in the neighborhood of ''$120 million''. We'll never know if AOL-Time Warner would have kept WCW around had they been profitable or even kept losses in the single digit millions range (Kellner absolutely hated pro wrestling), but the massive amount of red ink made the decision to put it down for the 3 count once and for all a lot easier.[[/note]]

* If the abrupt cancellation of ''WesternAnimation/RenAndStimpyAdultPartyCartoon'', coupled with him being infamously very hard to work with, wasn't enough to prevent Creator/JohnKricfalusi from being able to sell another show (not that it's stopped him from trying) and thus have him solely work on smaller projects (such as a CouchGag for ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' in which the family is shown in John K.'s bizarre style, as well as artwork for Music/MileyCyrus' 2013-14 ''Bangerz'' tour), then the accusations of him grooming teenage girls in the 1990s that appeared in late March 2018 (followed by harassment claims by several women who had worked on ''APC'') effectively sealed his fate. After ''that'', there was the issue of ''WesternAnimation/CansWithoutLabels'' and its very, very TroubledProduction. It was funded on Kickstarter in mid-2012 with an estimated release of February 2013, but that time quickly passed... and continue to pass with radio silence. It was later announced to be finished in 2017, but backers wouldn't be able to get it until ''May 2019''. As for the film itself: widely panned as mediocre at best with ugly animation, being poorly-paced, and a general amateurish dumpster fire that sunk his career back into the ground, presumably where it'll stay this time due to the lack of lifelines he has remaining. To underscore how far he has fallen from grace, the [[https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/ren-stimpy-revival-set-at-comedy-central-adult-animation-veteran-grant-gish-joins-viacomcbs-1234726073/ 2020 announcement]] of a ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'' reboot made a point of stating that Kricfalusi would have no involvement with it or receive any profits from it.

* Creator/{{Nickelodeon}}'s [[ScrewedByTheNetwork derailment]] of the company's flagship ''WesternAnimation/{{Rugrats}}'' series due to a contractual dispute with Klasky-Csupo, and the box office flop of ''WesternAnimation/RugratsGoWild'', pushed many K-C employees out of work, and from 2006 up until 2012, nothing was heard from the company, as Gabor Csupo wanted to pursue other projects. While the company is up and running again, they're a shell of what they used to be.

* Wolf Tracer Studios only made two movies-''WesternAnimation/RapsittieStreetKidsBelieveInSanta'' and ''Wolf Tracer's Dinosaur Island''. However, despite coming first, ''Rapsittie Street Kids Believe In Santa'' pretty much killed any chance of the studio producing another major project. When it was in production, the special was planned to have a sequel and a soundtrack with songs by Whitney Houston. It also attracted a high-profile voice cast, including Creator/MarkHamill, Nancy Cartwright, Jodi Benson, and Paige O'Hara, and got the privilege on airing on The WB network. However, after receiving dismal ratings and being criticized for its [[SpecialEffectsFailure animation quality]] and story, the sequel was never produced and the soundtrack was never made. The special has never re-aired on television after 2002 and hasn't been released on home video; resulting in the special [[MissingEpisode being impossible to find]] for the next 13 years. The next --and final-- project did not have any major release, with a returning Mark Hamill being the only high profile actor the studio was able to obtain.

** Rich's next studio, Rich Animation Studios, got hit with this ''twice.'' After their first feature film ''WesternAnimation/TheSwanPrincess'' flopped (though it spawned a small DirectToVideo franchise), the animation studio disappeared from cinema for a few years and then tried their hand at feature film again with ''WesternAnimation/TheKingAndI'' animated adaptation in 1999. The critical and commercial failure of that film (which came complete with a "no animated versions of our works" mandate from ''The King And I'' copyright holder Creator/RodgersAndHammerstein Estates) caused the company to be acquired by Crest Animation Studios. The newly-formed [=RichCrest=] Animation Studios then released their animated adaptation of ''WesternAnimation/TheTrumpetOfTheSwan'', which failed to secure a wide release and was also a critical and commercial disappointment. Not until 2010 did the company (as Crest Animation Studios) return to cinemas with ''WesternAnimation/AlphaAndOmega'', which [[CareerResurrection despite negative reviews was a commercial success]] and today is a CultClassic among young animation fans, and also ended up spawning a line of DTV sequels.

* Announced way back in 1964, RCA's [[UsefulNotes/{{CED}} SelectaVision]] video system was intended to be the "next big thing" after color television, but intra-corporate rivalries and mismanagement after David Sarnoff stepped down and was replaced by his son, Robert, in 1965, stalled progress on it for over a decade. It took not one, not two, but ''three'' false starts [[note]]the holographic [=HoloPix=]/[=HoloTape=], the film-based [=PhotoPix=], and a half-hearted attempt at a magnetic system called [=MagTape=], all of which were killed either due to quality issues or because of RCA's losses in their side businesses, particularly their disastrous exit from the computer industry in 1971[[/note]], and had to survive numerous attempts by upper management at killing the project as interest waxed and waned, as well as a compromise deal with RCA's management, dealers and Panasonic in 1976 that saw the [=SelectaVision=] name applied to the first VHS VCR marketed in the US [[note]]the Panasonic-designed RCA VBT-200, which hit shelves in the fall of 1977[[/note]], and a soft reboot in 1977 after it was discovered that JVC had poached the disc system and had started recruiting for ''its'' version (which eventually became UsefulNotes/{{VHD}}). (RCA also deliberately avoided magnetic tape until they were basically forced to, since [[ItWillNeverCatchOn they believed it would never be cheap enough for home use.]]) All of this meant it was delayed until spring of '''''1981''''' -- well into the UsefulNotes/{{VCR}} era, and long after Philips' and MCA's competing UsefulNotes/LaserDisc system was introduced. While the format did have some advantages at the time[[note]][=SelectaVision=] movies were significantly cheaper to buy than movies on videocassette or UsefulNotes/LaserDisc, and since RCA massively overproduced them, [=SelectaVision=] discs are still relatively easy to find in TheNewTwenties, decades after the format was discontinued[[/note]], and a factory-fresh disc with a good needle compared quite favorably with [=LaserDisc=], the format had massive durability issues; video quality on repeated plays was plagued with skipping and dropouts, degrading into an unwatchable mess after only a few hundred plays (RCA rated the discs at around 500 plays). More importantly, it didn't offer the recording capability of VHS/Beta; while the discs were cheap to buy, people were still far more interested at the time in recording things they could see for free on TV and watching them later, and video rental was still several years away -- and unlike VHS or Beta, [=SelectaVision=] was a purchase-only format controlled entirely by RCA, meaning that some content was simply not available. After all of the delays and the massive amount of R&D put into it, RCA needed [=SelectaVision=] to be a hit, but the format failed to take off, resulting in RCA finally killing the project in 1984, and its subsequent acquisition and breakup by its former parent General Electric. WebVideo/TechnologyConnections produced a 5-part series about the format's infamously TroubledProduction that [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PnpX8d8zRIA&list=PLv0jwu7G_DFVP0SGNlBiBtFVkV5LZ7SOU starts here,]] and WebVideo/{{Techmoan}} also covered [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LrPe0rwXOU the format here.]]

* Much like ''Literature/MobyDick'' above, while [[VindicatedByHistory now regarded]] as one of the UsefulNotes/{{great American novel}}s, ''Literature/TheGreatGatsby'' was a flop upon release, selling less than half of what Creator/FScottFitzgerald's previous novels sold and leaving many copies on the shelves. Fitzgerald himself believed he only made $2000 off the book. The problem was believed by Fitzgerald to be a problem of audience: most novel readers at the time of release were women, and The Great Gatsby did not have an admirable female character. The book's failure likely contributed to Fitzgerald's drinking issues and poor finances during the 1930s. His fourth and final novel was a flop, and Fitzgerald died in 1940 believing himself a failure as a writer - just two years before the ''UsefulNotes/YanksWithTanks United States military'' included the book for distribution to soldiers serving overseas, where its 1920s nostalgia caught on with the troops and ensured it massive postwar popularity.

* Canadian animation studio Cinar went out of business in 2004 after a financial scandal and a plagiarism lawsuit (''WesternAnimation/RobinsonSucroe''). The company later resurfaced as Creator/CookieJarEntertainment. In 2013, Cookie Jar was absorbed into Creator/DHXMedia. ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'' survived for a few more years after production moved to Oasis Animation.

* Canadian animation studio Cinar went out of business in 2004 after a financial scandal and a plagiarism lawsuit (''WesternAnimation/RobinsonSucroe''). The company later resurfaced as Creator/CookieJarEntertainment. In 2013, Cookie Jar was absorbed into Creator/DHXMedia, with only ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'' escaping from DHX's clutch.

* The failure of ''WesternAnimation/TitanAE'' brought down Creator/DonBluth's career, shut down [[Creator/TwentiethCenturyFox Fox Animation Studios]], and helped end the [[UsefulNotes/TheDarkAgeOfAnimation post]]-[[UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfAnimation Golden Age]] era known as UsefulNotes/TheRenaissanceAgeOfAnimation where the animation medium re-surged in both popularity and quality thanks to increasing challenges by filmmakers and artists against the AnimationAgeGhetto that had dominated the medium for decades. Thus, not only did it bring down the career of a celebrated animator, but also helped end an era that brought out some of the greatest animated media in history. A handful of other 2D animated film flops from Bluth's rivals at Creator/{{Disney}} and Creator/DreamWorksAnimation piled on to ''Titan A.E.'' and ended cinematic 2D animation until the end of the 2000's with the releases of ''WesternAnimation/ThePrincessAndTheFrog'' and ''WesternAnimation/WinnieThePooh'', and even then, the only [=2D=] films released in theaters after those films have been ''[[WesternAnimation/TheSpongeBobMovieSpongeOutOfWater The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water]]'' in 2015, ''[[WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyTheMovie2017 My Little Pony: The Movie]]'' in 2017, and ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitansGoToTheMovies'' in 2018.

* ''The Jay Leno Show'' was an attempt by NBC to keep Creator/JayLeno, who had recently retired as [[Series/TheTonightShowWithJayLeno the host of]] ''Series/TheTonightShow'', with the company, as well as air a cheaper alternative to the expensive scripted dramas that, at the height of the RealityTV boom in the 2000s, were seen as aging, overpriced relics. Uniquely, it was the first show on a major US TV network to air in UsefulNotes/PrimeTime five nights a week since Creator/{{ABC}} ran marathons of its megahit ''Series/WhoWantsToBeAMillionaire'' in 1999 -- and in hindsight, perhaps they should have remembered how ABC's [[WolverinePublicity oversaturation]] of ''Millionaire'' killed the hype surrounding it, because ''The Jay Leno Show'', taking up a third of NBC's prime time schedule, turned out to be a massive bomb that signaled the nadir of the network's 2000s AudienceAlienatingEra. Even worse, once ''The Jay Leno Show'' started circling the drain, NBC announced they would move it to a more natural timeslot at 11:35... where ''The Tonight Show'' was still airing [[Series/TheTonightShowWithConanOBrien under Leno's replacement]] Creator/ConanOBrien -- who was ''not'' happy that his show was being bumped back after he was hosting for ''less than a year''. (O'Brien had been subject to ''constant'' uncertainty from NBC executives dating back to the premiere of his version of ''Late Night'' in 1992- at one point, he was reportedly on a ''week-to-week'' contract earlier in his run there.) The resulting "Late Night War" between Leno and O'Brien caused the latter to quit NBC and bring his tenure hosting ''The Tonight Show'' to a premature end, though fortunately, he would soon bounce back with [[Series/{{Conan}} a new show]] on Creator/{{TBS}}. Behind the scenes, heads rolled at NBC after the ''Jay Leno Show'' fiasco. CEO Jeff Zucker was fired by Comcast (NBC's new corporate owner) in the aftermath of the Late Night War, and numerous other executives, including Marc Graboff and network chairman Jeff Gaspin, also left under their own volition. Leno returned to ''The Tonight Show'' in the aftermath of O'Brien's departure, but it was a PyrrhicVictory, as audiences who sympathized with O'Brien tuned in to TBS to watch his new show instead. Leno's return to ''The Tonight Show'', by contrast, left both him and NBC with a lot of ill will from viewers, and for the first time in fifteen years, ''The Tonight Show'' slipped to second place in the ratings behind Creator/{{ABC}}'s late-night news program ''Series/{{Nightline}}''. He would be let go in 2014 to be [[Series/TheTonightShowStarringJimmyFallon replaced by]] Creator/JimmyFallon, and would largely retire from television outside of guest appearances on other late-night shows, though he still works as a stand-up comedian and has a pretty popular car channel on You Tube.

* ''The Jay Leno Show'' was an attempt by NBC to keep Creator/JayLeno, who had recently retired as [[Series/TheTonightShowWithJayLeno the host of]] ''Series/TheTonightShow'', with the company, as well as air a cheaper alternative to the expensive scripted dramas that, at the height of the RealityTV boom in the 2000s, were seen as aging, overpriced relics. Uniquely, it was the first show on a major US TV network to air in UsefulNotes/PrimeTime five nights a week since Creator/{{ABC}} ran marathons of its megahit ''Series/WhoWantsToBeAMillionaire'' in 1999 -- and in hindsight, perhaps they should have remembered how ABC's [[WolverinePublicity oversaturation]] of ''Millionaire'' killed the hype surrounding it, because ''The Jay Leno Show'', taking up a third of NBC's prime time schedule, turned out to be a massive bomb that signaled the nadir of the network's 2000s AudienceAlienatingEra. Even worse, once ''The Jay Leno Show'' started circling the drain, NBC announced they would move it to a more natural timeslot at 11:35... where ''The Tonight Show'' was still airing [[Series/TheTonightShowWithConanOBrien under Leno's replacement]] Creator/ConanOBrien -- who was ''not'' happy that his show was being bumped back after he was hosting for ''less than a year''. (O'Brien had been subject to ''constant'' uncertainty from NBC executives dating back to the premiere of his version of ''Late Night'' in 1992- at one point, he was reportedly on a ''week-to-week'' contract earlier in his run there.) The resulting "Late Night War" between Leno and O'Brien caused the latter to quit NBC and bring his tenure hosting ''The Tonight Show'' to a premature end, though fortunately, he would soon bounce back with [[Series/{{Conan}} a new show]] on Creator/{{TBS}}. Behind the scenes, heads rolled at NBC after the ''Jay Leno Show'' fiasco. CEO Jeff Zucker was fired by Comcast (NBC's new corporate owner) in the aftermath of the Late Night War, and numerous other executives, including Marc Graboff and network chairman Jeff Gaspin, also left under their own volition. Leno returned to ''The Tonight Show'' in the aftermath of O'Brien's departure, but it was a PyrrhicVictory, as audiences who sympathized with O'Brien tuned in to TBS to watch his new show instead. Leno's return to ''The Tonight Show'', by contrast, left both him and NBC with a lot of ill will from viewers, and for the first time in fifteen years, ''The Tonight Show'' slipped to second place in the ratings behind Creator/{{ABC}}'s late-night news program ''Series/{{Nightline}}''. He would be let go in 2014 to be [[Series/TheTonightShowStarringJimmyFallon replaced by]] Creator/JimmyFallon, and would largely retire from television outside of guest appearances on other late-night shows, though he still works as a stand-up comedian.

* The infamous "FingerpokeOfDoom" event during a 1999 episode of ''Wrestling/WCWMondayNitro'' is often cited as the beginning of the end for Wrestling/{{WCW}},[[note]]If it wasn't this, then David Arquette's ill-fated world title run did it for sure.[[/note]] but the event that truly sent the promotion to the point of no return was when all WCW programming was canceled by order of parent company [[Creator/TedTurner Turner Broadcasting]]'s then-chairman-and-CEO Jamie Kellner, who was seeking to sell the promotion off after Turner's parent company, Time Warner, merged with AOL and wanted to rid the conglomerate of assets costing them millions. Wrestling/VinceMcMahon's [[Wrestling/{{WWE}} World Wrestling Federation]], WCW's rivals, bought the promotion's remaining assets and programming library for ''$4 million'' (bear in mind that WCW was worth over '''$500 million''' at one time) just so that AOL Time Warner can desperately rid their portfolio of professional wrestling. An extreme example of an entire ''company'' being ScrewedByTheNetwork.

* Two examples from the territory days: The original Sheik and Nick Gulas. Both promotions died due to fan backlash. In the Sheik's case, he kept himself on top of his own territory for too long, and the fans got sick of the same act after twenty years. Gulas tried to push his son George into the main events, effectively killing the towns he promoted in. This led to the split with Jerry Jarrett when Jarrett refused to allow George to work on top in the towns Jerry controlled. Coincidentally, The Sheik was one of the few promoters to back Gulas in the ensuing war between Gulas and Jarrett.

* While Creator/JephLoeb's stories have always had detractors, ''ComicBook/{{Ultimatum}}'' is the series that truly hurt his career, due to all kinds of research failure, in addition to gratuitous violence and tons of death. While he sort of recovered with the decent ''ComicBook/CaptainAmerica: Fallen Son'' and ''Nova'', the fact that he ruined the Ultimate line means he doesn't get much work writing comics anymore. Loeb was in charge of the television and animation division of the Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse, however, where he has had much better success, though with mixed opinions from fans (particularly on the animation side, where his management style goes right into the AnimationAgeGhetto) until that was taken away from him and handed to CreatorMarvelStudios.

** Another factor in Silverman's departure from NBC was ''[[Creator/DavidLetterman The David Letterman Show]]''. This was his attempt to usher comedy in a daytime environment dominated by soap operas, game shows, sitcom reruns, and syndicated talk fare hosted by Phil Donahue and Creator/MervGriffin. It didn't go over well as the piss-poor ratings proved that daytime television was not yet ready for that sort of thing. Still, Silverman pressed on with it, cutting its run time from 90 minutes to 60 after a few weeks before it was mercifully canned after ''four months'' on the air. Silverman originally axed three modestly performing game shows to make room: ''Series/ChainReaction'' (which ironically recycled a music cue from the above-mentioned ''Supertrain'' as its theme), ''Series/HighRollers'', and ''Series/TheHollywoodSquares'' (''Series/WheelOfFortune'' narrowly avoided this fate as well; it escaped cancellation twice during this span and ''Series/AnotherWorld'' had its run time cut back to make room for the spin-off soap ''Texas''). All things considered, Silverman openly hated game shows, feeling that they were a waste of time and not as entertaining as scripted programming. Never mind that game shows are generally cheaper to produce than scripted programming and might have helped NBC while Silverman nearly ran the network dry (case in point, ''Squares'' still pulled in successful ratings at the time of its cancellation). Averted for Letterman himself, who would move onto a successful career in late-night television in 1982.