‘Salem’ canceled by WGN America; season 3 to be show’s last

Following this season, it looks as though “Salem” will be turning into ash.

Today, WGN America confirmed that the series, which was in many ways one of its first recent forays into original scripted programming, is going to end following its third season, which will conclude in the new year. This is a show that had and still has a great deal of ambition, but the ratings may not be up to snuff at this point in order to continue to support the show financially. This is the struggle when it comes to being a network trying to support this sort of programming for the first time: There are going to be some significant bumps in the road, given that not everyone really associates your network with this sort of programming growing up. For me, we know that we have memories of the network mostly for repeats of other shows and for Chicago-related sports highlights. Other shows may get to be long-running hits, such as “Outsiders” or “Underground.” It’s just not going to happen here.

In a statement confirming the series’ cancellation, the network’s president Matt Cherniss said the following:

“Salem is a fantastic show that greatly contributed to our successful launch into original programming … We thank [executive producers Brannon Braga and Adam Simon,] our talented cast and our partners at Fox 21, for entrusting us with their unique and remarkable vision for the world of Salem. We also thank the fans for their loyal support of the show.”

The thing that we don’t like about this announcement, other than the fact that it does mark the end of the show, is that it’s coming out at a time in which “Salem” is not going to have much time to give anyone a fitting end unless there was some awareness in the past that this sort of thing could happen.

Now that we’ve said all of this, hopefully we’ll see the other actors on some other shows very soon. We know that for us, we’d be overjoyed in the event we got to see Seth Gabel head over to “Arrow” to reprise his role as The Count — even if that makes no sense given where the character was left off logically.

Do you have a take on the show’s cancellation? Feel free to let us know now in the attached comments!