Ending two seasons of lackluster ratings, CBC announced the cancellation of Tom Stone earlier this month at the CFTPA conference in Ottawa. The Calgary-set drama, about an ex-con working undercover for the Mounties, has been pulled from the schedule and its final three episodes will not air.

‘I couldn’t build an audience,’ says CBC executive director, network programming Slawko Klymkiw. ‘We did our best, but at some point you’ve got to move on.’

The comic drama moved this season from Mondays to Sundays at 8 p.m., but attracted no more than 360,000 viewers despite a strong lead-in from the million-or-so people watching The Magical World of Disney. CBC had hoped Disney fans would click with the show’s family-friendly vibe.

They didn’t – and the show lost out to Law & Order on CTV and The Simpsons on CanWest Global.

‘We’re looking at building an entire drama franchise on Sunday night,’ adds Klymkiw, ‘and we need something stronger. I thought the show was getting better and the scripts were getting better, but in the world of Canadian drama you’ve almost got to hit it out of the park in the first three weeks.’

Producer Jordy Randall of Calgary’s Alberta Filmworks is disappointed but not surprised. ‘We thought the show had good potential and was coming into its own. We’ve done a lot of work to improve the show,’ he says. ‘But at the same time we weren’t shocked.’

CBC promoted season one during its coverage of the Sydney Olympics, but the series gained little name recognition until a large ad campaign got underway for season two. Randall thinks the show needed heavier promotion.

-www.cbc.ca