Why is Snowpiercer Season 4 the last?

It is official. Snowpiercer Season 4 is going to be the last. That’s still the case despite AMC saving the final season.

Of course, fans would love to see the dystopian series saved and given the chance to continue. This is a show with smart writing, an intriguing plot, and plenty of moments for viewers to question what their own actions would be.

At one point, we didn’t even think we’d get to see Snowpiercer Season 4. The season had finished the production process when TNT opted to cancel it. All episodes of previous seasons were removed from Max, and suddenly, the remaining episodes were potentially going to be left unwatched.

AMC saved the show. It brought the three seasons to AMC+, and we’ll get to watch Snowpiercer Season 4 later this month. However, this isn’t a save to keep it going. It’s just to give the show a home for the final season. Why is the series still canceled?

TNT canceled all original programming

After announcing the renewal for the series, TNT then followed up months later with a decision to cancel all original programming. Fans hoped that it meant anything still in limbo would be canceled, but that shows currently in production would still get to air.

This was followed with an announcement that the fourth season would be the last of the series. It was clear that TNT was looking to wrap up everything that was in development.

Then TNT opted not to even air the fourth season. That was the minute fans worried that they’d never see the final 10 episodes.

AMC isn’t talking about saving Snowpiercer

The AMC deal doesn’t seem to be to save the show. It’s to give the series a home for its final episodes.

This could be a cost thing. Dystopian futures aren’t cheap to film, especially those that involve a lot of graphics in the way that Snowpiercer does. It takes a lot of effort to create that icy wasteland, and we know Snowpiercer opts for a love of comic-style graphics to connect back to the graphic novels and original movie that the series is based on.

It’s also possible that the fourth season ends the way that it needs to. It’s not clear where in the writing process the final season order came, so we hope to see that the writers had time to end the show.

Then there’s the fact that it took so long for the series to find a new home. Casting options will have come to an end, and getting back the entire cast for a fifth season would have been difficult. It makes more sense for AMC to just give the show the home it needs to air out its final season.