Due South Television Series DVDs

History

Due South originally debuted as a made for television movie aired on CTV in Canada and CBS in the United States. After higher than anticipated ratings, Due South was turned into a continuing drama series with its first season launching late in 1994. It was the first Canadian-made series to earn a prime time slot on a major US network.

After the 24-episode first season, CBS cancelled the series. But due to the show's success in Canada and the United Kingdom, the production company raised sufficient money for a second 18-episode season which ran from 1995 - 1996. The show was once again shown on CBS in late 1995 (CBS ordered an additional five episodes but aired only four of them), but again in 1996, CBS refused to renew the series.

After a one-year hiatus, CTV revived the series in 1997 with international investment (from the BBC, Pro Sieben AG in Germany, and the French company TF1), and it ran for two further seasons, until 1999. In the United States, seasons three and four were packaged together as a single third (26 episode) season for syndication. The post-1997 episodes have been labelled a spin-off from the original series by some references, but were in fact titled Season Three and Season Four. Despite critical acclaim and a consistently warm reception by American audiences, Due South never became a huge hit in the United States; however, it was one of the most highly rated regular series ever aired on a Canadian network and remains highly regarded and popular in the United Kingdom, where it was aired on BBC2 between 1996 and 2002 and on ITV3 since 2006.