Because you will have to wait a good while until seeing another one.

Welcome to the slowly degrading world of network television, where they totally disregard the fans who watch their shows in order to squeeze in their new shows.

The December 17th episode will be a mid-season finale, ala Lost from last season. The series wont pickup again until APRIL 14th, a solid four months later.

Blerg. (quoting Tina Fey from 30 Rock)

It’s like no one remembers what happened to Lost’s ratings after they sliced the season into about 155 different chunks.

Taking its place: The Terminator: The Sarah Connnor Chronicles.

FOX is trying to use the powerhouse that is 24 to lure viewers into Sarah Connor, even though most people forgot and have lost interest in anything related to the Terminator.

Seriously, where have all the new ideas gone that we have to regurgitate a series of films and turn it into a TV show?

(by the way, you’ll see my tune change when the Star Wars TV series comes out!)

Anyways, there is plenty of TV to keep me occupied, even if Prison Break is off the air for that long, so it’s not a huge problem. It’s just baffling how networks disregard history lessons (Lost) and their fans by creating reasons for them to lose interest.

They get you pulled into a story and then end it without any kind of resolution. While the show has mainly been focused around escaping from prison and running from the law, there was a love story as a subplot, one that should have been resolved.

According to the Ausiello report, it all came down to contract crap and hurt feelings. Of course.

The writers had actually planned for Sara to die sometime during the season, probably early on, maybe by episode 13 or 14. There was a needed “emotional loss” for Michael Scofield in order to provide motivation for his actions the rest of the season.

Only they had planned to make the death much more involved. Michael was supposed to have a chance to save her, but fails, which would have been something that almost killed him, but likely would turn him towards vengeance. That will still obviously happen, but not in the way that would have been better for the fans.

So why did Sara not appear in any of these episodes? It just seems to have come down to contract stuff and disappointment.

The actor who plays Sara, Sarah Wayne Callies, was up in Canada being pregnant and unable to participate until likely episode 10. But when she found out that she wasn’t going to be part of the entire season, perhaps her disappointment and looming motherhood made her just decide to quit.

They offered to fly up there to film the final scenes, but she declined. According to the writers and spokesman interviews by Ausiello, they tried hard to accommodate her situation, but it just never worked out.

It seems obvious to me that she wanted to continue to be part of this show, and when she found herself dying midway through the season, it ticked her off. And the thing was, it was going to take a NEW contract to just sign her for 13-14 episodes, instead of the entire season, and it wasn’t worth the hassle to her.

Who can really blame her? A baby coming soon, which is probably the most important thing in her life now, and then word reaches her that she needs to put in a lot of work for just a few more episodes and then she’s done forever?

So while none of us knew she had already been written off the show, we all lost the kind of conclusion that would have been more satisfying. After all, Sara was the key component in their initial escape and also helped him in season two, where they actually seemed to fall in love and long to be together.

You can read the entire interview with the Prison Break guys by visiting the Ausiello report, which has more of the story.