“The seventh show we were not allowed to produce. We were discouraged from finishing the script, although we did, but the company refused or decided not to produce it. It was about authoritarianism. What we missed in our version is how fast it happens. Watching what’s happening in the United States now, the speed at which things are breaking and the government is being taken apart, was not anticipated,” Nye told Variety. In each episode of the show, Nye died a horrible death: “I drown, I get buried, I’m smashed by tektites, I get crushed by an asteroid, I get electrocuted. But the authoritarian show, I was going to be shot by firing squad,” he said.
So far, “what’s happening in the United States now” hasn’t quite reached the stage of firing squads. (Arguably.) But Donald Trump has made no secret that he’d like to punish his enemies. At Charlie Kirk’s memorial, the president claimed that the podcaster “did not hate his opponents, he wanted the best for them. That’s where I disagreed with Charlie. I hate my opponents, and I don’t want the best for them. I’m sorry.” Over the weekend, Trump posted a message to Truth Social urging the Justice Department to target his political nemeses. And his ongoing ire at late night talk show hosts has contributed to the cancellation and temporary suspension of Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel’s respective shows.
Nye himself said he’s working on a new show, but the media landscape is entirely different from when Bill Nye The Science Guy was produced on public television. (There’s barely a public television now, for example.) “You have to be optimistic,” Nye said to Variety. “You can’t go into the game thinking you’re going to lose. We’ve got to buckle down, stick together and produce a product that people want. My colleagues and I are working on that. We’ll be back, but it is a very difficult time.”
