Dusk was a

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

English language English is a West Germanic language that developed in early medieval England and has since become a English as a lingua franca, global lingua franca. The namesake of the language is the Angles (tribe), Angles, one of the Germanic peoples th ...

specialty channel A specialty channel (also known in the United States as a cable channel or cable network) can be a commercial broadcasting or non-commercial television channel which consists of television programming focused on a single genre, subject or targete ...

. Dusk broadcast programming consisting of

films A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of Visual arts, visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are gen ...

, television dramas, and

reality TV Reality television is a genre of television programming that documents purportedly unscripted real-life situations, often starring ordinary people rather than professional actors. Reality television emerged as a distinct genre in the early 199 ...

, and documentary-style television series from the thriller, suspense and

supernatural Supernatural phenomena or entities are those beyond the Scientific law, laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin 'above, beyond, outside of' + 'nature'. Although the corollary term "nature" has had multiple meanin ...

genres. Dusk went on the air on September 7, 2001, as Scream (stylized as SCREAM), under the ownership of

Corus Entertainment Corus Entertainment Inc. (often simply known as Corus) is a Canadian mass media and television production company. The company was founded in 1987 as Shaw Radio Ltd. as a subsidiary of Shaw Communications and was spun-off from Shaw in 1999. It h ...

and

Alliance Atlantis Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. (commonly known as Alliance Atlantis) was a Canadian media company that operated primarily as a specialty service operator in Canada. Alliance Atlantis also had offices in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Halifax, Los ...

as a Category 2 service. During its early years, Scream broadcast horror, thriller, and suspense films along with some television series. After the acquisition of Alliance Atlantis by

Canwest Canwest Global Communications Corporation, which operated under the corporate name Canwest, was a major Canadian media conglomerate based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, with its head offices at Canwest Place (now called 201 Portage). It held radio, ...

and

Goldman Sachs The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services company. Founded in 1869, Goldman Sachs is headquartered in Lower Manhattan in New York City, with regional headquarters in many internationa ...

, the channel was relaunched as Dusk in 2009, with a pivot from horror to paranormal- and suspense-themed programming to appeal to a wider audience. Two years after Canwest was sold to

Shaw Media Shaw Media, Inc. was the television broadcasting division of Shaw Communications. It owned the Global Television Network, which broadcasts nationally via 13 television stations, as well as 19 specialty channels including Slice (TV channel), Slice ...

, a sister company of Corus, the channel ended operations in March 2012 and was largely replaced on most providers by ABC Spark.

History

In November 2000, Corus, on behalf of a corporation to be incorporated, was approved by the

Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC; ) is a public organization in Canada tasked with the mandate as a regulatory agency tribunal for various electronic communications, covering broadcasting and telecommunic ...

(CRTC) to launch a television channel called ''HorrorVision'', which would be devoted primarily to the horror and thriller genres. The channel was launched as ''Scream'' on September 7, 2001, as a joint venture between Corus Entertainment and

. Programming on Scream focused primarily on horror, thriller, suspense films and television series. On January 18, 2008, a joint venture between

and

Goldman Sachs Capital Partners Goldman Sachs Alternatives is the alternative investment arm of Goldman Sachs, focused on private equity, private credit, secondaries, real estate, infrastructure, and growth equity investments globally. The group, which is based in New York ...

known as CW Media, acquired 49% of Scream through its purchase of Alliance Atlantis' broadcasting assets, which were placed in a trust in August 2007. On September 9, 2009, Scream was re-launched as Dusk, shifting away from horror and "gore" to focus more broadly on paranormal and suspense-driven programming (such as ''

Supernatural Supernatural phenomena or entities are those beyond the Scientific law, laws of nature. The term is derived from Medieval Latin , from Latin 'above, beyond, outside of' + 'nature'. Although the corollary term "nature" has had multiple meanin ...

'' and mainstream film premieres such as '' Along Came a Spider''), to appeal to a broader viewer demographic such as women. On October 27, 2010, ownership changed once again as

Shaw Communications Shaw Communications Inc. was a Telecommunications in Canada, Canadian telecommunication, telecommunications company which provided telephone, Internet, television, and mobile services. The company was founded in 1966 as Capital Cable Televisio ...

gained a 49% stake in Scream as a result of its acquisition of Canwest and Goldman Sachs' interest in CW Media. On February 10, 2012, Dusk revealed through an announcement via its

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

and

Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...

accounts, that it would be ceasing operations on March 23, 2012. A statement later announced on the channel's website stated the channel was being shuttered for strategic reasons to concentrate on "areas of expertise." Corus later indicated more specifically, through CRTC filings, that Dusk was discontinued to proceed with the launch of ABC Spark, such that

Shaw Cable Shaw Communications Inc. was a Telecommunications in Canada, Canadian telecommunication, telecommunications company which provided telephone, Internet, television, and mobile services. The company was founded in 1966 as Capital Cable Televisio ...

and

Shaw Direct Shaw Direct G.P. is a direct broadcast satellite television distributor in Canada and a subsidiary of the telecommunications company Rogers Communications. As of 2010, Shaw Direct had over 900,000 subscribers. It broadcasts on Ku band from two ...

could carry the latter while complying with the CRTC's "3:1 ratio" policy (which limits the proportion of speciality channels carried from companies affiliated with a particular service provider). The last program aired on Dusk was the 1990 film ''

Ghost In folklore, a ghost is the soul or Spirit (supernatural entity), spirit of a dead Human, person or non-human animal that is believed by some people to be able to appear to the living. In ghostlore, descriptions of ghosts vary widely, from a ...

'', which was aired in a 24-hour marathon on March 22. As before the movie was finished, the network either signed off the air by going

dark Darkness is the condition resulting from a lack of illumination, or an absence of visible light. Human vision is unable to distinguish colors in conditions of very low luminance because the hue-sensitive photoreceptor cells on the retina are ...

or changed over to ABC Spark at 6:00 am ET on March 23.

Epilogue

Dusk was Canada's first horror television channel dedicated to the thriller, suspense and horror genres and was one of the most-watched new speciality channels. After Dusk's closure, another attempt to launch a horror-based channel took place five years later when Sylvain Gagné, owner of IO Média inc., launched Frissons TV in September 2017 with its English counterpart, Terror TV to be launched.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dusk (Tv Channel) Former Corus Entertainment networks Movie channels in Canada Television channels and stations established in 2001 Television channels and stations disestablished in 2012 2001 establishments in Canada 2012 disestablishments in Canada Defunct specialty television channels in Canada