It's all down to return on the investment. Hallmark Entertainment has to fight it out on television with things like the most recent Batman movie as well as the competition from other programs in the same time slot on other channels. Long forms (as mini-series are referred to in the trade) spread the risk and pump up the return on the broadcaster's investment in the program. Hallmark doesn't put up a dime, it spends the broadcaster's bucks and shares in the profits. The broadcaster, for it's part, pre-sells the program to as many outlets as possible before it "green lights" the project.

I worked on two Hallmark projects shot in Ireland-- "Scarlett" (the sequel to GWTW) and "Kidnapped". Could they have been better? Sure, but the cost of the productions would have escalated by a factor of ten, at least.

There is one other factor to consider, and that's the general "dumbness" of TV audiences. By and large the light bulb in my refrigerator is brighter than the boob in front of the tube. When we refer to programs like "Hamlet" on the old Hallmark Hall of Fame series, we are referring to what is today regarded as "elitist" programming. And that, I'm afraid, is a thing of the past. Television, it seems, not religion, is the opiate of the masses.