FOX has canceled Scream Queens after two seasons. The show, which suffered from low ratings, couldn't escape cancelation forever with the Ryan Murphy name attached. Though supposedly the first season did well on non-linear platforms, looks like it wasn't good enough this time around. Even with a new setting this season, the show was unable to improve its ratings, with its finale only garnering a 0.5 in the A18-49 demo.
What do you think of this news? Let us know in the comments below!
Jimmy Kimmel Live is one of three late night shows that I watch. So I was incredibly excited to see him host my favorite awards shows, the Emmys. He was great. So great that he will be hosting the Oscars in 2017. I really enjoyed all of his bits, and I wish he was on screen longer.
14- The Gilmore Girls Revival is Total "Bulls***"
The Gilmore Girls revival was a slight letdown. But, as usual, Kelly Bishop knocked it out of the freaking park. Like seriously, someone give this woman an Emmy. Now. She was the best part of the show by far, and Emily Gilmore was the only character I found myself liking more after this revival. That "Bulls***" scene was killer.
13- FX Becomes Better
While most devoted their attention to FX's other new fall comedy (Atlanta), I watched Better Things. And I really, really enjoyed it. While it took a little while to find itself, by the end, I was really loving it. I can't wait until it returns for season 2. 12- Netflix Gets Stranger
Stranger Things was the breakout hit of the summer, and by the time I watched it in October, seemingly everyone had already seen it. It was really fun, and Winona Ryder was amazing in it. Netflix has had a lot of new shows this year, but Stranger Things stands out among them all. 11- John Oliver Talks about Donald Trump
Before this clip became popular, I'd never seen John Oliver's show. I watched it online, and I found it to be really funny. While I'm still not a regular viewer of Last Week Tonight, I appreciate his work, and I'll still check out clips on YouTube.
10- Denise Hemphill Loves Quantico
Denise is my favorite character on Scream Queens. And when she "died", I was incredibly angry with the show. And then she came back to the show. Which was incredible, because she got to talk about Quantico some more, and that was my favorite part of the entire second season of Scream Queens.
9- Seth Meyers Takes a Closer Look
"A Closer Look" is always a segment I look forward to on Late Night with Seth Meyers. It's my favorite part of the whole show, and it's improved a lot since its introduction. This year, with Trump/Clinton in full swing, it was at the top of its game, and I can't wait for more. 8- Lady Dynamite
Netflix is known for some pretty high-quality shows (well, also Fuller House, but still), and Lady Dynamite is among my favorite. It may not have received the same attention as Stranger Things, but it was by far my favorite of Netflix's new shows (and they had a lot) this year. I don't like it quite as much as Grace and Frankie, but I still adore it. Speaking of, when the heck is it coming back?
7- NBC Goes to the Good Place
NBC's newest comedy series The Good Place is among my favorite shows of the year. It's brilliantly crafted and acted, and I find it to be hysterical. Kristen Bell, Ted Danson, and the rest of the cast are just really great in this show, and I can't wait to finally see its first (hopefully of many) season wrap up in January 2017.
6- Sarah, Sarah, Sarah!
The People Vs. OJ Simpson was one of the most acclaimed shows of the year, and I adored it. Most of my love for it was because of Sarah Paulson, who knocked it out of the park. "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia" was one of my favorite episodes of television this year (and maybe ever).
5- Sam Bee Goes Full Frontal
Before Full Frontal, I had never seen Samantha Bee in any television program, as I never watched the Daily Show. However, I decided to tune in, and I'm so glad I did. Full Frontal has quickly become one of my favorite shows, and I look forward to hearing her take on the crazy things that Donald Trump does happen each week. 4- David S. Pumpkins
David S. Pumpkins became an internet sensation after his debut on the Tom Hanks episode of SNL. The sketch left me thinking two things: "That was brilliant!" and "That was so weird!". David Pumpkins is arguably the best SNL sketch of Season 42 so far, and will probably become a classic Halloween sketch.
3- Rachel Bloom Wins the Golden Globe
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend was the best new show of the fall 2015 season, and Rachel Bloom received critical acclaim for her role in the series. She appeared to be an underdog for the Golden Globe win, but she defeated several other worthy nominees, winning the CW's second consecutive Golden Globe. It was a deserved win that made me so incredibly happy.
2- Live from New York, It's Ariana Grande
This is SNL's second appearance on this list, and it deserves it, after an excellent 2016. Ariana Grande was, without a doubt, my favorite host of the 2010s, and one of my favorite ever. This was such a great episode, from start to finish, and Grande was the reason it all worked. She truly shined in the Tidal and Sound of Music sketches, while taking a backseat in the excellent Mermaids sketch. No doubt, she'll be back on the SNL stage.
1- Hairspray Live!
When Hairspray Live was announced, I had my doubts, but those were put to rest after watching it. Hairspray Live tops my list for the best TV moment of 2016. I've seen it about 10 times now, and I still love it. Everything about this was just amazing, and everyone killed it. Especially Ariana Grande.
In a terrible, terrible year, these things made me a little more happy, and for that reason, they're the best of the worst.
As you may know, I'm slated to cover FOX Renew/Cancel Watch this season again. My only missed predictions last season were Bones and Sleepy Hollow, though I understand completely why they were renewed (click here for more information). But now it's time to look ahead to the fall season, and while I'm not going to make any concrete predictions right now, I can still preview what that first table may just look like. So without further ado, here's my first analysis. I've broken it up into several categories, though when the table comes it'll be back to "Certain to be Renewed", "Likely to be Renewed", etc.
The Obvious Renewals
The Simpsons
Family Guy
Gotham
Empire
The Simpsons is going into its 28th season, still pulls in relatively good ratings, and it's a very strong player in syndication and merchandise. They have way bigger things to worry about than The Simpsons. The same goes for Family Guy; it's not as big as it once was, even in relative ratings, but FOX loves Seth MacFarlane and Family Guy is still one of their highest-rated and reliable shows. On the syndication front, Gotham will only need one more season to get there after this season, though if it struggles this season Warner Brothers may need to reduce the licensing fee (or you know, The CW is always there!). But it's not like Gotham's ratings are terrible, so it should be fine either way. And finally, there's Empire, one of the biggest success story on all of television in recent seasons. Need I say more?
The Promising Newbies
Son of Zorn
Lethal Weapon
Pitch
FOX is really into doing business with Lord Miller Productions these days, with Son of Zorn and midseason entry Making History joining The Last Man On Earth on their schedule. Considering they're premiering it after The OT and it gets probably the best time slot they could offer it and it's very on brand for FOX Sunday, it has everything going for it right now. I can't say whether or not it'll be renewed since we haven't seen ratings, but I can tell you that it looks promising. Similarly, Pitch is getting great attention online and will most likely receive a ton of advertising during the MLB playoffs. Combine that with the fact that its presumed W18-34 skew is something that is highly coveted and we've found ourselves a promising show that may be hindered by its time slot. The time slot that would be most ideal for it would be Wednesdays before Empire, which is instead going to Lethal Weapon, which has time slot hit written all over it.
The Promising Veterans
The Last Man On Earth
New Girl
Scream Queens
Lucifer
Although The Last Man On Earth is far from a ratings powerhouse, it's from Lord Miller Productions and brings in a lot of awards love, more so than Empire or really any other show they air. I can't speak for Season 2 but Season 1 also had a lot of streaming presence due to its young skew and serialized nature. While it's not grandaddied into a renewal like The Simpsons, there are shows that are probably in a little bit more trouble (more on that later). Similarly, there's New Girl, which before last season began I thought for sure would be its last, but it proved to be stable and at least better than their other Tuesday entries. This could very well be its last season, but it wouldn't be because the ratings are terrible, it would because it's getting old. But I think they can get more out of it as they want. Then there's Scream Queens, which apparently sees great C3 and streaming bounces. There's more to it for this show than just the live ratings, and I think it'll be around as long as those jumps are too. And finally, promising midseason entry Lucifer did well last season behind The X-Files and respectable behind Gotham, enough to earn it a renewal and a fall spot. While it's bound to decline a lot this season due to its average being front loaded, its respectable ratings landed it in this category.
The Not Promising Newbie
The Exorcist
The Exorcist and Sleepy Hollow will time share on Fridays this season, and it's already very hard to say which will be the lesser of the worse. There's no hype for it at all, and while that doesn't necessarily mean it won't do well, the other three newbies have much more going for them already than this one does.
The Not Promising Veteran
Rosewood
In recent years, FOX hasn't been known to cancel a show after its second season; though a few of times they've gone three limited seasons. Rosewood may be an exception, and its situation reminds me a lot like Touch's situation a few years back. Touch had poor retention from its lead-in in its first season and the half-hours were ugly. It went from a 3.3 to a 1.3 in the same time slot over the course of 11 episodes. When they downgraded its time slot to Fridays the following season, it held up surprisingly well, down only 67% year-to-year. OK, so maybe that's not to great. And considering it finished with a string of 0.6s in the 2012-13 season, it pretty obviously go canceled. Like Touch, Rosewood is going from a show that did OK in its plum time slot that had half-hours to show it only did well because of the time slot, and now is seeing a downgrade to having to go against The Big Bang Theory, football, and Grey's Anatomy. It doesn't see any of those bounces that FOX brags about a lot of their shows getting in DVR or streaming, and doesn't hit those young demographics when it airs by itself, so I wouldn't be surprised to see Rosewood gone. Maybe it'll hold well, but that 0.8 finale says it won't.
The Respectable
Brooklyn Nine-Nine
Brooklyn Nine-Nine is a workplace comedy distributed by NBC Universal that snuck its way onto FOX. It's like if ABC randomly decided that instead of picking up American Housewife CBS was going to buy it from them. Brooklyn Nine-Nine had great exposure on Sunday, but lost all that momentum and then some when it had to anchor Tuesday nights unsuccessfully. It was surrounded by duds, but this fourth season was pretty much ensured one way or another for syndication purposes anyway. It doesn't do terrible, but FOX has a few new comedies this season, and if enough of them hit then Brooklyn Nine-Nine could be in trouble, especially since they don't own it. This season, it only gets harder, as it'll be facing The Voice, NCIS, and The Middle. Maybe Hulu would be interested in a fifth season if need be, but for now, while I can't group it with New Girl in the promising category, it's also no Rosewood.
Per Deadline, FOX has issued a second season renewal to Scream Queens. Ryan Murphy's horror-comedy averaged a 1.1 rating (A18-49) over the course of its 13-episode run. As of now, Jamie Lee Curtis is expected to return in the second season's new hospital setting.
The Simpsons and Bob's Burgers have both been renewed. Empire, Family Guy, Gotham, Brooklyn 9-9, and Rosewood are also all getting renewed, no questions asked. That's 7 shows that FOX either has or definitely will renew by May, and possibly some at Friday's upcoming TCA. In addition, The Last Man On Earth's decent ratings compared to the rest of the comedies prompted me to move it up to a likely renewal. I've also moved Bordertown from a likely cancellation to a likely renewal after this week's 1.5 A18-49 rating, which was a promising 83% retention out of Family Guy.
FOX
Meanwhile, look at the shows that I'm watching. Cooper Barrett premiered to a 1.2, and rose to a 2.1 for its second airing, but only because of football inflation. In addition, Scream Queens premiered to a mediocre 1.7, and fell to a very poor 0.8 A18-49 rating by the ninth airing. I do think that W18-34 may be its main demographic, but even then, it's pulling in poor ratings.
All four shows could easily be cancelled looking at these live ratings alone. However, if all four are cancelled and the rest of my predictions indeed turn out to be correct, then FOX would have renewed 8 shows and cancelled 9. Can they really do that?
Nope. Not with American Idol leaving the schedule too. And with the fact that I also trust that FOX is starting to look more into the C7 ratings as well as the C3, FOX may be the toughest of the Big 4 networks to predict. However, I do have a hunch that FOX will begin to tout itself as the "young-skewing network".
Is FOX The Young-Skewing Network?
Compared to shows on other networks, most of FOX's shows have unbelievably good (often close to 1:1) ratios amongst the hard-to-reach-live M/W18-34 and A18-49 demographics. In the case of Empire, the W18-34 numbers have actually been higher than the A18-49 numbers, and such can be said for most airings of shows like Family Guy and Bob's Burgers. In fact, here are all the FOX shows that perform well in the M/W18-34 demographics relative to their A18-49 numbers:
M18-34
Bob's Burgers
The Simpsons
Family Guy
Cooper Barrett's Guide to Surviving Life
Bordertown
The Last Man On Earth
W18-34
Scream Queens
New Girl
Grandfathered
Rosewood
Empire
Now, that's a LOT of shows that do relatively well in the M/W18-34 demographics! All of the above shows either tie, beat, or fall just a tenth under their A18-49 ratings in their M18-34 or W18-34 ratings, depending on the show.
Unfortunately, very few of those shows do better than low 1s in the ratings. However, they are definitely hitting a demographic that other networks are having trouble doing, and I am beginning to think that if FOX had to choose between two shows with identical A18-49 ratings, they would renew the show that does better in M/W18-34. This is one of the reasons why a show like Bones may lose out to a show like Grandfathered, if you told me that one had to be renewed and the other canceled. However, seeing how Grandfathered is unable to grow more with its newly-obtained New Girl lead-in, combined with the fact that 20th Century Fox does not distribute the show, really diminishes its prospects as well.
Notably missing from the list are: Gotham, Brooklyn 9-9, The Grinder, Bones, and Sleepy Hollow. Brooklyn 9-9 is still a certain renewal for syndication purposes, and Gotham because despite not having as high a young-skewing ratio week-in and week-out, it is still one of FOX's highest-rated shows.
At this point, it is mostly a matter of which of the young-skewing shows perform best all-around. This includes, but is not limited to, C3 ratings, C7 ratings, streaming data, and VOD ratings.
What do you think of my predictions? Leave your thoughts and predictions in the comments below!
