Following the ratings success of The Bible mini-series on History, NBC ordered a sequel — AD: The Bible Continues. Has this mini-series been the answer to the network’s prayers? Will they want a second season?
Produced by Mark Burnett and Roma Downey, AD: The Bible Continues tells the tale of the later chapters of biblical history (following the Crucifixion of Christ). It focuses on the disciples who had to go forward and spread the teachings of Christ to a world dominated by political unrest. The cast includes Juan Pablo Di Pace, Adam Levy, Richard Coyle, Vincent Regan, Greta Scacchi, Babou Ceesay, Chipo Chung, Emmett J. Scanlan, Jodhi May, Joanne Whalley, Ken Bones, Kevin Doyle, Helen Daniels, and Fraser Ayers.
The series debuted on April 5th to a respectable 2.33 rating in the 18-49 demographic with 9.68 million viewers. Unfortunately, the numbers saw severe drops in weeks two (falling 28%) and three (falling 31%) and the rating have kept coming down nearly every week. AD has hit series lows of a 0.7 rating in the demo and little more than four million viewers.
Though this was billed as a mini-series, the producers have said that their writers have been working on scripting season two. Just in case the network wants a second season, they need the additional lead time to have episodes ready for next Easter.
Still, based on the ratings, there doesn’t seem to be much reason for NBC to order a second season of AD. They could make the show an annual event but the audience numbers really aren’t big enough for a network.
Burnett and Downey could however choose to take the project back to cable where The Bible was a big success for them. That also did very well with DVD sales. In today’s ever-shifting marketplace, they could find enough outlets to keep producing Bible-based series for years to come without being on a network.
What do you think? Would you like to see a second season of AD: The Bible Continues on NBC? Would you watch it elsewhere?
7/3 update: NBC has cancelled the series. They won’t air a second season but…
Only reason it was cancelled was that the powers that be doesn’t want anything about Christmas to be taught!!!! It’s a bigger scheme IlluminatI
If it was shown on a different network I’d watch I watched when it was on the history channel followed on nbc and if it’s made somewhere else I watch it there.
I would like to continue watching A.D. We watched every week.
I would love it to continue
I feel as a Christian that the Bible AD Continues should be shown. There is so much more to the disciples journeys and stories that I and many more Christians want to see. I would go to the history channel or even lifetime. Thank you and I hope to see more of Mark and Romas journey to tell these stories for they are so important. Thank you
I would totally love to watch season 2 … Please bring it back!!!Please type here to add a comment. (Note: spam, name-calling, and personal attack comments will be deleted.)
I found this serious excellent. Don’t understand why network would not continue with another season. And yes, i would go elsewhere, other places to watch even though NBC would be first choice, only program in all the channels that was deceit enough to watch.
This is the best show of the Bible I have ever seen!! Please continue!!
please continue this is one of the only tv shows that i take the time to watch, the world need many more shows like this
Please do season 2 my wife and I love the message of the films.
I loved the series and was looking forward to a new season. Put it on cable.
Please keep the series. We need a story like this on TV for everyone to watch. There is a lot of garbage on TV nowadays. All these terrible reality shows that the kids are watching and other disgusting shows. Pure nonsense.
I was anxiously awaiting season 2 of A.D. I am devastated to learn that it has been cancelled, but it is not uncommon for NBC to put shows they don’t especially like in a time slot where it is difficult to succeed. I had to DVR it because I was not home from church service on zsunday evenings in time to watch it.
This series was the ONLY reason that I watched NBC. It was the ONLY decent program they had to offer.
I hope that the next season is on nbc I enjoyed every bit of it and it was a complete refresh feeling.
I think that they should keep the series I loved watching it. Couldn’t wait until the next season so that I could watch it again, it was a eye opener and a refresher for my mind and faith please bring it back