ABC’s new outer-space drama debuted on Sunday night. Will Defying Gravity be allowed to complete its mission or, like so many shows before it, be lost in space?
Defying Gravity follows the adventures of eight international astronauts as they fly a spaceship named Antares. On a top-secret mission, their lives are being recorded and telecast on Earth as part of a documentary. Despite the fact that the crewmembers wear libido-suppressing devices, there are plenty of romantic entanglements.
The show features the talents of Andrew Airlie, Christina Cox, Paula Garces, Laura Harris, Peter Howitt, Florentine Lahme, Karen LeBlanc, Ron Livingston, Ty Olsson, Zahf Paroo, Eyal Podell, Maxim Roy, Dylan Taylor, and Malik Yoba.
The sci-fi drama’s storyline is strangely similar to the failed pilot for Virtuality that aired a month ago. Defying Gravity is a Canadian series that’s co-produced by CTV, Omni Film Productions Limited, and Fox Television Studios. Filming has been completed on all 13 episodes of season one and Defying Gravity is currently airing in Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, and the United States.
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The show has been pitched as “Grey’s Anatomy in space” but unfortunately it hasn’t attracted the same level of viewership for ABC. Defying Gravity debuted on Sunday with a pair of episodes and was outperformed by competition of predominately repeats. The first hour attracted merely 3.83 million viewers and only a 1.1/3 rating/share in the 18-49 demographic. The second hour dropped to 3.56 million while the demo numbers stayed the same.
Defying Gravity moves to its regular timeslot of 10pm this Sunday night. Based on these numbers and the expected drop in ratings for the show’s second night, it’s very doubtful that ABC will continue to air the series for very long.
One has to wonder if ABC really expected the series to last very long anyway. As of now, the network has only scheduled some of the 13 episodes. By the time that Brothers & Sisters returns for its fourth season, at most only nine episodes of Defying Gravity will have aired.
Whether ABC intends to move the show to a new night (normally Saturday but there’s college football coming) or pull it altogether remains to be seen. Either way, with numbers like these, it’s inconceivable that the show will be coming back for another year on ABC.
What do you think? Should the show have a future or should ABC just pull the plug and cancel it already?
Image courtesy ABC.
It’s one of the better shows out there right now. I mean, how hard is it to actually find something interesting and CREATIVE on TV right now anyway? KEEP IT!!!!!!!!!!! I will be so disappointed if they cancel it. It’s the only show I watch right now due to complete lack of good TV. I’m surprised no one else has mentioned that it’s a nice replacement for Battlestar Galactica, over which my heart is still breaking.
I just started watching this show this weekend and now I’m all caught up. Wow! I love the store, flashbacks, and the music to set the mood. I love how they keep answering questions and keep giving you new ones. I hope this show stays. I can’t take another medic, cop, or lawyer show. ABC PLEASE KEEP DEFYING GRAVITY!
KEEP IT! It’s the most innovative, interesting series to come along in a very long time. Well written and acted. What would the replace it with?– Another same ole same ole? They need to give it time to gather an audience.
I am hoping that not only will they air all 13 episodes, but go on to make series 2. I was on holiday in Canada when the first episode aired, but now I’m back in Australia, I have no option but to resort to ‘devious’ internet means to get my DG fix each week. I would love to see it appear on FoxTel’s SciFi channel here sometime. I think the critics of the flashbacks are missing the point somewhat – the story isn’t ALL about Antares and the current mission, but about the events that have lead to the complex… Read more »
ps — I have no problem with the flashbacks on Defying Gravity: they work. They don’t always work, depending on how writers and directors use them, but they do here. Oh, and anybody who can’t handle flashbacks is really looking for mindless entertainment, not this, and should probably go play video games instead (bet they can’t handle subtitles either, silly creatures, but adults routinely can and do). DG is a program that appeals to grownups, and I’m glad of that.
Keep it!! But while ABC is at it, it needs to either change the timeslot or put other programming in place before it on Sunday nights that would attract a similar demographic (which, trust me, would include a lot of women; more of us like sci-fi after seeing the briiliantly reimagined Battlestar Galactica). Right now, ABC has put together an impossibly stupid lineup for Sunday nights with Defying Gravity at the end of it. Why is it that the ABC programming nerds think the audience for Regis Philbin and an idiotic reality show with a name like Shark Tank would… Read more »
I love the show. keep it going
Brilliant show. Filled with drama, suspensiona and great acting. I’m a thorough fan!! I can only hope that this show continues on and gets the attention it deserves. Myself and reems of friends are enjoying each episode. Good work!
this show would have worked if it was not for the bloody flash backs. it did not work on lost and definatly does not work on this show. i end up skiping most of the flash back as all they are doing is slowing the show down to much and its gettig very boring. if they killed the flash backs and only did them when it was somethhing pertanant to the outcome of the plot not just doing it for the purposes of charcter development ( wich could have been done without flash backs ) i would then probobly be… Read more »
I’ll join the crew voting to continue.
I hope ABC keeps airing it. I hope they allow it a solid ending if they chose to let go. I hope a specialized network like the SyFy channel picks it up. Network TV has seldom embraced science fiction. Its been on cable that science fiction has done well. Yet to its credit ABC did let Life on Mars come to a respectable conclusion. There is hope that Defying Gravity will defy gravity and continue to air.
I don’t want this show to be shut off..
I love this show, i think its very good
I think the series has a strong storyline but has been a little slow on the off.
Too much talking and not enough action. Unless something really exciting is going to happen, don’t think it’ll make it. Sorry guys 🙁
This show is one of the best new ones I’ve seen in a while. I never thought I’d be into science fiction, but this one is so plausible that I’m loving it. And on top of having a great concept, the casting is absolutely amazing!
Cancel it. The first episode was okay, the second episode was not as good, but the third episode tanked. There is no hook with this series despite the fact that it takes place in outerspace. The characters feel like students that the writers knew in highschool and there is no plot whatsoever. One thing that makes this difficult to follow is the constant flashbacks that most of the time have nothing to do with the main plot of the episode and hinders what little pace the story has. Any episode plot seems to either be some sort of systems failure… Read more »