(Photo by: HBO)
It’s court dismissed for Perry, Della, and Paul. HBO has cancelled its version of Perry Mason so there won’t be a third season. The second season of eight episodes finished airing in April.
A detective drama series from Robert Downey Jr.’s Team Downey, the Perry Mason TV show is a prequel that provides a reimagined origin story for the legendary criminal defense lawyer. The show stars Matthew Rhys, Juliet Rylance, Chris Chalk, Shea Whigham, Eric Lange, Justin Kirk, Diarra Kilpatrick, Katherine Waterston, Hope Davis, Fabrizio Guido, Peter Mendoza, Mark O’Brien, Paul Raci, Jen Tullock, Jon Chaffin, Onahoua Rodriguez, Jee Young Han, Sean Astin, Tommy Dewey, and Wallace Langham. Initially, Perry Mason (Rhys) is a low-rent private investigator who lives check-to-check in the 1930s. His wartime experiences in France haunt him, and he suffers the after-effects of a broken marriage. He eventually becomes an attorney. Della Street (Rylance) is his secretary and former police officer Paul Drake (Chalk) is is his lead detective. In the second season, months after the Dodson case has ended, the scion of a powerful oil family is brutally murdered. When the DA goes to the city’s Hoovervilles to pinpoint the most obvious of suspects, Perry, Della, and Paul find themselves at the center of a case that will uncover far-reaching conspiracies and force them to reckon with what it truly means to be guilty.
The second season of Perry Mason averaged a 0.03 rating in the 18-49 demographic and 362,000 viewers. Compared to season one, that’s down by 69% in the demo and down by 36% in viewership in the live+same day ratings (includes DVR playback through 3:00 AM).
“We are tremendously grateful for the remarkable work of Matthew Rhys and the unrivaled cast and crew of Perry Mason for their reimagining of such a treasured and storied franchise,” HBO said in a statement. “While we won’t be moving forward with another season of the series, we are excited to continue working with the brilliant creatives at Team Downey on future projects.”
What do you think? Have you enjoyed watching the Perry Mason series? Are you disappointed this HBO series wasn’t renewed for a third season or is two years enough?
really disappointed; loved the updated versions of all the characters from the old show….p
Very disappointed. It’s the only show my husband and myself both watched. Season 2 was better than season 1 and I could see it only get better with season 3. Please change your
minds!
I am totally shocked that such a well done show can be cancelled. There is no other show like it on tv. Great critical reviews. Can’t imagine what went wrong.
Very angry. HBO put the show in the second season up against the most popular television show in the world, NCIS. They have almost identical audience types. No wonder the ratings were down. Season 1 was on Sunday night and season 2 was buried on a Monday.
very mad
Not pleased!
Although I did like season one of the show better it was still a great show with fantastic actors.
I’m having a difficult time understanding most shows that HBO “(MAX)” as it’s now strangely called are deciding to keep or cancel.
Seems like a lot of their shows with low IMDB ratings keep getting renewed while those with much higher ratings are being cancelled even after just one season. Yo MAX, Being left hanging on a show’s storyline is starting to get very OLD..
Sorry for another excellent series being canceled. I don’t understand why they keep disgusting series like the new one Idol and cancel Perry Mason
Agree!
Another good scripted show bites the dust. TV Land is quickly becoming a vast wasteland known as Reality TV. What has happened to the intelligence level of the TV viewing public.
They should probably have done a “case of the week” approach. Season 1 already dragged on endlessly and I gave up on season 2 after a single episode.
And they leave us hanging with that last haunting scene of Perry in prison! Even a 4 or 6 episode arc to tie things up would have been appreciated.
Truly sad news. Perry Mason was one of the best shows HBO had done in years – right up there with Barry and Succession as far a quality storytelling goes. No season three of Perry Mason, but how about season one of Della Street?
Good news to hear awful return off 3 years tired of it stupid 1956 version the best nothing compare two shows .