Tonight marks the final episode of The Defenders for the season. How likely is the CBS freshman series to be back next fall with season two?
The Defenders follows a pair of lawyers operating out of Las Vegas. They’ll do just about anything for their Sin City clients, often taking on cases no one else will touch, and try to keep their sanity while doing it. The TV show stars veterans Jerry O’Connell and Jim Belushi as well as Jurnee Smollett, Tanya Fischer, and Gillian Vigman.
For its premiere, the series dominated its timeslot with a 2.9 in the coveted 18-49 demographic and 12.2 million total viewers. That put the new show in first place in both categories and essentially doubled the performance of ABC’s now-cancelled, The Whole Truth.
Unfortunately, The Defenders’ audience slowly eroded over the course of the season and by January had hit a new low of a 1.5 rating in the demo and 6.81 million viewers. CBS switched the series to Fridays in February and, not surprisingly, the ratings got worse. On Fridays, Defenders has averaged a 1.3 demo rating and that’s worse than what now-cancelled Medium was getting in the same timeslot.
If you look at the season averages, The Defenders is one of CBS’ worst performers. Though the network has not officially cancelled it yet, it is hard to imagine that CBS execs would consider renewing it for a second season.
What do you think? Should The Defenders be cancelled? Why do you think the series hasn’t attracted a bigger audience?
Image courtesy CBS.
We loved the show. Would so like you to continue it
why?…..why do all you execs cancel good shows?….try putting it in a good time slot…belushi is in his element…..i think if you get a top notch writer to twist it you will have a hit…gotta be nuts to take it off…..ever think why the old series was a hit?…..think about it
I love this show. Don’t cancel this. I hate the “reality” shows.
Please do not cancel this show. It is our favorite compared to all the cr_p that is on nowadays!
I love the Defenders. It is one of the best shows on tv,sure beats all of the reality crap that is one these days. I am tired of all the food shows being cancelled and the crappy ones are stilll here. Please don’t take The Defenders off the air.
This the best show on tv in my opinion. The only show that i watch since the cancelled Las Vegas
I love the show! Unfortunately I don’t get to see it on it’s normal day and time but I do “on demand” it. I think the rating should take into account the on demand ratings too!
I love the show, and it is one of the few shows on television that I actually enjoy watching. As someone else stated, everytime I find a show that I enjoy, it gets cancelled. There is so much trash on tv and it’s just nice to have something decent to watch.
I think the show has a lot of chemistry and is very entertaining. Show’s like this, Blue Blood’s and Hawaii Five O are refreshing comparred to a lot of the reality crap there is these days.
I love The Defenders. Jim Belushi & Jerry O’Connell make a great team. It seems as though Jim Belushi’s shows do not get as much advertisement and credit as they should. I hope they do bring back the show next season. CBS’ problem is that they do not advertise their shows as much as they should and then they cancel them out of the blue, without regard to their viewers.
Great show can’t understand why it will be cancelled,should be put in a better time slot.
Please do not cancel this show. My husband and I love this show, and good shows are getting harder and harder to find. The few times that we do find a show that we really enjoy, they end up being canceled. There are many other shows on the air that deserve to be canceled. Please re-think your decision to cancel this show.
Love this show! Don’t cancel it!
This show has what so many others do not – chemistry. If it is failing, blame it on lack of network support. Why they invest money in development and production and then cheap out on promotion is hard to understand. If cancelled, we can only hope someone else will pick it up.
I think it’s a great show. Certainly a lot better than some of the junk out there like The Mentalist. Part of the problem for ratings now days is “On demand”. Do ratings take “On demand” into account. They should. They might find a big difference when they do.
Thanks
Vic
My husband and I both love this show —Please do not cancel it. Take some of those stupid reality shows off the air.