Pete Kaczmarek and Nick Morelli consistently get themselves and their clients out of some pretty big jams. Unfortunately, there’s one that they can’t escape. Their TV series, The Defenders, has been cancelled by CBS after one season.
The Defenders follows a pair of Las Vegas lawyers who will do just about anything for their Sin City clients. They often take on cases no one else will touch and try to keep their sanity while doing it. The TV show stars Jerry O’Connell, Jim Belushi, Jurnee Smollett, Tanya Fischer, and Gillian Vigman.
The TV series got off to a decent start with a 2.9 rating in the all-important 18-49 demographic and 12.17 million viewers. In weeks two and three, those numbers started to tumble however with the demo falling 14% and then another 12% in weeks two and three. Airing on Wednesday nights, the ratings kept falling and hit a low of a 1.5 in the demo and 6.8 million.
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Because The Defenders was already registering poor numbers, CBS decided to try it on Friday nights, an evening with fewer viewers. If most fans followed and the show could sustain the Wednesday numbers, CBS would likely have been satisfied.
That didn’t happen and the remaining six installments fell even lower, hitting a 1.1 in the demo. That was a much worse performance than the timeslot’s previous occupant, already-cancelled Medium.
While The Defenders was supposedly still in contention for a second season until recently, most knew it was a long shot at best.
Word is that CBS has now cancelled The Defenders. All 18 produced episodes have aired. The series finale ran on March 11th.
What do you think? Are you sorry that there won’t be a second season for The Defenders?
Wondering where the rest of your shows stand? Check our CBS cancel/renew page.
Image courtesy CBS.
CBS finally hade a show worth watching.alot better than the crap they have had on.BRING BACK BELUSHI ..THE BEST SITCOM COMIC EVER!!!!!
One of the few good new shows last season. Please bring it back but keep it on one night so it can be found!
I’m sorry to hear they’ve cancelled this program. I always enjoyed it. Sometimes I think these stations have truly lost their collective minds.
Like many of you I can’t believe they are going to take this show off the air. This is a good quality show where we all, as a family, could watch and enjoy. Great cast, great story, funny. Just great. What a shame!
This was one of my favorite shows. It was in my top 3. Please bring it back. I don’t feel it was given a real chance. The move to Friday night wasn’t advertized very well and sports sometimes interfered. Please show the reruns and please renew this next season.
It seems that any time we get show on t.v. that is actually worth watching, it gets cancelled. Wonder if the problem was that there was not enough sex or violence involved. It seems that a program with lots of sex and violence seems to outlive anything else. The Defenders was so good, funny and entertaining. All I can say is, whoever decided to cancel the show sucks.
I loved The Defenders! It always had a good story, with a moral lesson to be learned from. I guess these days in Hollywood, it all has to be about sex, immorality & making fun of anyone who tries to do right! It was a good family show, which are becoming fewer & fewer! I loved the cast, they were funny & entertaining. There are not many shows on the networks that I care to watch, & I am very disapointed I lost this one. I really wish the network would reconsider!! Did I say I Loved It?
iI can’t believe you went and done it again took off good shows and leaving crap on tv like how i met your mother and other sitcoms like that.
I don’t watch TV at all, but I made an exception with “The Defenders.” Belushi and O’Connell had great on-screen chemistry and I really enjoyed the plot turns and the dialogue. The show actually kept me interested and made me wanting more.
This is such a disappointment, but I blame CBS because I could never get the time correct so I could watch the show.
Folks, time to write CBS and demand this show get a second chance.
The defenders was a very decent show, unlike so much on television. The characters were fun, smart and human and some very good and touching stories and fun ones like the episodes with Dan Akroyd. It was a show like Boston Legal vane which enjoyed great success and what’s not to enjoy about the Vegas back drop, which many people recognize. Should have been given more of a chance and perhaps better promoted.
You’ve got to be joking??? There is finally a sho9w on that was worth watching, and you cancelled it. Don us all a big favor and please bring it back. It was humanized and it made myou want to see more. Mzaybe a differeent time slot would help?
The Defenders was the best new TV series I’ve seen in quite awhile. The cast was perfect, and the writing was witty and intelligent. The characters were humanized and we could relate. Something is seriously OFF with the rating system. Obviously this show didn’t get the promotion and time slot it deserved. This series is a survivor!! Give it a second chance!!
I’m very upset the tv series The Defenders will no longer go to a second season. The cast was brillant and the stories were entertaining and well written. I think it did not get the time slot it deserved for it’s first season. I was floored when I found out it was cancelled. It was such a refreshing series and I was sure it would stay on several seasons. It had all the charm and character to make it.
Really liked this show. It was funny without being a sitcom. Please reconsider.
It’s just too bad they’re gone. Truly enjoyed this show. We need shows that have laughing and joking mixed in with the drama . You at CBS, try to get it back on, okay.