10 times a show was canceled after getting renewed — and broke our hearts

Britt HayesFri, August 7, 2026 at 5:37 PM UTC

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Alison Brie on ‘Glow’; Kirsten Dunst on ‘On Becoming a God in Central Florida’; Bobby Cannavale on ‘Vinyl’Credit: Erica Parise/Netflix; Patti Perret/Sony/SHOWTIME; HBO

Canceling a TV show is one thing. Shows get canceled all the time! But canceling a show after it was renewed for another season? That’s just rude.

Wonder Man is the latest project to suffer this particular pop culture indignity. The critically acclaimed Marvel series starring Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Ben Kingsley was renewed for a second season in March, two months after the first season debuted. At the end of July, however, Disney+ reversed course, announcing that it was canceling the series without explanation. The decision was baffling — while Disney+ hasn’t released viewership numbers for Wonder Man, it seemed to be well-liked by viewers.

Abdul-Mateen, who earned an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series for his performance in the superhero satire, shared his reaction on Instagram, writing, “I wanted to say thank you to everybody who WATCHED the show, ENJOYED the show, and SHARED that they enjoyed the show in some way or other. The show worked. And that’s my favorite thing about it.” He ended his post with “See you at the EMMYS.”

Wonder Man has now joined an exclusive club of shows that were canceled after getting renewed. Whether they were new titles brimming with potential or beloved fan-favorites with multiple seasons under their belts, these cancellations really stung.

01 of 10

The cast of ‘GLOW’Credit: Erica Parise/Netflix

Netflix’s cancellation of GLOW is arguably the most frustrating in the streamer’s history. Alison Brie and Betty Gilpin lead a fantastic ensemble as a pair of struggling actresses who team up with a director (Marc Maron) and recruit an eclectic group of badass women to form the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling. Inspired by the real-life ’80s wrestling phenomenon, GLOW was a hilarious and incisive series that devoted just as much time to developing its supporting cast as it did its leads.

GLOW was renewed in 2019 for a fourth and final season, the foundation for which was laid at the end of season 3. Over a year later, in October 2020, Netflix announced that it was reversing its decision and canceling the series amid production concerns due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Had the streamer waited a few more months, it’s possible that GLOW could’ve finished filming its final season. Co-creators Liz Flahive and Carly Mensch responded to the cancellation in a joint statement that emphasized the severity of the pandemic.

“Netflix has decided not to finish filming the final season of GLOW,” they said. “We were handed the creative freedom to make a complicated comedy about women and tell their stories. And wrestle. And now that’s gone. There’s a lot of s---ty things happening in the world that are much bigger than this right now. But it still sucks that we don’t get to see these 15 women in a frame together again. We’ll miss our cast of weirdo clowns and our heroic crew. It was the best job.”

02 of 10

I’m Sorry

Andrea Savage on ‘I’m Sorry’Credit: truTV

Andrea Savage’s semi-autobiographical sitcom premiered on TruTV in 2017, but took a little time to find its audience in the streaming era. Savage, who also created and co-wrote the series, played a fictional version of herself — a writer juggling her career and motherhood in Los Angeles — opposite Tom Everett Scott as her husband, Mike. Unsurprisingly, given Savage’s comedic background, the series was hilarious and sharply observed, and featured lots of familiar funny-faces, including Judy Greer, Jason Mantzoukas, and Scott Aukerman.

I’m Sorry ran for two seasons, with TruTV ordering a third in June 2019, a few months after the season 2 finale aired. Fans waited over a year for an update on season 3, only for TruTV to announce that the series was canceled due to COVID-19. The news was particularly frustrating because all 10 episodes of the third season had already been written; filming was underway when production was shutdown by the pandemic.

03 of 10

Inside Job

Brett Hand (Clark Duke) and Reagan Ridley (Lizzy Caplan) on ‘Inside Job’Credit: NETFLIX

Inside Job really delivered on the promise of the creative talent involved. Created by Alex Hirsch and Shion Takeuchi, whose credits include the beloved animated series Gravity Falls and Regular Show, and starring a voice cast that includes Lizzy Caplan, Adam Scott, Christian Slater, and Tisha Campbell — in addition to a whole host of comedy favorites — Inside Job premiered on Netflix in October 2021.

The hilarious and irreverent animated sitcom is set in a world where bonkers conspiracy theories, like flat Earth and secret reptilian overlords, are real, and the world is controlled by six organizations: the Catholic Church, the Illuminati, Atlantians, Reptoids, Juggalos, and a U.S. shadow government called Cognito. Caplan leads the voice cast as Dr. Reagan Ridley, a robotics engineer committed to making the world a better place while dealing with typical workplace frustrations in an environment that’s anything but.

Netflix split the initial 18-episode run into two parts, a then-increasingly common practice seemingly meant to keep subscribers from canceling, with the second batch of episodes releasing in October 2022. In between the releases, in June 2022, the streamer renewed Inside Job for a second season, but the following January, Takeuchi revealed that Netflix had canceled the series, leaving fans frustrated by an unresolved cliffhanger.

04 of 10

A League of Their Own

Chanté Adams and Gbemisola Ikumelo on ‘A League of Their Own’Credit: Nicola Goode/Prime Video

Created by Broad City’s Abbi Jacobson and The Onion vet Will Graham, A League of Their Own premiered on Amazon Prime Video in August 2022, 30 years after Penny Marshall’s beloved film of the same name hit theaters. Set in 1943, the series follows the formation of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, which recruited hundreds of women to keep America’s favorite pastime in the spotlight during World War II.

A League of Their Own expanded on aspects of Marshall’s film that were present but not fully emphasized, namely the participation of queer and Black women in a precarious time to be either. In addition to an ensemble that included Chanté Adams, D’Arcy Carden, Kate Berlant, and Dale Dickey, the series also featured original film star Rosie O’Donnell in a meta role as the owner of an underground gay bar.

Amazon took seven months to renew A League of Their Own, at which point the series was given a four-episode second and final season to wrap up the story. Adding insult to injury, Amazon later canceled the series in August 2023 amid the WGA strike. Jacobson responded to the cancellation in an Instagram post, writing, “What luck I have had to get to tell these stories and play this character I love so much. What a rare thing in life. And so I am sad today.”

With regards to Amazon blaming the cancellation on the WGA strike, Jacobson added, “To blame this cancellation on the strike (which is an essential fight for fair wages, protections, and working conditions, etc…) is bulls--- and cowardly.”

05 of 10

On Becoming a God in Central Florida

Kirsten Dunst on ‘On Becoming a God in Central Florida’Credit: SHOWTIME

Set in the ’90s, On Becoming a God in Central Florida starred Kirsten Dunst as Krystal Stubbs, a working-class mom whose husband (Alexander Skarsgård) dies in a freak alligator accident. Struggling to make ends meet at a waterpark, Krystal is forced to inherit her husband’s commitment to Founders American Merchandise, a patriotic multi-level marketing scheme. The darkly comedic series, which also starred Mel Rodriguez, Gossip frontwoman Beth Ditto, Ted Levine, and Mary Steenburgen, debuted on Showtime in August 2019 and ran for 10 episodes.

At the time, On Becoming a Godin Central Florida felt incredibly relevant and relatable, an aspect that’s only intensified in the years since. Sadly, after renewing the series for a second season in September 2019, Showtime walked it back in October 2020 as part of a wave of cancellations related to COVID-19.

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06 of 10

Perpetual Grace, LTD

Jacki Weaver and Ben Kingsley on ‘Perpetual Grace, LTD’Credit: Lewis Jacobs/Epix

Perpetual Grace, LTD seemed to be facing an uphill battle from the jump — no disrespect to the folks at Epix, but it wasn’t exactly the most popular network/streaming option prior to its rebranding as MGM+. That particular hurdle aside, Perpetual Grace, LTD had a lot going for it when it premiered in June 2019.

The series follows James (Jimmi Simpson), an ex-firefighter who teams up with a shady magician named Paul (Damon Herriman) to steal money from Paul’s father, a manipulative pastor played by Ben Kingsley. Featuring an ensemble populated by killer character actors like Jacki Weaver, Luis Guzmán, Kurtwood Smith, Timothy Spall, and Michael Chernus, Perpetual Grace, LTD is an off-kilter neo-noir that mines deranged humor from its eccentric characters.

Created by Steven Conrad and Bruce Terris, the series is tonally similar to Conrad’s other TV credits: Patriot, which ran for two seasons on Amazon Prime Video, and his recent HBO series DTF St. Louis — great shows that both took time to find an audience and are considered somewhat overlooked. Such was the case for Perpetual Grace, LTD, which wasn’t given much of a fighting chance. Epix renewed the series for a second and final season to let Conrad wrap things up and resolve the season 1 cliffhanger.

In a since-deleted tweet responding to the news, Conrad said, “[U]nder these terms, never going to happen,” referring to Epix’s plan for a shortened second season. After that, the network quietly canceled the series without so much as a follow-up announcement.

07 of 10

People of Earth

Wyatt Cenac on ‘People of Earth’Credit: TBS

People of Earth premiered on TBS in October 2016 and starred The Daily Show’s Wyatt Cenac as a journalist who goes to upstate New York to report on a group of people who believe they were abducted by aliens. It’s not long before he recovers his own memories of being abducted and uncovers a vast extraterrestrial conspiracy.

Like creator David Jenkins’ later series, Our Flag Means Death, the TBS sci-fi sitcom centered on an eclectic group of lovable oddballs, with a cast that included Ana Gasteyer, Oscar Nuñez, and Da’Vine Joy Randolph. Unfortunately, also like the HBO series, People of Earth was canceled after two seasons.

TBS initially renewed the sitcom for a third season ahead of the season 2 finale in September 2017. Nine months later, Jenkins revealed that TBS had reversed its decision and canceled the series. “Just got word last night: TBS has cancelled People of Earth,” he tweeted. “Thank you to everyone who was a fan of the show and enjoyed its gentle, amiable sci-fi weirdness. It was an honor sharing this show with you. Let’s do it again soon. Love you all.” The creator also noted that the third season had already been written, which made the news sting a little more, just like with I’m Sorry.

08 of 10

The Society

Kathryn Newton on ‘The Society’Credit: Seacia Pavao/Netflix

The Society probably could’ve had a great run for a handful of seasons if not for COVID-19, the villain behind the cancellations of many shows on this list. Featuring a buzzy young cast that included Kathryn Newton, Gideon Adlon, and Natasha Liu Bordizzo, the series’ 10-episode first season debuted on Netflix in May 2019. A young-adult riff on Lord of the Flies and The Leftovers, it follows a group of teens who have to figure out how to manage life in their small Connecticut community when all the adults mysteriously vanish.

Netflix renewed The Society for a second season in July 2019, but reversed course and canceled the series in August 2020, citing production delays due to the pandemic — which is even more frustrating to think about a few years later, now that most streaming and premium cable shows take over a year to produce a new season.

09 of 10

Stumptown

Cobie Smulders on ‘Stumptown’Credit: Eric McCandless/ABC

Based on the comic book series of the same name, Stumptown premiered on ABC in September 2019 and starred Cobie Smulders, Jake Johnson, and Michael Ealy. Smulders plays Dex, a Marine veteran juggling more than her share of struggles: She’s coping with PTSD from her time in Afghanistan, where her boyfriend was killed in an explosion, and she’s caring for her brother, Ansel (Cole Sibus), who has Down syndrome. Dex takes up a job as a private investigator to make ends meet and get out of her gambling debt, relying on a detective (Ealy) to give her leads and on her bar-owner best friend (Johnson) for support.

“She’s unlike any character I’ve ever read,” Smulders told Entertainment Weekly ahead of the series premiere. “It’s this messy person who drinks and gambles too much and is not going to show up all the time, but at the same time, she’s inherently good and wants to help others and is quite righteous. It’s exciting to play a fully realized woman, and not just a couple shades of a character.”

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The darkly comic detective drama was renewed for a second season in May 2020 and — would you believe it? — canceled that September amid production concerns driven by the COVID-19 pandemic.

10 of 10

Vinyl

Bobby Cannavale and Olivia Wilde on ‘Vinyl’Credit: HBO

Created by Martin Scorsese, Mick Jagger, veteran journalist Rich Cohen, and The Sopranos writer/producer Terence Winter, Vinyl was an automatic must-see. HBO seemed heavily invested, too: In February 2016, just four days after the premiere of the two-hour pilot — directed by Scorsese himself — the network renewed the series for a second season.

Set in ’70s New York, the series follows a record executive (Bobby Cannavale) trying to salvage his label and reconnect with his passion for music during a major transitional period that gave birth to punk, disco, and hip-hop. Costarring Olivia Wilde, Ray Romano, and Juno Temple, Vinyl was admittedly a little wobbly in those first 10 episodes, which were propped up by compelling performances and a premise filled with potential (and mountains of cocaine).

At the end of the first season, Winter exited his position as showrunner and was replaced by screenwriter and frequent Steven Soderbergh collaborator Scott Z. Burns. But viewers never got a chance to see if or how the series might progress, because HBO canceled it in June 2016.

During an appearance at the Rome Film Festival in 2018, Scorsese called the decision “tragic,” and blamed himself for the cancellation. “We tried for one year with HBO, but we couldn’t get the creative elements together,” Scorsese said, according to The Hollywood Reporter. “It was something that I realized, in order to make it right… I think I would have had to direct every episode and be there for the three to four years.”

on Entertainment Weekly

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