The swift ax of TV networks will soon again, and the all-important ratings are a key judgment of whether a television show will survive to see another year. 2017 saw a number of shows like Sense8, The Odd Couple, The Carmichael Show, and Girl Meets World suffer under the very same ax of cancellation, and now we know the first show of 2018 that will not be returning to the air. ABC has opted to cancel The Mayor, despite still having four unaired episodes left on its schedule.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, The Mayor has been cancelled by ABC. The Disney-owned network had previously ordered three more scripts from the comedy back in November 2017, and there are still four unaired episodes that remain. But ABC is pulling The Mayor from its schedule ahead of its January return, and will be replacing it with re-runs of Modern Family for the time being.
It should be said that all hope is not lost for The Mayor. The rookie comedy is reportedly being shopped around by its producers, ABC Studios. Hulu has stacking rights for the series, so its possible that the streaming service has a vested interest in airing more episodes. The Mayor has only aired seven of its 13 episodes.
The Mayor was a comedy that debuted in the fall season of 2017. It followed a young rapper (Brandon Micheal Hall) who runs for mayor of his town as a publicity stunt and ends up getting elected. He then tries to make an honest turn at being a good mayor, and invoke real change in his town. The show was executive produced by Hamilton's Daveed Diggs.
Despite the timely subject matter of the show, The Mayor did not seem to dominate much of the television conversation. Paired with Black-ish on ABC's Tuesday night comedy line-up, The Mayor debuted in the fall to a 1.2 rating among the 18-49 demographic. The overall live viewership continued to slide from there, with one November episode only acquiring 2.45 million total viewers. Delayed viewing (through next day streaming or DVR) was also unimpressive to the network; it probably didn't help matters that the comedy aired at the same time of This Is Us over on NBC.
The Mayor was the only new comedy debut for ABC in the fall 2017 season, but it's not like the network doesn't have plenty of new shows on the way. This year will see the debut of the Roseanne revival, the family comedy Splitting Up, and Zach Braff's Alex, Inc. ABC also has the dramas The Crossing, Deception, Shondaland's For the People, and the Grey's Anatomy spinoff all still left to schedule.
This was unhappy news for fans of The Mayor, but you can drown your sorrows in the hundreds of over shows constantly battling for your attention. Check out our list of midseason premieres to find a new show or lament about what else has been axed with our cancellation guide.
