It’s the time of year when many people expect plenty of show cancelations on network TV. However, cable cancelations are announced much less regularly, making this week’s news even more of a shocker. TNT has announced that Franklin and Bash is officially ending after four seasons on the network.
The playful and sometimes silly lawyer drama follows Breckin Meyer and Mark Paul-Gosselaar as the titular characters, two lawyers and legal partners who are also good buddies on the show. Season 4 premiered in August of 2014, but unfortunately, the latest batch of episodes was down in the ratings from Season 3. The Season 4 opener, in fact, only pulled in 1.2 million total viewers, whereas more than 2 million caught the Season 3 finale. That’s a fairly significant drop, and it makes sense that TNT would not want to produce a fifth season of the drama.
The drop in viewership might be attributed somewhat to the lineup changes that occurred during Season 4. While both Jared Franklin and Peter Bash were made partners during the fourth season, it was also revealed in the opener that popular characters Carmen Phillips and Pindar Singh had left the firm. Kumail Nanjiani, who played Pindar, actually left to join HBO’s comedy Silicon Valley, so you can catch him in Season 2 of that series during the spring. Unfortunately, some shows manage to maintain their audiences following changes, and some don’t.
Sometimes shows can stick around if they have low total numbers but high 18-49 advertising demographic numbers, but that’s also not the case with Franklin and Bash. Variety is reporting that the show failed to do above a .5 rating in the 18-49 demo. There’s only so much a network can do with ratings like that.
Unfortunately, another good lawyer show has bitten the dust this week. On the bright side, over at USA, you can still catch Suits, and CBS offers new episodes of The Good Wife on Sunday nights. Neither of those shows has Mark Paul-Gosselaar’s beautifully sculpted hair, however.
Luckily, TNT has another new series hitting the lineup, soon. The Librarians is based on a series of movies produced for TNT over the last decade. The new show is obviously not meant to replace Franklin and Bash, but it’s nice to see the lineup growing, regardless. The Librarians will hit the schedule on December 7 at 8 p.m. ET.
