Praise ‘Lucifer’! Or rather, ‘Lucifer’ fans should praise Netflix as the streaming service has rescued another cancelled series– FOX’s ‘Lucifer’ which was cancelled last month. Though neither Netflix nor Warner Bros. Television would officially comment, insiders have divulged that 10 new episodes have been ordered for the show’s fourth season. This is particularly odd since Netflix has never offered episodes of ‘Lucifer’, but presumably the existing three seasons will surface on the streamer soon. (FOX shows are pretty much exclusively available on Hulu.)
While Netflix is known for reviving dormant shows, it has mainly focused on older material like ‘Arrested Development’ and ‘Fuller House’. It hasn’t rescued a show fresh after cancellation since ‘Longmire’ in 2014. That series ran for three seasons on A&E, then for an additional three on Netflix.
Following ‘Lucifer”s cancellation, fans rallied and began lobbying for another network or streaming service to pick it up. At the end of May, star Tom Ellis appeared at a Q&A at MCM London Comic Con, where he teased “Conversations have started happening as a result of the noise that you guys have been making so all I can say is thank you, thank you, thank you.”
In a separate interview with TV Line, he also cautiously stated:
“I don’t want to promise anything for anybody, because there are so many things that have to align for things to happen. But I didn’t have hope, and I do have hope now. And as long as there is hope, I will keep fighting. Because I think that’s what our fans want us to do.
“Since doing Lucifer, I’ve done press in various parts of the world, and I’m fully aware that this show is much more popular than what it had seemed to be on Fox… So I’m not surprised about people being angry. I just wasn’t ready this tsunami of love that came with it.”
Obviously, crafting a show to stream is different from creating one for network broadcast, but if you’ve been paying attention, lately Netflix has shifted from dropping entire seasons in one chunk. Instead, they’ve begun rolling shows out in smaller bundles more frequently to prolong the experience. They have even dabbled with shows that arrive one episode a week, but those have been comedic shows that deal with current events– ‘Chelsea’, ‘The Joel McHale Show’ and the most recent addition ‘The Break with Michelle Wolf’. But CBS All Access (‘Star Trek: Discovery’) and Hulu (‘Runaways’) have begun releasing certain high-profile shows on a more traditional weekly schedule. It’s possible that practice may become more common with streaming media.
So ‘Lucifer’ has been saved fans! It’s up to you to stream it and spread the word to make this a hit for its second home!
