'My Lady Jane is the latest victim of the broken streaming model'
My Lady Jane has been cancelled by Prime Video after one season, and it joins a long line of shows to be cut short before they've been given time to flourish.
Fans immediately began lamenting the decision, and it shows an ongoing, and frankly worrying, trend in the entertainment industry. The period drama was cancelled because it didn't find a broad enough audience in the seven weeks since it was binge dropped on the streaming platform with little fanfare — certainly not the kind dedicated to Prime Video's shows like The Boys or Clarkson's Farm, at least.
Read more: 'My Lady Jane is the queer fantasy costume drama we've been waiting for'
The show reimagines the life of the Nine Days Queen Lady Jane Grey (Emily Bader) and her romance with Lord Guildford Dudley (Edward Bluemel) if history had been different, with added fantastical elements for good measure. It's funny, it's quirky, and it featured a fantastic ensemble cast that included Dominic Cooper, Rob Brydon and Anna Chancellor.
My Lady Jane's unceremonious cancellation despite positive reviews and fan support shows how streaming has completely changed the game, it has led to the belief that if something isn't an instant hit then it doesn't deserve the chance to continue.
TV used to work that way, shows were allowed to grow an audience over time. A prime example is the success of Schitt's Creek, the Canadian sitcom created by Dan and Eugene Levy, the series was a slow-burn and only became a big hit in its later seasons at which point it won multiple Emmys.
Schitt's Creek began as a cult hit and became the beloved series it is now thanks to word-of-mouth fan support, but mostly —and this is what streamers like Prime Video and Netflix can learn— because it was given the chance to develop and grow beyond its initial season. In fact, it's thanks to Netflix making the series available on its platform from season 3 that its audience grew exponentially, but it wouldn't have even got that far had Canada's CBC Television not given the show a chance first.
Breaking Bad is another show that only became a big hit after several seasons, and it is widely seen as one of the best shows ever made now. But more and more nowadays it simply isn't the case that a show will be given a chance, and with dozens of platforms demanding viewers' attention it's hard for some shows to break through as quickly as others.
It seems TV executives believe that if it's not the next Stranger Things, Bridgerton or The Boys it doesn't deserve a renewal.
My Lady Jane is just one of the latest victims of this new trend. It happened to The Great, it happened to Shadow and Bone, it even happened to the Willow sequel —which was promptly deleted from Disney+ shortly after its cancellation.
All of these shows' cancellations have prompted backlash, with fans rallying to try and save them by getting another platform to pick it up. When news of My Lady Jane's cancellation went public viewers were, unsurprisingly, unhappy by the decision (a fan campaign has also been launched).
Many shared their sadness over a creative, fresh show like My Lady Jane being dropped so soon after its release, while others remarked how they'd only just started watching and it was a shame to not allow more time for the show to find its audience.
But there were also others who remarked that the cancellation was just another reason they stopped dedicating their time to new shows, because it's become too hard to invest in a new show when it has become so commonplace for them to be cancelled after one season. This is the other side of the coin to the new streaming model — viewers are less inclined to watch something new because there's a high probability it will get cancelled.
It's a vicious cycle, really. A new show is made, and regardless of how creative it is or how many people enjoy it if it isn't a huge hit it is cancelled, meaning fewer people want to spent their time watching new TV shows, resulting in more shows being made only to then be cancelled, and so on.
This isn't a sustainable way to make television, not only does it squander creative potential it also could lead to streamers churning out the same old thing because they know it'll make money. Audiences deserve better than that, and My Lady Jane certainly deserved more than just one season — if only it had been given the opportunity.
My Lady Jane is out now on Prime Video.
