The first to get the axe and join our big list of canceled TV shows of 2022 is Gentefied, a half-hour comedy drama produced by America Ferrera (Ugly Betty), as NBC News (opens in new tab) reported on Jan. 14. Deleted from Netflix’s production lineup after its second season came out last November, Gentefied had a 96% score on Rotten Tomatoes (opens in new tab), but didn’t find enough of an audience to get a spot in Netflix’s (now public) Top 10 (opens in new tab) ratings. The show focused on a trio of Mexican American cousins in Boyle Heights, Los Angeles, whose story involved borders, familial separation and gentrification. Ferrara appeared in the show, which starred Joaquín Cosío, Carlos Santos and JJ Soria. Gentefied co-showrunner Linda Yvette Chávez tweeted a lengthy (opens in new tab) message to the fans of the series following its cancelation, showing her appreciation for how they received messages from the show’s “millions” of fans who “saw themselves and their families on screen for the first time. Chávez wrote about how the show’s existence, giving visibility to families and persons you don’t always see on TV was an act of change “made up of small acts of revolutionary love.” She also seemingly made a veiled reference to how Netflix values ratings above all else, stating that “we have to rethink the way in which we value” this kind of “revolutionary art.” “Metrics and algorithms,” she writes, “will never measure the true impact of what we did here.”
Netflix’s other canceled show is much less revolutionary
Then, on Monday (Jan. 17), Netflix pulled the plug on Paris Hilton’s latest TV project: Cooking with Paris. The series only had one season, which debuted on August 4, 2021. Deadline (opens in new tab) broke the news. This six-episode series, which saw Hilton share recipes with famous friends including Kim Kardashian West, Saweetie and Demi Lovato, is as much the polar opposite of Gentefied as you might expect. A dud with critics, Cooking with Paris underwhelmed the critics, as seen by its 25% Rotten Tomatoes score (opens in new tab). If you were one of the apparently many who didn’t watch the series, its premise was simple: marrying Hilton’s opulent lifestyle with a cooking show — so it’s not just about what she wore while she cooked, but the diamond-encrusted cooking equipment she used. It barely made a scratch in the Netflix Top 10, either.
Analysis: Netflix is doing what Netflix does
Netflix has long been known for its ruthlessness when it comes to not renewing TV shows for additional seasons. And while Gentefied is the kind of series many would like to see return, we could see a world where Netflix price hikes became a lot more regular if it continued to renew more and more shows. Of course, anyone willing to think about canceling Netflix now is going to have to deal with possibly missing the Ozark season 4 release date (one of the 7 new shows to watch this weekend). These two shows have recently been joined on the lengthy Netflix cancellation list by Another Life, the science fiction series is officially done and dusted after two seasons. The show starred Katee Sackhoff and followed a group of astronauts exploring the origins of an alien artefact. While we like Netflix (it is one of our best streaming service picks), nobody likes to see shows get canceled. And with many new upcoming shows on the horizon — such as The Cuphead Show — and plenty of one-season shows in the grave (so long, Cowboy Bebop), Netflix subscribers know one thing above all else: don’t get attached. In other TV news, the Outlander season 6 trailer is here to thrill with the tease of incoming war. Love MMA? We’ve got all the UFC 270 live stream info for Ngannou vs Gane this weekend! If you want new films to watch? Hulu’s getting two big movies very soon.
