Cancellation Watch Breaking News: The CW Renews The Flash, Supernatural, Black Lightning, and All of Its Fall Genre Entries

The CW made us wait a little longer than usual this year, but the result is the same as the network has announced renewals for all of its Fall genre shows–The Flash, Arrow, Legends of Tomorrow, Supergirl, Supernatural, and Riverdale–along with mid-season entry Black Lightning. The last few years, that network seemed very eager to make its renewal announcements, usually getting them out in January or February. This year took a little longer, but none of the renewals came as a surprise. I have had almost all of those shows at Renewal Likely status for a while and would have been surprised with anything less than the blanket renewal announcement. The Arrow-verse shows (including tangential entry Black Lightning) have remained among the network’s best performers, and Supernatural is holding strong in its thirteenth year. The linear viewing for Riverdale is lower than most of the networks other genre entries, but it regularly places in the Weekly Nielsen Social Net Top 10 and also performs very well in encore viewings on Netflix. I have theorized that a shake-up could be coming to the Arrow-verse in the near future due to audience attrition, but that would not impact those shows until next season at the earliest as confirmed by the renewals.

Left off the renewal list is mid-season entry iZombie, but that does not come as a surprise and does not necessarily mean that it is in trouble. That one has only been back on the air since late February, and it is performing at expected levels. The network will wait until May to make the final decision on that show–along with The 100 which returns later this month–when it makes its schedule announcement for the 2018-19 season. If past trends hold, then iZombie will get one more season to bring it to the 70-plus episode threshold the network usually targets for its lower-performing shows that have been around past two seasons. A Call to Action for that show from its fans could definitely help push the network toward a renewal nod, though.

The Upfronts for the broadcast networks occur in mid-May and that is when the schedules will be set for next season. Expect more renewal and cancellation announcements as we approach that time, especially during the week before the Upfronts (NBC kicks things off on Monday morning May 14th). Be sure to stay tuned to this site and the Cancelled Sci Fi Twitter Site for updates and breaking news over the coming weeks.