East New York was canceled after just one season. Why did CBS make this disappointing decision? We take a look inside the choice.
There was some devastating news in May 2023. East New York was canceled after just one season. The decision came shortly after CBS made a U-Turn decision on SWAT‘s cancellation.
Of course, fans of the series are angry. They want to know why CBS would opt to cancel the show. Well, it does come down to financial reasons, and it came down to the SWAT U-Turn.
SWAT and East New York were fighting for the same spot
When the cancellation news came in, we learned East New York and SWAT were fighting for the same timeslot. In the end, the noise SWAT fans made after that show’s cancellation made CBS change its mind. The cop drama was renewed for a seventh and final season. With the timeslot gone, East New York was canceled.
However, there were other financial reasons to cancel the show. This wasn’t a CBS Studios series. It was a Warner Bros. TV Studios series. CBS didn’t fully financially benefit from the series, so the linear ratings had to be a little stronger than they were. Despite The Equalizer lead-in, the series just didn’t get the ratings that CBS hoped for.
On top of that was the fact that the full seasons wouldn’t be available to stream on Paramount+ the whole time. The streamer would only have the most recent season, and CBS was trying to work with Warner Bros. TV to get that changed. CBS wanted to keep people on its streaming platform to watch the show instead of the show heading elsewhere. This is a problem with other TV shows, including the FBI shows.
East New York is still currently available to stream on Paramount+ for now.