9 Years Ago, Fox Killed Ghosted Before Canceling It For Good

Fox’s comedy slate was in a transitional period in the 2017-2018 season. The network’s flagship animated comedies, The Simpsons and Family Guy, were institutions rather than growth engines, while their two biggest live-action comedies were coming to a conclusion, with New Girl ending after season 7 and Brooklyn Nine-Nine leaving for NBC.

The Mick, a classic Fox-brand comedy with an irreverent lead in an ultimately heartwarming family show, premiered in January 2017. Kaitlin Olson’s sitcom was successful enough that the network rushed a second season, which premiered nine months after the first.

Fox had two other freshman comedies that season, including LA to Vegas, a raunchy, fun, intentionally trashy comedy about the employees and regular passengers on a bargain airline making weekend runs to Vegas. Audiences liked the show more than critics, who found it to be an overly broad, conventional workplace sitcom with a Las Vegas sheen.

Fox’s other freshman comedy was far more original. Ghosted was a supernatural sitcom starring Adam Scott and Craig Robinson as odd-couple paranormal investigators.

Comedies often need time to find their rhythm, as writers learn the characters and performers discover what makes them funniest together. With two comedy stars and the involvement of Paul Lieberstein, the showrunner for The Office seasons 5-8, Ghosted had potential, but Fox couldn’t commit to the fantasy elements, undoing what made the show special before canceling it anyway.

Fox Reworked Ghosted And Ruined What Made It Special

Ghosted was created by Tom Gormican, who executive produced the series alongside stars Craig Robinson and Adam Scott. Fox initially ordered a pilot before picking up the supernatural comedy for a 10-episode first season. The show centered on paranormal skeptic Leroy Wright (Robinson) and true believer Max Jennifer (Scott), who were recruited by the mysterious Bureau Underground to investigate unexplained phenomena.

Fox didn’t give that version much time to find itself. After nine episodes had aired, the network announced in November 2017 that it was ordering six additional episodes. However, the back order came with a significant creative overhaul. The showrunner was replaced, and the additional episodes finessed Ghosted into more of a conventional workplace comedy.

Ghosted had two experienced comedy stars with natural odd-couple chemistry. Its paranormal cases, monsters, conspiracies, and increasingly strange mythology were what distinguished it from the countless other workplace sitcoms on television. Rather than renewing the show for a second season and retooling between seasons, Fox tried to rebuild the show while it was still making its first batch of episodes. The network didn’t even have much opportunity to see whether the experiment worked. Ghosted disappeared from the schedule in January, and the rest of the episodes didn’t begin airing until June.

Fox ultimately canceled Ghosted after one season anyway. Instead of leaning into the unusual genre elements that gave the sitcom a reason to exist, Fox watered them down in an attempt to fix a promising comedy that had barely gotten started.

Ghosted’s Twitter Premiere Proved Fox Was Struggling With Streaming In 2017

Ghosted premiered during an awkward transitional period between broadcast television and the streaming era. Fox demonstrated just how eager they were to reach digital audiences by streaming the entire Ghosted pilot on Twitter more than a week before its October 1 television premiere.

It was the first time Twitter had streamed a full scripted television episode, with stars Adam Scott and Craig Robinson introducing the show and participating in a Q&A with other cast members afterward. The experiment was innovative, but it also reflected an industry that hadn’t quite figured out what streaming meant for broadcast television. Networks were increasingly competing with Netflix original TV shows and other streaming services while still relying on traditional ratings to determine whether shows survived.

Ghosted was available after broadcast through FOX NOW and Hulu, but the situation became even stranger during its first season. December 14, 2017, Disney announced its agreement to acquire most of 21st Century Fox. The deal included Fox’s television studio and its stake in Hulu, but not the Fox broadcast network, which would eventually become part of the new Fox Corporation.

That meant Fox was trying to navigate the streaming transition just as its longtime corporate structure was being dismantled. Ghosted could stream online, but it didn’t have the kind of vertically integrated streaming home that might give a modestly rated genre comedy another path to survival today.

Release Date

2017 – 2017-00-00

Network

FOX

Directors

Jennifer Arnold, Rob Schrab, Dean Holland, Jamie Babbit, Michael Patrick Jann, Wendey Stanzler, Kyle Newacheck

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