Lucy Hale's latest television drama Life Sentence hasn't been connecting with audiences as much as The CW hoped. The network shifted the freshman drama to Friday nights a month ago, and now they've finally bit the bullet and delivered the news to the cast that the series is getting cancelled alongside another freshman drama, Valor. Hale shared the Life Sentence news with fans via Twitter and composed a heartfelt message to those who watched the show:
Lucy Hale was thankful as well as frank in her statement regarding Life Sentence. Hale was not ready for the journey of cancer survivor Stella Abbott to be over, but stated in her tweet she was taking the experience as a life lesson. Hale's statement seemed to acknowledge the show's low ratings (which only worsened after the switch to Friday nights) were the reason for The CW dropping it. Hale's tweet was liked and replied to by folks like her Life Sentence co-star Elliot Knight and former co-star on Pretty Little Liars Andrea Parker. Hale did not say whether The CW will allow for the rest of Season 1 to air, as the cancellation comes with three episodes left in the series.
While Lucy Hale may be resigned to let Life Sentence go away after Season 1, the show's small fanbase is not. A petition to renew the show for Season 2 has appeared online, and it has amassed 1,400 signatures just one day after Hale's tweet. That's almost certainly not enough to change any of The CW's decision-makers' minds about cancelling the series, although stranger things have happened. The show was largely panned by critics upon release, but the show did have a decent audience approval amongst those who watched it. Perhaps if the show were to get some sort of traction on a streaming platform and get more viewers behind it, the network might be swayed to bring it back. That said, even a solid viewership may not be enough to get The CW to bring back Life Sentence, as evidenced by Deadline reporting the cancellation of another network drama: Valor.
The CW's military drama didn't have phenomenal ratings, but Valor still managed to consistently draw a larger audience than the network's Dynasty reboot, which was recently just given a Season 2 renewal. Valor received a heads up the show might not get the go-head for Season 2 sooner than Life Sentence, as Season 1 had its episode count cut back in November. That news turned out to be arguably better for Valor's lead actors Matt Barr and Christina Ochoa, as both managed to land roles on new shows ahead of the upcoming pilot season and before the show's actual cancellation.
Life Sentence and Valor are both done at The CW, although those interested can currently stream Valor on Netflix. As for Life Sentence, the series is currently slated to air on The CW its finale on Friday, May 25 at 9:00 p.m. ET unless the network pulls it. For a list of shows soon to make their television premiere, visit our summer premiere guide.
