This week marked the freshman season finale for FX's Mayans M.C., the pretty stellar sequel series for the exhaust-pumping and face-bruising drama Sons of Anarchy. The flagship series has been off the air since 2014, but has remained as popular as ever due to it being a mainstay on Netflix for quite a few years now. It sounds like that reign might be over soon, though, as Netflix is reportedly getting rid of Sons of Anarchy in December.
More specifically, it's looking like December 1 will be the day that Sons of Anarchy rides off into the non-Netflix sunset. (Note that this news is apparently specific to the company's U.S. audiences, and not international ones.) The proof here, as it were, is Netflix itself. Below, you can check out the show's Details page, which pinpoints the removal date.
No direct and lengthy reasons were given, obviously, but we can draw some conclusions as to why Netflix would be parting ways with Sons of Anarchy, despite the biker drama being one of the streaming giant's most popular licensed series. The biggest factor has to be the lack of a current deal between Netflix and Fox, with the most recent partnership dissolving back in August 2017.
Since that time, Netflix has steadily been purging various Fox and FX shows from its library, which is why you can't find animated hits like Bob's Burgers or Archer anymore, nor live-action winners like It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia or Empire. (As well, nothing that has hit the network in the past two fall seasons.) In fact, Sons of Anarchy is one of few Fox and FX projects that still remains, and it's unclear how long others like American Horror Story and Gotham will stick around.
Netflix has gotten more comfortable with cancelling its own produced series recently -- check out our full rundown -- so it's assumedly easier for execs to say farewell to other studios' content. But even though it's losing all kinds of shows to other companies diving into standalone streaming services, Sons of Anarchy's popularity with customers made it seem worthy of whatever it took to keep it around Netflix for as long as possible.
Sons of Anarchy's influence is still felt in many places -- even in Canada, strangely enough -- and it will likely continue to keep bringing in new viewers. Even if it doesn't happen to be streaming on Netflix when that happens.
Of course, Netflix isn't the only streaming giant on the block anymore. Hulu stepped up its licensed TV game in recent years as Netflix made its own a second or third priority, and that's where you can find a lot of Fox and FX's original series. The Gifted, Lethal Weapon, Hell's Kitchen, Legion, and more.
Yes, Hulu is also where Sons of Anarchy fans can currently find Jax Teller and his violently botched attempts to bring peace and non-violence to Charming, California. All seven seasons of Kurt Sutter's brutal epic are available for streaming in full.
Since Sons of Anarchy is set to exit Netflix's streaming library soon, that's probably pretty convincing evidence that Mayans M.C. won't ever end up at the company. The Latinx spinoff isn't yet available on Hulu, however, so perhaps conversations are happening behind the scenes.
Thankfully, Netflix still has a lot of good shows ripe for binging, with plenty of others on the way, so be sure to check those out after saying goodbye to S.O.A. on Netflix.
