Getting invested in a TV show a dangerous game. Few series are ever 100% safe from cancellation before a certain point, and the nagging question behind every cliffhanger is of whether or not the show will have time for resolution. Fortunately for fans of some of NBC’s most notable primetime series, there have been surprisingly early orders for extra episodes. Blindspot, Chicago Fire, Chicago P.D., and Law & Order: SVU have been ordered to twenty-three episodes for their current seasons.
The Hollywood Reporter confirms that these three shows have pulled ahead of other NBC dramas and comedies. The typical episode order for a season of primetime television is only twenty-two episodes, but NBC evidently has a great deal of faith in these four shows.
Blindspot has been a breakout hit of the fall season. Ratings have remained impressive from the very first episode, causing NBC to give the full season order after only a few episodes. The series stars Jaimie Alexander of Thor fame as a tattooed amnesiac with crazy combat skills, and both Blindspot and Alexander have taken audiences by storm. This bonus twenty-third episode is proof enough that the network believes that the early success of the show is not just a fluke.
The other three shows come from the brain of none other than Dick Wolf, of Law & Order franchise fame. While most of the spinoffs of the original Law and Order are off the air at this point, Wolf has proven that he knows how to build a franchise.
The twenty-three episode order for current Law & Order venture SVU is managing to inflate the show in its seventeenth season just a little bit more. Sex crimes procedural SVU has survived some serious cast shakeups that saw the end of the partnership that drove an awful lot of the plots, and NBC doesn’t look like it plans on giving up on it anytime soon.
The other two shows to receive the twenty-three episode order are in a franchise of their own, although there is some crossover with SVU thanks to the grand Venn diagram that is the brain of Dick Wolf.
Chicago Fire follows the stories of the lives and careers of the paramedics and firefighters of the Chicago Fire Department. After its premiere in 2012, the show was considered enough of a success that NBC ordered a spinoff written to coexist within the same universe as SVU and Chicago Fire. Chicago P.D. premiered in 2014 and is now airing its third season.
Blindspot airs on Mondays at 10 p.m. ET, Chicago Fire airs on Tuesdays at 10 p.m. ET, Law & Order: SVU airs on Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ETC, and Chicago P.D. airs on Wednesdays at 10 p.m. ET, all on NBC.
