Given its slumping ratings, it's not all that surprising that ABC has decided to pull Manhattan Love Story from the schedule. With that said, it's disappointing that the charming romantic comedy series appears to be the first official network TV casualty of the fall season.
Deadline reports that, after hitting a new ratings low (0.7 in adults 18-49), Manhattan Love Story has been cancelled. ABC is set to run back-to-back episodes of Selfie on Tuesdays at 8:00 p.m. going forward. While Selfie's numbers aren't exactly soaring, the fellow freshman comedy took in 3.82 million viewers last Tuesday, which is over a million viewers more than Manhattan Love Story's 2.62 million.
Manhattan Love Story stars Analeigh Tipton and Jake McDorman Dana and Peter, two single New Yorkers who start dating. While Jake's kind of slick dude, Dana's new to the city and about as socially awkward as it gets when it comes to men. But they click, or they were trying to.
Reviews for Jeff Lowell's ABC sitcom leaned negative. Our own Jessica Rawden gave it two and a half stars in her review. Declining numbers suggest viewers were falling away from the series with each episode. I'm in the minority in terms of general opinion, apparently. While I wasn't in love with the heavy use of inner monologues in the pilot episode -- we sometimes hear Dana and Peter's inner thoughts -- that seemed to be tapering off, and a charming sort of chemistry between Tipton and McDorman was starting to gel, particularly in this week's episode, which had Dana and Peter preparing to seal the deal. Things didn't go as planned.
As I said, it's not surprising that ABC's calling it quits on the series, between its declining numbers and the poor reviews. But I would've liked to have seen the next episode, titled "Sex Actually," which was on the schedule for November 4 and according to the synopsis, focused on a fight between Peter and Dana about the great holiday-themed romantic comedy, Love Actually. From the sound of it, this dispute may be just as effective as food poisoning at keeping Dana and Peter from taking their relationship to a more physical level. Deadline doesn't say whether or not ABC plans to air the episode at a later date.
With Manhattan Love Story done, that will presumably make Analeigh Tipton and Jake McDorman available to pursue other projects. This isn't either actor's first foray into comedy, or romantic comedy for that matter. Tipton played the young and smitten Jessica in feature rom-com Crazy, Stupid, Love., and she played the best friend (Nora) in the zombie-rom-com(ish) Warm Bodies.
Jake McDorman is likely more familiar to TV viewers, having played Fiona's brief nice-guy love interest Mike in Showtime's Shameless, as well as frat guy Evan Chambers in ABC Family's college-set dramedy Greek. I kind of loved that these two actors were starring opposite one another in the underappreciated ABC series. Hopefully both will find new roles sooner than later. In the meantime, expect more Selfie on Tuesday night.
It's unfortunate that Manhattan Love Story was cancelled. However, if you are looking to add the series to your digital collection, you can check that out here.
Photo Credit: ©ABC
