The story of Amy Jellicoe, TV’s most tragic heroine, has come to an end. HBO announced Tuesday afternoon that it would not be renewing Mike White’s contemplative comedy Enlightened for a third season. ”It was a very difficult decision,” the network said in a statement. Buzzfeed first broke the news.
Viewership for Enlightened has been low from the start, and White told Vulture in an interview last month that he was far from confident he’d be granted another season. “Girls has so much buzz and not great numbers. We have less buzz and less numbers. It actually hurts us,” he said, explaining. “In a way, Girls is the show that they go, ‘Well, even if the ratings aren’t great … ’ If Girls was doing huge numbers and we were still doing bad numbers, then we could be more the pro bono case. But Girls is like the pro bono case.” Enlightened’s second season finale, which aired March 3, drew 220,000 viewers in its first Sunday at 9:30 p.m. airing; by comparison, Sunday’s Girls finale drew 632,000 viewers at 9. While the cancellation was not wholly unexpected, White did have plans to continue Amy’s journey.
