Netflix Canceling Queer-Led “First Kill” After Only One Season Is Disappointing!

In very unfortunate news, Netflix has decided to cancel the queer-led supernatural series First Kill after only one season, even though it was able to post some good viewing numbers and gave rise to an engaged fandom.

Debuting on June 10, 2022, First Kill was able to quickly attract a passionate online fandom who just couldn’t get enough of the teenage romance happening between the series leads Calliope and Juliette as they tried to keep their relationship going while dealing with a bunch of monsters and family issues.

However, after only hitting the streaming service barely two months ago, Netflix has decided to stake the show, which understandably caused a lot of upset in the fandom. According to Variety, even though First Kill was able to deliver some good viewing numbers, they weren’t enough to justify the cost of a second season.

Hmmm. If you say so, Netflix.

I highly doubt Netflix didn’t have enough money to at least greenlight a second season to deliver a proper series farewell for the fandom.

Certain fans have been tweeting about how Heartstopper, a recent gay-led teen series, getting renewed for two more seasons feels quite shady considering it had an already established fanbase (due to the graphic novels) and still did fewer numbers during the debut week than First Kill (which is based on a short story by Victoria Schwab). In a sense, one can argue that shows with W/W queer representation do tend to get canceled more often than content with M/M queer representation.  

Some fans are also bringing up the point that shows, especially queer ones, with PoC lead characters have to work harder to prove themselves to remain uncanceled compared to their non-PoC lead contemporaries.

Personally, even though I did a reaction video to the trailer for the first season of First Kill, I didn’t find it to be a well-written teen show. Having said that, I did enjoy seeing the creativity of the fandom.

Also, Netflix continues to lose subscribers. One would assume that TPTB might consider course-correcting by keeping fan-favorite shows away from the chopping block just a bit longer and think about canceling them AFTER they fail to increase numbers during the second or third season.

I really want to see the statistical data showing the trend between axing fan-favorite shows and subscriber loss.

With Amazon Prime Video recently canceling The Wilds after only two seasons, First Kill not coming back for a sophomore offering is yet another blow for fans of W/W-inclusive queer content. 

What do you think of Netflix canceling First Kill?

Let us know.

Author: Farid-ul-Haq

Farid has a Double Masters in Psychology and Biotechnology as well as an M.Phil in Molecular Genetics. He is the author of numerous books including Missing in Somerville, and The Game Master of Somerville. He gives us insight into comics, books, TV shows, anime/manga, video games, and movies.

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