Netflix cancels The Break with Michelle Wolf, The Joel McHale Show

Netflix at the moment is still where they want to go when it comes to comedy talk shows. Today, the streaming service officially canceled both The Break with Michelle Wolf and also The Joel McHale Show with Joel McHale.

So what happened to cause the two series to end? Per a report from Deadline, there just wasn’t enough viewership for either one of these shows to continue.

When it comes to The Break, it’s hard to really sit here and say that there is anything that the show could or should have done differently in terms of promotion — it arrived on the heels of Wolf’s appearance at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner and it also received a good bit of press promotion over the next couple of months. While McHale’s show didn’t have the same sort of promotion, he did have a large following due to his roles on both Community as well as The Soup. 

Ultimately, we don’t really fault the performers so much for these shows not working as much as we do the format. It’s just hard to really create a great talk show for a service like Netflix, which we view more as an escape for many people out there. It’s really a chance to get away from the world more so than it is a chance for anyone to hear jokes based on current events. The talk-show format works better on traditional TV because there’s a tradition that comes with watching it, getting a refresher on the day, and seeing things in a close-to-live format.

We do think that both of these hosts will have some chances elsewhere, but our feeling is just that Netflix (or any other streaming provider) is going to be the place for it.

What do you think about these two shows being canceled? Share right now in the attached comments! Also, let us know if you think that there could be a Netflix talk show that would succeed. (We’re not really counting Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee, since it’s almost more of a comedy-documentary show.)

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