The Enemy Within season 2 renewal debate: Will we get more at NBC?
From the very beginning, it felt clear that we were dealing with a show with some serious potential. After all, there were echoes of The Blacklist in the show’s very premise, though the further along we get, the more that the differences start to make themselves clear. This is a show with far greater ambiguity, at least when it comes to whether or not Shepherd is good. It’s got a full-fledged narrative built around her towing the moral line and trying to decide if she’s a woman who tried to sacrifice everything for her daughter or someone cold-hearted and calculated who is really just out for themselves and no one else. There are compelling arguments to be made for both, but it’s also SO hard to know just which way this show is going to land.
The case for more new episodes – Story-wise, we have a feeling the writers have already established a little more of a long-term plan here, and the one that they’ve got so far is intelligent, intense, and addictive.
The ratings are also such that NBC will at least put The Enemy Within in the category of “worthy of some consideration.” The second season to date is averaging a 0.9 rating in the 18-49 demographic, which is not the sort of number to be sneezed at. It’s the sort that actually should give you at least a modicum of hope for the future — it’s faring well with The Voice as a lead-in and if it were to hold tight to this rating for some time in the future, you could make the argument that this show could have a little bit more life in it yet.
The case for it being canceled – Unfortunately, NBC doesn’t really have a great track record with their midseason Monday shows coming back for another season. The ratings for Taken took a big dive when it came back for a second season, leading to its cancellation. Meanwhile, Good Girls is at the moment hanging on for dear life. If NBC doesn’t think that there’s going to be a way for this show to find a an audience for itself next season without the already-established lead-in, we do think that there are scenarios in which you could see this show finding itself heading to the TV graveyard rather than back to life for another season.
NBC will still have a little bit more time to render this decision, and with this show having a shortened episode order and numbers hovering around the bubble, they’re going to take their time trying to figure this one out.
We don’t want to ride the fence too much here, but at the moment, we really do think that the odds of a The Enemy Within season 2 are 50-50. It’ll come down to both the final episodes of this season and what NBC thinks about their pilots at large.
For some more news regarding The Enemy Within…
Including a larger preview for what lies ahead, just be sure to visit the link here right now!
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