Yesterday afternoon, HBO finally broke the bad news — they had officially canceled the critically acclaimed show “Enlightened.” The show, starring Laura Dern and written by Mike White, suffered in the ratings during its two seasons, but had a strong and loyal fan base who had spent the last few months taking to the interwebs to urge the network to give the show another season. Alas, it seems it was not meant to be. The second season concluded a few weeks ago, and White purposefully wrote the final episode with the possible cancelation in mind. Ideally, the show would be renewed, but if not, the second season ending tied things up for Amy Jellicoe in a somewhat neatish bow.
I came into watching “Enlightened” late — way late. I binge-watched every episode over the course of a week, and then watched the season — now series — finale with everyone else. I fell madly in love with this show for its idealism and its depth and I’m so, so, so disappointed it won’t be coming back for a third season. I’m not alone — my Twitter timeline is filled with devastated and angry tweets from loyal “Enlightened” fans. What are we to do now that we’ll never know whether Amy triumphs against Abbadon, or gets back together with Levi (Luke Wilson), or whether Levi maintains his sobriety, or Tyler and Eileen’s relationship survives the fallout of his involvement in Amy’s whistleblowing? And what about Dougie? I was just starting to really love Dougie! Sigh.
Clearly, we need to figure how to cope with this news. I have some ideas for how to deal with the cancellation of “Enlightened”… Keep reading »
