Zero Hour Cancelled: ABC Drops Series After Three Episodes Due to Low Ratings and Negative Feedback
ABC confirmed that the drama Zero Hour has been cancelled after only three episodes.
The show starred Anthony Edwards, a former ER actor who played Hank Galliston, a publisher of a paranormal magazine on a mission to save his wife who was kidnapped.
The show premiered on Feb. 14 and had the lowest rating for an ABC scripted show premiere during the regular TV season, according to The Christian Science Monitor, with just 6.3 million viewers. The viewership dropped to about 5 million by its third episode, and was pulled without any shot at redemption.
The show received negative feedback from reviewers like Vicki Hyman of The Star-Ledger, in which she describes the show as a "too-ambitious-by-half-globtrotting thriller." She also refers to the exposition as "jarring and chunky" and explains that the dialogue is "laughable."
During an interview with Entertainment Weekly on the day the show first aired, Edwards was asked if he was worried about the amount of commitment the audience would have to give each week to get the show. He said he himself likes to be committed to a story and is currently a fan of Downton Abbey.
The show competed against American Idol and The Big Bang Theory during its 8 p.m. airtime.
