ABC Pulls Drama Series From the Air, Moves It to Hulu

ABC's Promised Land, a critically acclaimed family drama about two Latinx families running a California vineyard, will spend the rest of its first season on Hulu. On Tuesday, ABC announced that The Good Doctor will be coming back sooner than expected on Feb. 28 to take over the Monday 10 p.m. ET timeslot. Promised Land's fifth episode, which airs on Feb. 21, will be the last one to debut on ABC before the switch to Hulu.

ABC ordered 10 episodes of Promised Land, so the last five will be exclusive to Hulu, reports TV Line. The episodes that aired on ABC will also be available on the streamer. Promised Land's sixth episode will be added to Hulu on March 1. ABC didn't say if the show was canceled, so there's still a small glimmer of hope that maybe its performance on Hulu could keep it alive.

Promised Land earned critical acclaim, even scoring a 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating. However, the show failed to attract a wide audience. The first four episodes have averaged just a 0.2 18-49 rating, while the overall audience has declined from 1.9 million to 1.5 million viewers. Even with Live+7 DVR playback included, the show has only averaged 2.9 million viewers and a 0.3 18-49 rating.

"Promised Land is a beautifully executed and tremendously entertaining series of which everyone at our company is extremely proud," an ABC representative told TV Line. "We know it has a passionate audience that is very invested in this show, and those viewers will be able to stream all subsequent episodes exclusively on Hulu every Tuesday for the rest of the season."

Promised Land was created by Matt Lopez and debuted on Jan. 24. The show stars John Ortiz as Joe Sandoval, the patriarch of two blended families who run a successful vineyard in Sonoma County, California. The series touched on important topics, including the challenges undocumented immigrants from Mexico face. The ensemble cast also included Cecilia Suarez, Augusto Aguilera, Christina Ochoa, Mariel Molino, Tonatiuh, Andres Velex, Katya Martin, Rolando Chusan, and Bellamy Young. The show is an ABC Signature production.

Since Promised Land is leaving the schedule, The Good Doctor Season 5 will end its winter break earlier than planned. The new episode, "Rebellion," will find Dr. Shaun Murphy (Freddie Highmore) trying to decide what's next for himself and Lea (Paige Spara) now that he's called off their wedding. Past episodes of The Good Doctor are also available to stream on Hulu.