Netflix Scraps 3 More Promising Shows Amid Recent Turmoil

Netflix just scrapped three major shows amid the ongoing turmoil at the company. At this point, the streamer is infamous for canceling Netflix original series prematurely, and it is facing more and more backlash for raising prices, cracking down on password-sharing and possibly even introducing advertisements. To top it off, The Wrap reports that Netflix just canceled three animated shows and laid off much of the staff in place to support them.

Netflix has now confirmed The Wrap‘s report on the shakeups in its animation department. The company fired Phil Rynda – an executive in charge of developing animated original series – along with several of his staff members. It also canceled its long-promised adaptation of the comic book series Bone, along with the series The Twits and Toil and Trouble. To many fans and industry insiders, this marks the end of a promising era at Netflix animation. This ending comes with the dramatic accusation that the company has “staged data” to justify its cancellation decisions.

Artists and creators have flocked to Netflix Animation over the last few years for the promise of creative freedom, and in many cases they got it. The tradeoff, however, has always been the presumed short lifespan of the series. Now, The Wrap reports that those creators also faced corporate pressure to compromise as well as micromanagement of their work based on user metrics.

To creators, the process could be challenging from start to finish, but to fans, it became heartbreaking when big cancellations were announced. This week, that includes the cancellation of Bone – an animated adaptation of Jeff Smith’s beloved comic book which was announced way back in 2019. The Wrap also reported that Netflix has canceled its adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Twits, though Netflix reps responded that the project is still alive but is shifting in development – possibly into an animated feature.

Finally, the streamer has reportedly canceled its planned series Toil and Trouble, a witchy, whimsical show from Lauren Faust. Creators anonymously said that the ethos of creating original content has gradually given way to a philosophy of creating content that “our audience wants to see.” To that end, even critically successful shows like Elizabeth Ito’s City of Ghosts were canceled with little or no explanation.

Ito was one of the few who complained about “staged data” on the record, saying that Netflix gave her team “data meant to prove a point that Netflix has and squash conversation around it.” She said that data like this would tell creators for the first time “what [Netflix] should have gotten for what they spent on the show,” and Netflix confirmed that it does make cancellation decisions based on data “which takes into account viewing versus cost.”

While these stories are sad for everyone involved, Netflix may pay the cost in the long run. Ito is reportedly doing her next project at Apple TV+, and other creators interviewed said that they had gone to other platforms as well. Netflix, meanwhile, is struggling with plummeting stock prices, dropping subscription rates and active user dissatisfaction.