Suits LA, the West Coast-set spin-off from the hugely successful show Suits, won’t be getting a second season. That makes it the second Suits spin-off to be canceled given that Pearson was canceled last year.
The original Suits was a huge success and introduced us to Meghan Markle, becoming the must-watched show of 2023 when it moved from broadcast TV to Netflix. It was the number one streaming show for 12 consecutive weeks. But Netflix chose not to buy this spin-off, so it wasn’t exposed to the same huge potential audience as the original show.
Why Suits’ spin-offs don’t last
While The Hollywood Reporter shared the news of Suits LA‘s cancellation, it didn’t go into the reasons why. But like its fellow spin-off Pearson, the reason is almost certainly poor viewing figures.
As TVLine reported last year, Pearson only averaged 513,000 viewers – half the viewership of Suits Season 9, and lower than all but one USA Network drama at the time (the exception was the final season of Mr Robot, which had 360,000 viewers on average). While 1.07 million people watched the pilot, the finale was watched by 490,000 people – just over half the audience for the Suits finale.
Pearson struggled to find viewers even though it got decent reviews. I suspect Suits LA struggled even more, because its reviews have often been terrible.
The show is currently sitting with just 39% from the critics on Rotten Tomatoes, and just 54% from the audience. As the AV Club put it: “There’s no way to sugarcoat it: Suits LA is a disaster. In every conceivable way, this offshoot fails to capture the original’s breezy allure.”
The first and only season of Suits LA is currently streaming on Peacock in the US. While it’s not currently streaming in the UK, those in Australia can catch it on 7plus.
