Once a ceiling has been cracked wide open to let in the sky, it can’t be all the way closed back off to darkness. We’ve done it already though - that’s the great part. Last night on her Instagram Live, lead actress Javicia Leslie (Ryan Wilder/Batwoman) said of the show’s potential renewal that “whatever’s meant to be will be, in the most beautiful way. And there are no words for that kind of hurt. The first love story between two Black women to lead its own show. The first Black lesbian superhero character to lead her own show. What matters is that Batwoman was a shining beacon of what’s possible in Black queer storytelling on television.
Batwoman wasn’t the network’s highest rated (though it’s worth noting that Batwoman had higher ratings than two shows that were already granted early renewal, Nancy Drew and Riverdale) - but in a streaming era it’s always hard to gauge how much network ratings factor, writers’ rooms and stars often encourage fans that after they’re done watching live to stream the next day on the CW app. But honestly, all the armchair post-game analyzing won’t matter much anyway. The CW is in the middle of a drawn out sale of its network, which certainly has complicated the renewal process for many of its shows. There will be a lot of speculation in the days to come, just as there has been over the last months while fans anxiously awaited news for a renewal. So many inspiring, brilliant people contributed to this series. Just got the sad news that #Batwoman will not be seeing an S4.
Here’s the announcement from Batwoman show runner Caroline Dries: After three seasons and 51 episodes, the CW has cancelled Batwoman. This is the one post I never wanted to write.