“Breaking Bad” was not a mega-hit when it first came out. Sure, it earned good reviews, but its pilot episode garnered less than 1 million viewers upon its first airing, as creator Vince Gilligan told the Los Angeles Times. It was a pretty inauspicious start to what would become a worldwide phenomenon, but that’s the thing about a lot of shows — they just require some time to find an audience. And in the case of “Breaking Bad,” Netflix proved to be a major boost in getting eyeballs to actually check it out (via Vox).
But for those early seasons before landing on Netflix, it was a rough go, as RJ Mitte explained in an interview with Big Issue. According to him, the show was always in trouble of getting canceled before being picked up for one more round. As he explained, “Every year they pretty much told us we were cancelled. Every time we wrapped it, they’re like, don’t expect a second season, don’t expect a third season, don’t expect a fourth season.” But the show kept going because it was a massive hit with critics, as Mitte went on to say, “Luckily we had a cult following when it came to the critics. That’s what kept us on. Only in the last seasons, four and five and six, we really got the viewership. But by then it was already on the path of wrapping.”
It’s frightening to think what the show’s fate would’ve been if it came out within the last few years on some streaming platform that needed proof a shot was an instant hit. Hopefully, it serves as a reminder that some series need tender love and care to find their audience.
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