Despite the ending for the third season giving us one of the biggest cliffhangers in the show’s history, it turns out we won’t be getting a fourth season of the Paramount Plus iCarly revival. Longtime viewers were pretty much left in the dark as to why the decision was made to cancel the show so here’s what we know so far.
The news broke to fans rather unceremoniously and was confirmed by Variety, with a spokesperson for Paramount presenting the cancellation as some sort of win.
“’iCarly’ will not be returning for a fourth season on Paramount+. The series had a great three-season run and delivered on what fans really wanted to see with Carly and Freddie finally getting together. We want to thank the entire cast, the writers, directors and producers along with the whole crew for their dedication, creativity and talent,”
It definitely sounds like the streaming service wants fans of the show to view this as a glass-half-full situation and the slap in the face that it really is. Sure it was great to see Carly and Freddy finally get together, something that fans have been waiting for since the original show began way back in 2007. However, let’s not pretend that the revival show ended with everything tied in a neat little bow, in fact, it ended on one of the biggest cliffhangers in the show’s history as Carly’s mom, a character who has been absent for pretty much her whole life, appears out of nowhere.
Fans were obviously left eagerly awaiting the answers that would ultimately never come. We don’t even get to see what Carly’s mom looks like, instead, the camera zooms in on her shocked reaction to seeing her mother.
So why was it canceled?
The cliffhanger ending certainly suggests that Paramount Plus was not entirely transparent with the show’s creators. It looks like everyone involved was expecting at least one more season and it wouldn’t be a surprise to find out the actors and crew were just as shocked as the fans to hear the news.
Unfortunately, like most streaming services, Paramount Plus does not disclose its viewership figures, so we don’t know how well the show was doing in terms of numbers. However, in most cases like this, poor viewership can be blamed for a surprise cancellation.
In terms of ratings, the show seems to have been received incredibly positively, with the first season of the revival getting a 100% Rotten Tomatoes score and the most recent season getting a 95% audience score. However, high ratings don’t always translate into high viewership; anyone who’s ever enjoyed a show on Netflix will know just how cutthroat the industry can be with fan favorites like Warrior Nun being shot down in its prime.
The Rotten Tomatoes ratings back up the idea that the show just wasn’t holding a big enough audience. The third season does have an audience score of 95% but that number comes from less than 50 ratings. As for the critic score, well, there aren’t any. It seems that while iCarly had a devoted fanbase, it was just too small to continue, the world of streaming is brutal and it seems the show wasn’t bringing in the views so Paramount Plus pulled the plug with no warning.