Syfy announced today that their near-future, dystopian series Incorporated will not be returning for a second season. That news comes as somewhat of a surprise seeing as its ratings were not too bad and the network had previously shown a tendency to give its shows two seasons to prove themselves. But with now a third series from the past year cancelled after one season (the other two were Aftermath and Hunters), perhaps Syfy is no longer being quite as generous. And the network does have quite a lot of development in the pipeline now, so they may not be able to afford to keep as many shows on the schedule if they are not pulling in enough viewers. I had also thought that this counted as a high-profile entry for the network seeing as Ben Affleck and Matt Damon were attached as executive producers. But their name-recognition value was apparently not enough to keep the show going.

Incorporated had a 0.16 rating average for its first season based on the overnights for the 18-49 demographic and it was pulling about double that when delayed viewing was factored in. As you can see from the chart below, that 0.16 score puts it on the lower side of Syfy’s scripted series from the past year, though not as far down as renewed 12 Monkeys and Wynonna Earp. Dark Matter and Killjoys had the same ratings average as Incorporated during their second seasons this past Summer, but they have international partnerships that make them cheaper for Syfy (of course, so did Aftermath, and that show was cancelled). Incorporated came exclusively from Syfy, and apparently they wanted to see higher viewership to keep it going. The series wrapped up its first season on January 25th and there is no indication that the network will try to shop it around to other venues for a possible second season.

Ratings results for Syfy scripted shows from December 2015 to present (The Magicians and The Expanse are season to date).