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).
| Rank | Show | Rating | Status |
| 1 | The Magicians S2 | 0.38 | 3rd Season Renewal Likely |
| 2 | Childhoods End | 0.36 | Mini-Series |
| 3 | Z Nation | 0.25 | Renewed for 4th Season |
| 4 | The Expanse S2 | 0.19 | 3rd Season Renewal Possible |
| 5 | Channel Zero | 0.19 | Renewed thru 4th Season |
| 6 | Killjoys | 0.19 | Renewed for 3rd Season |
| 7 | Dark Matter | 0.16 | Renewed for 3rd Season |
| 8 | Incorporated | 0.16 | Cancelled |
| 9 | Aftermath | 0.16 | Cancelled |
| 10 | Van Helsing | 0.16 | Renewed for 2nd Season |
| 11 | Wynonna Earp | 0.13 | Renewed for 2nd Season |
| 12 | 12 Monkeys | 0.12 | Renewed for 3rd Season |
| 13 | Hunters | 0.08 | Cancelled |
Ridiculous..But Van Helsing is returning, you gotta be Kidding.
I can’t even tell you how many times I checked SyFy looking for this show to come back! I really, REALLY enjoyed this show! This was the ONLY show I watched on SyFy! It was great to see Julia acting again after her breakout role in Sabrina with Harrison Ford!! If I knew the show was going to be cancelled, I would have recorded the past shows to rewatch!
I looked forward to watching incorporated, it was different and entertaining. I am devastated that it will not return, would a different network please pick it up, and get it up and running. Please! I absolutely thought the concept of the show was genius. I feel that it didn’t have much advertisement and fell short of an audience becouse of it.
Oh come on! Incorporated was something different from what syfy normally has, it was new and refreshing, it deserves a chance more than one season! The show is great and should be kept, its ratings will go up as people come to find out about and you advertise it. This is a complete lack of foresight and intuition to cancel this terrific show.
This show had real potential. I enjoyed it. Clearly Sci-fi doesn’t know what they’re doing.