Cult-Favorite CBS Series Was Just Removed From Netflix

Jericho, the short-lived CBS cult classic starring Riverdale's Skeet Ulrich, Birds of Prey's Ashley Scott, and The Walking Dead's Lennie James, is no longer streaming on Netflix. Both seasons of the fan-favorite series left the streaming platform on August 15. Jericho originally aired from 2006 until 2008; it was cancelled after the first season, but a fan campaign by fans helped bring it back for a seven-episode second season to wrap up dangling storylines. There were rumors for years of revivals at Syfy, Netflix, and other potential venues. After the TV show ended, Devil's Due Publishing and IDW Publishing released third and fourth "seasons" as comic book series.

Stephen Chbosky, Josh Schaer, and Jonathan E. Steinberg created the series, which was set in the fictional city of Jericho, Kansas. It begins after a nuclear attack wipes out 23 major cities in the contiguous U.S.

Back in May 2012, reports emerged that Netflix approached CBS about reviving Jericho and that CBS TV Studios was considering the idea. Skeet Ulrich later said that it was CBS that ultimately put the kibosh on the idea. Netflix was not yet the juggernaut that it is in terms of original content. In 2013, they brought back Fox's cancelled sitcom Arrested Development for a fourth season, then gave it a fifth a few years later. In the time since, Netflix has revived series like Lucifer and The Killing. Most recently, the streaming giant announced that they would bring Manifest back for a fourth season.

"It's so frustrating. Because the thing that killed that show was the marketing strategy that they had for it," Ulrich told The AV Club in 2017. "Lost was in its fourth season when they split it into basically two 11-episode half-seasons, with a three-month hiatus in between the 11th and 12th episodes. But they had four seasons, and they had a following, and they did a massive amount of marketing when they broke between the 11th and 12th to let people know when it was coming back. And CBS wanted to use that model of marketing for Jericho. And it killed it."

Jericho can now be found on ViacomCBS's streaming platform Paramount+. If you don't have Paramount+, you can always pick the show up on DVD.