Despite a strong critical reception, Netflix has officially cancelled Terminator Zero after one season, with series creator Mattson Tomlin confirming that he had already completed writing all of the scripts for Season 2.
Tomlin revealed the cancellation on X while responding to a fan asking about the show’s future.
“It was cancelled. The critical and audience reception to it was tremendous, but at the end of the day not nearly enough people watched it,” he wrote.
Tomlin had planned to explore the Future War storyline across Seasons 2 and 3, but accepted that the first season ultimately stands on its own.
In subsequent posts, he offered more insight into the decision, explaining that while Netflix was supportive creatively, the show’s production scale required substantial audience engagement to justify continuation.
“Netflix was really great about supporting the show and giving me tremendous creative freedom to do what I wanted to do. Good partners. The show was expensive and very time consuming. The only way they could justify it was if the audience showed up for it, and they just didn’t.“
Netflix had offered Tomlin the opportunity to produce two or possibly three additional episodes to wrap up the story. However, he declined the proposal.
The story he envisioned spanned multiple seasons, and condensing it into a short epilogue did not align with his creative goals. He maintained that the Season 1 finale left the narrative in a “good place”
Notably, Tomlin confirmed that he had already written all of Season 2 and outlined much of Season 3. He even teased that the series was originally conceived as a five-season arc, with a particularly meaningful series finale that was part of his initial pitch to secure the project.
He then reflected on the broader reception and the challenge of working within such an established franchise, stating, “It was a challenge to go into a franchise with that much baggage and find a way to reconnect with fans and take it somewhere new. I’m glad we were successful in that for so many of you. I hope to return to that world someday.”
Tomlin also pushed back against the idea that Netflix failed to promote the show. According to him, the company organized large in-person premiere events in New York and Los Angeles, conducted an extensive press junket for the animated series, and featured the show prominently on the platform’s front page for more than two weeks.
“I feel like NF did right by the series,” he stated.
In his assessment, a demographic mismatch may have contributed to the show’s underperformance. He observed that anime audiences generally skew younger, while the Terminator fanbase tends to skew older.
Terminator Zero attempted to bridge that gap, asking both groups to “meet in the middle,” but not in a way that generated the viewership numbers required to justify further investment.
Terminator Zero is a science fiction action anime developed by Mattson Tomlin for Netflix. The series is set within the Terminator universe created by James Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd. Animation production was handled by Production I.G under the direction of Masashi Kudo.
The eight-episode first season premiered on Aug 29, 2024.
Source: X