NBC Exec on Suits LA Cancellation: 'Hard Decisions Were Necessary'

*Suits*, a beloved series that first aired on USA in 2011, has enjoyed a significant resurgence in recent years, thanks to its full availability on Netflix, fueling countless binge-watch sessions. Despite this renewed interest, the much-anticipated spin-off, *Suits LA*, was unable to capture the same magic and has been canceled after just one season, as announced with the release of NBC's fall schedule. Jeff Bader, NBC's president of program planning strategy, shed light on the decision to pull the plug on the show.

“It’s so hard to talk about shows and which ones you bring back, and *Suits* had a very short run, but it really just has not resonated the way we thought it would,” Bader explained to Variety after the fall schedule was made public. “There can be many, many reasons why, people are speculating why it hasn’t resonated, but it’s just not really showing the potential to grow for us in the future, unfortunately.”

Suits LA was canceled after just one season. Photo by: Nicole Weingart/NBC via Getty Images.

Bader elaborated on the tough choices the network had to make, saying, “And it’s those decisions we had to make. We had to look at the performance of the shows, both on linear and on digital. We had to see the ones that looked like they had growth potential in the future. So we’re looking at how stable they are on their linear performance, how stable they are on digital, which ones are growing and which ones are declining. And we had to make some hard decisions.”

He also noted that NBCUniversal considers the potential for transferring canceled shows to Peacock, but *Suits LA* did not receive the go-ahead for such a move.

In contrast, Bader outlined the criteria for shows that managed to stay on the network's schedule, particularly in light of the need to accommodate more sports programming with the NBA taking over Tuesday nights. “We looked at what their performance was week-to-week, episode-to-episode, on both linear and digital, to just try and glean which ones we thought had the best ratings story,” Bader told the outlet. “And then on the creative side, the creative teams did the same thing. Which ones have the most potential, or the best potential, to capture a new audience? And these were the two shows that made their way to the top.”

*Suits* originally ran for nine seasons from 2011 to 2019. The revival series, *Suits LA*, premiered in February and starred Stephen Amell, Lex Scott Davis, Josh McDermitt, and Bryan Greenberg. Additionally, original *Suits* cast members like Rick Hoffman, David Costabile, and leading man Gabriel Macht made appearances on the new show. Aaron Korsh, the creator of *Suits*, also served as the creator and executive producer of the spinoff, which aired its final episode on May 11, 2025.