Fans of So You Think You Can Dance can finally stop waiting for the return of their favorite competition show. Variety reports that Fox Television Network president Rob Wade confirmed on Sunday, “there’s no plans to order another season.”
This is devastating news for fans who have watched and grown up with the show, finding favorite dancers and choreographers, and even aspiring to become America’s Favorite Dancer. It’s hard to be surprised, though.
Since 2019, the future of SYTYCD has been uncertain. A two-year break during the COVID-19 pandemic led to a return that didn’t exactly dazzle. Controversies made things even murkier as the well-loved judges’ panel was reinvented multiple times. A format switch in the show’s now final 18th season seemed like the final blow for fans who missed the magic of a competition show that brought professional dance opportunities to dancers from across the world.
It’s not that people are over reality dance competitions. Dancing with the Stars has reported record live audience participation over the last few seasons, even as the show bounced back and forth between Disney+ and ABC programming. Boasting a 20-year run like SYTYCD, DWTS has done a better job of maintaining its identity and growing with its audience. Last fall, DWTS aired its 34th season, growing viewership for five consecutive weeks. Six weeks into the season, Vulture reports, the show was “averaging 6 million same-day viewers on ABC and Disney+ every Tuesday night.”
SYTYCD faced several tragedies, including the death of alumn and regular mentor and judge, Stephen “tWitch” Boss. It also seemed like the show was struggling to maintain its identity, having increasingly less on-screen dance and audience input as seasons went on. The less SYTYCD reflected the dance industry (and the more loudly they proclaimed that changes were more dance industry focused), the less invested audiences found themselves in the show and its dancers.
If SYTYCD is rebooted in the future—Rob Wade told Variety, “We’ve had conversations about it, but nothing formal,”—an honest approach to the competition is likely what fans are hoping for, rather than the virality-chasing and social-media-ready format that prioritized documentary over dance in Season 18.
The end of SYTYCD is a blow for a dance community that craves representation on screen. Despite the strength of DWTS, new programs like Netflix’s Star Search reboot have not had confident starts (and may not return). But at least we can all breathe a sigh of relief that we won’t be anxiously hoping for yet another hard-to-love season for the sake of legacy.
