"Kaos": Netflix cancels the series after just one season

Bad news from the Olympian series: Netflix is cancelling "Kaos" after just one season. However, this is not confirmed by Netflix itself, but by actress Aurora Perrineau in an Instagram post.

"It hurts," she writes, but praises her fellow actors and the show's creative team. "Everyone was brilliant and unique. Every performance surprised and delighted me. [...] We created something strange, dark, hilarious, insane and absolutely tragic - something completely human."

When asked by a fan if that meant the series had been cancelled, she replied: "Unfortunately, yes."

Promising premise - but not enough audience

Perrineau's post was promptly followed by the outcry from "Kaos" fans. Netflix was living up to its reputation of cancelling good series with an open ending after just one season. The streaming giant is not making any friends with this. In fact, "Kaos" has an exciting premise that showrunner Charlie Covell ("The End of the F***ing World") wanted to tell in three seasons.

Specifically: "Kaos" is set in today's modern world, but the Greek gods are not just myths - they are reality. A regime. Father of the gods Zeus, played with marvellous arrogance by Jeff Goldblum, falls into a midlife crisis when a wrinkle on his forehead reminds him of his transience. In order to consolidate his reign of terror, he tightens the reins even more. Meanwhile, Prometheus, played by 'Game of Thrones' star Stephen Dillane, is actually forging a plan to overthrow Zeus - with the help of three people who don't even realise that they are part of his complex plan.

On Rottentomatoes, "Kaos" received a solid recommendation rate of 76 per cent from critics, while the series performed even better with audiences at 83 per cent. The Netflix information platform What's on Netflix also reported that the modern myth of the gods remained in the global top 10 of the streaming charts in the first four weeks after its release - a promising start.

In truth, however, "Kaos" is said to have struggled with "mixed" viewer numbers right from the start. According to a recently published report - also from What's on Netflix - the series only achieved just under 15 million views in its first four weeks. That's only around half as many as the far less well-known series "Supacell", which I already presented in my streaming highlights in June.

The official budget of "Kaos" is not known, but the well-known ensemble of Jeff Goldblum, Janet McTeer, Stephen Dillane, Cliff Curtis and David Thewlis alone is likely to have swallowed up considerable fees. There are also a few elaborate special effects. Forbes author Paul Tassi also surmises that the so-called "completion rate" for "Kaos" is likely to have been quite low.

An important point: Tassi already wrote a year ago that Netflix not only attaches great importance to views when making renewal decisions, but much more to how many viewers watch a season to the end. If the completion rate is below 50 per cent, the streaming service concludes that more than half of the audience would not return for a second season. Investing in further episodes is therefore not worthwhile, especially for expensive series, as it would hardly contribute to subscription growth - in line with a strict cost-benefit analysis.

And yet: what remains is disappointment. At least for the "few" fans like me.