The Season Finale of Wild Cards Preempted Last Night

Wild Cards is a CBC series that airs in the United States. It stars Vanessa Morgan as con artist Max Mitchell, who through circumstances I won't go into here must work with police officer Cole Ellis (Giacomo Gianniotti). The show has proven popular in Canada and has gotten better ratings for The CW than most of its shows. While Wild Cards isn't particularly original, it is a fun show with interesting characters and I have enjoyed it since it debuted in 2024. Last night the finale of its second season was set to air on The CW. Unfortunately it was preempted by a NewsNation special, Cuomo Town Hall: The First 100 Days. As to the Wild Cards season finale, it will now air next week, on May 7.

At any rate, I was not exactly happy. Here in the Columbia/Jefferson City market, the season finale of Wild Cards was still being advertised as airing on April 30 as of yesterday. From an internet search it would seem that the decision to delay the season finale of Wild Cards was made only about two days ago or so. Apparently Nexstar, the parent company of both The CW and NewsNation, made the decision to delay the Wild Cards season finale on the spur of the moment.

As to their motivation for doing so, that is anybody's guess. Cuomo Town Hall: The First 100 Days also aired on NewsNation, so it was not as if The CW was the only venue available for the special. For that matter, I do no think the special comes under the heading of news so important or pressing that they had to change The CW's schedule at the last minute. As to the Neilsen ratings, Wild Cards is one of The CW's higher rated shows, so it's not like they had to prop up their ratings for the night and I seriously doubt that they thought Cuomo Town Hall: The First 100 Days would get higher ratings than Wild Cards. And it is not as if the season finale of Wild Cards has not yet been completed. It already aired on CBC on April 2 of this year! It is then a total mystery to me as to why Nexstar decided to preempt the season finale of one of The CW's most popular shows.

Of course, Wild Cards is not the only show affected by the decision to air a TV special in lieu of regularly scheduled programming last night. The third season of Sullivan's Crossing, another Canadian import, was set to begin on The CW on May 7. Now, it will not start on The CW until May 14. Sullivan's Crossing is apparently another one of The CW's more popular shows. 

Now I don't know if other viewers were unhappy with The CW last night. I haven't run onto any viewers complaining about the preemption on social media. It may be that while they were unhappy about not seeing the season finale last night, they were not so unhappy as to complain about it on social media. As for myself, I thought what The CW did was disrespectful to their viewers. They preempted Wild Cards last night for a special that was airing on NewsNation and hence there was no great need for it to air on The CW as well. There are certainly legitimate reasons broadcast networks have to preempt regularly scheduled programming. I don't think anyone believes that the networks should never preempt television shows. Historic examples of times the broadcast networks had to preempt their regular schedules include the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the Challenger disaster, and 9/11. The first 100 days of a presidency is not one of those reasons.

By sheer coincidence, today CBC renewed Wild Cards for two more seasons. A search on the various social media services shows that many, presumably Canadian fans are happy about this. Unfortunately, there has been no word yet from The CW whether they will renew the show.