The grindhouse series from Syfy called "Blood Drive" has just been cancelled after just one season due to low ratings despite good reviews.
The season ended with the finale where the hero Arthur Bailey (Alan Ritchson) managed to escape Heart Enterprises through a blood wall, but ended up on the shores of Blood Rock Prison, which is the supposed setting of season 2 – if the show did not get cancelled.
Unfortunately, the show had poor ratings where season 1 averaged 470,000 weekly viewers, which was lower than Syfy's recently cancelled show "Dark Matter."
Showrunner James Roland lamented in his blog, "Obviously the ratings were low but it was also a very noisy show on social media (thanks to you guys!) and a very well-reviewed show with critics as well."
"Blood Drive" did get positive reviews and received an 81 percent rating on RottenTomatoes where critics hailed it as humorous and weird, and paid a respectable homage to the grindhouse films of the 1970s.
Nevertheless, even with above-average reviews, the show could not sustain itself with the low viewership. Despite the sad outcome, Roland expressed his thankfulness, "This I do know: despite canceling us, Syfy was the only network with the steel to make the show in the first place... and for that I'm forever grateful."
Roland, however, has not lost all hope with the series as he hinted that it could continue on another network or perhaps get revived on the same one. He remarked, "There's definitely no Season 2 in the immediate future, but I remain cautiously optimistic there's more story to tell in this world."
"Blood Drive" took inspiration from the grindhouse genre films of the 1970s which was made popular again by critically-acclaimed director Quentin Tarantino through his work on "Pulp Fiction," "Kill Bill: Volume 1," and "Grindhouse."
