9-1-1 is moving to ABC, but its spin-off is staying on Fox

Fox is giving up one of its biggest hits, but there's actually a good reason for it

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9-1-1 is moving to ABC, but its spin-off is staying on Fox
9-1-1 Photo: Fox

Wrap your mind around this one: Fox decided not to renew 9-1-1 for another season, so now ABC has swooped in and snatched it up. The Ryan Murphy-created show has been one of Fox’s biggest primetime hits, but now it’s going to air its next season—its seventh—on ABC instead. But wait, it gets weirder: Spin-off 9-1-1: Lone Star has been renewed by Fox and will continue to air on Fox for at least another season. That means, much like the Yellowstone franchise, you’re going to have to look in more than one place in order to see everything the 9-1-1verse has to offer.

But perhaps weirdest of all is that there’s actually a very sensible reason for all of this, as laid out by Vulture: 9-1-1 is produced by 20th Century Television, which is now owned by Disney instead of Fox. Ergo, Fox doesn’t have an ownership stake in the show, so even though it gets big ratings, it’s expensive to keep on the air because Fox has to license it from Mickey Mouse. Meanwhile, Disney owns ABC, so it now gets to license the show to itself, and it also owns Hulu, so it gets to license the show to itself again. Disney didn’t take over all of culture on accident, folks.

As for Lone Star, Vulture’s theory is that Fox is going to use it to buoy its new slate of in-house originals, like the similarly first responder-themed Rescue: Hi-Surf. It must be the cheaper of the two shows (it doesn’t star Angela Bassett for one thing), because otherwise it would be weird for Fox to retain the spin-off and not the flagship show. Then again, it seems to be the buzzier of the two shows, with that terrifying body-horror clip going viral a few weeks ago, so maybe Fox is being cannier here than we were giving it credit for.

Either way, everybody seems to be getting what they want out of this, except for the frozen guy who got his chest popped open by Rob Lowe in Lone Star. That guy’s dead as hell.

8 Comments

  • pie-oh-pah-av says:

    That means, much like the Yellowstone franchise, you’re going to have to look in more than one place in order to see everything the 9-1-1verse has to offer.Not really since they’re both on Hulu, and new episodes show up there the day after they air.

  • soylent-gr33n-av says:

    Okay, I was seeing stills of that scene, with what I now know are Lowe’s hands inside that dude’s chest. I thought it was un unused take from John Carpenter’s The Thing.

  • minimummaus-av says:

    “That means, much like the Yellowstone franchise, you’re going to have to look in more than one place in order to see everything the 9-1-1verse has to offer.”I just find it easier to not watch any of them. And if anyone I asked me, I would have thought 9-1-1 was on CBS because it seems like a CBS thing.

  • gterry-av says:

    Original 911 is actually a pretty decent show especially for that type of show. Lone Star is not nearly as good as has practically become the Rob Lowe show making it so much worse.

  • sandsanta-av says:

    Lone Star is the superior show out of the two anyways, couldn’t make it through the first season of “original” 9-1-1… It’s just bad.

    • erictan04-av says:

      In the last couple of years, Lone Star has been much better and more watchable than the original

  • gargsy-av says:

    “But perhaps weirdest of all is that there’s actually a very sensible reason for all of this, as laid out by : 9-1-1 is produced by 20th Century Television, which is now owned by Disney instead of Fox.”

    The fact that one company produces it and another airs it is *far* from the weirdest part of the story.

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