Ray Donovan died this week, allowing every extant human on the planet to add “Outlasted the end of Ray Donovan” to their resumes, for the rest of their lives. Given that the Liev Scheiber-starring Parade O’ Bad Boys ran for 7 seasons on Showtime—which is to say, 82 episodes, which is to say, 7 years of human existence—you might think you’d be hard pressed to find anyone willing to go on the record suggesting that more Ray Donovan is what the planet needed. And yet, you’d be wrong, thanks to series showrunner David Hollander, who seems to be legitimately upset that 7 seasons of Ray Donovan is all that we’re collectively going to get.
This is per Vulture, which talked to Hollander about his reaction to the cancellation—including the fact that no one at Showtime gave him any indication it was coming, despite the show being one of its longest-running and most solid sources of large white men glowering into the middle distance. (Also: Ratings.) Among other things, the showrunner was (understandably) annoyed that he had been given no indication that he should have maybe been wrapping things up as the show’s seventh season rolled along, which is why Ray and his various associates ended the season in even rougher shape than usual. It seems to be especially irritating in so far as the show’s sixth season did end on a fairly finale-ready note, with Hollander noting that, “We were pretty burned out. It felt like the end,” until Showtime reportedly begged for the show to come back. Plus, Hollander was planning to bring the whole story to a close in Season 8 in any case.
“Every other year, it was them dragging us out kicking and screaming,” Hollander said, noting that bringing the Rays and the Donovans of the world together has never exactly been a picnic. “We were so used to it being the other way, where we were burned out by a show that was very hard to make and the network would pull us and cajole us and push us. We were used to being a show that was not canceled. We never thought we would be canceled.” He also noted that money—including increasing performer costs, an expensive move to New York, and the status of the CBS-Viacom merger, all likely impacted the news.
Hollander seems legitimately bummed out to leave the show’s not-inconsiderable legions of fans hanging, and hopes that the show will be remembered for its “poetic inside and a really hard-boiled outside,” which is also how we like to remember our eggs. “They knew that they would get emotional stories,” Hollander continued of the show’s fanbase, “But they would also get the explosions, the violence, and the unpredictable behavior of the characters,” like that time that Jon Voight’s character Mickey [FIND OUT SOMETHING THAT HAPPENED ON RAY DONOVAN, INSERT DESCRIPTION HERE], which we can all agree was a moment that showed the series at its [INSERT APPROPRIATE CLOSING ADJECTIVE HERE]
49 Comments
Maybe hire someone who watched the show to write this article or at least pretend you did? At this point, you are practically screaming, “HEY FANS OF THIS SHOW, YOU SUCK.” And that’s not a good look.
hey my father died making fun of ray donovan like his father before him!
When I first saw the headlines about this situation, I thought Ray Donovan was the actor. Never heard of the show, and if it’s gone on this long..? Eh.
If you were still watching Ray Donovan after a couple of seasons you kind of deserve mockery.
really?coming from a guy who has his dvr set up for the flintstones
“HEY THIS THING YOU LIKE SUCKS AND ALSO YOU SUCK FOR LIKING IT.”Yeah, good luck with that.
If you read a few comments down, I express that Ray Donovan deserved a proper ending since it clearly made Showtime money and had a fan base. I just don’t get people getting so triggered at some harmless snark over a tv show.
I just don’t get people getting so triggered at some harmless snark over a tv show.And I really don’t get people who use the term “triggered” incorrectly in order to mock people. The term you are looking for is “annoyed.” I was annoyed by how this article was written. It wasn’t just mocking the show, it was mocking fans of the show.Imagine you watch a show. It’s a good show, you watch every episode. Perhaps, over time, you lose track of it, but you still have fond memories of watching it. Then, suddenly, you hear it’s been cancelled, so you go to a website to read about why…and that website proceeds to mock you for ever liking the show in the first place. Either this riles you up or it makes you feel sad; in either case, you now feel worse after reading this article.That’s what this article has done: it’s made people feel worse about themselves and about the world around them. I don’t give two shits about Ray Donovan; I care about people.
This might surprise you but people often have differing opinions and that is okay.
You can have differing opinions but getting shitty about being made fun of is silly. I’ll defend Batman V Superman for you right now. You’d be perfectly entitled to mock me all you want. If you love Ray Donovan then more power to you. If you love it so much you shouldn’t be getting annoyed at some harmless snark. A tv show got cancelled, Ray Donovan isn’t a real man who just got murdered.
Not sure how I was “getting shitty” there but you do you bud
that’s what i told your mother before we watch the series finale
Considering she pays absurd money for Australian cable TV purely to watch British import soap operas, I’d be honestly impressed if you convinced her to watch even one episode of Ray Donovan.
It’s really crazy how snarky and bitchy they are about Ray Donovan. The headline to this article is GARBAGE
It’s just a TV show
I don’t even watch Ray Donovan, I just don’t care for this tone. It’s condescending and rude.
You may have wandered into The Onion by mistake
The Onion is at least satire. This isn’t.
The point is that an Onion offshoot may often take a snarky and/or sarcastic approach to its subject matter
Really? Alright, let’s look at another article about a show being cancelled: Netflix pulls a bullshit move, cancels The OA. Hmm. It appears that article is snarky and sarcastic against the studio the cancelled the show, not against the show and the showrunner. Weird, I wonder what’s different.I mean, it’s probably that the person who wrote The OA article actually watched the goddamn show, rather then the person who wrote this article who watched nothing and apparently thinks anyone who did is stupid.And if your response is “Hey, it’s just a TV show,” maybe you shouldn’t be on a website almost exclusively about movies and TV shows.
You’re very upset about Ray Donovan right now
You’re very stupid.
It’s just a tv show
Either you are being deliberately obtuse or you are actually this thick-headed.I don’t give two shits about Ray Donovan. If the article mocked the show, I wouldn’t care. But it didn’t — the writer didn’t even bother to watch the show or pretend to have watched it. Instead, they mocked people who did watch the show.It’s not about the show, stupid. It’s about people.
It’s just a tv show
So you’re a troll. Good to know.Fuck off.
Either you are being deliberately obtuse or you are actually this thick-headed.With the commenter known as recognitions, it’s both. There’s no point in interacting with that one; simply ignore or (even better) dismiss.
“poetic inside and a really hard-boiled outside,”Wha? Did he even watch his own show? What poetry?
I think he is confusing “Art” with “Fart”
Sheesh, I’m not a huge fan of this series or anything, but the sheer elitist arrogance of this article really reflects poorly on the AV-Club. We get it, you’re better than the show. Congratulations.
They’ve spent the last 7 years just loving to do it. Every Ray article is weirdly full of ill-tempered snark. SAD!
so did this show have an actual following? i think i stuck with it until season 4. it was an ok show. but it just got tiring with the whole “our family is so fuc…..OH MAN, IT’S EVEN MORE FUCKED NOW” routine. i’m just surprised it last this long.
It is a little bit strange that in the era of algorithm-driven decisions on show life / death at places like Netflix, Showtime’s willingness to let its shows coast for years on meager creative juice ended up being kind of endearing.
We have friends who swear this is the greatest show. As a result we no longer trust their judgment which has prevented us from being able to enjoy Shitt’s Creek.
ha! i haven’t watched schitt’s creek but my wife swears it’s so funny. but she also laughs at jimmy fallon so, very much like you, i’m not trusting her judgement.
We have made at least 4 separate attempts to get into Shitt’s Creek and it just hasn’t taken, which kills me because I friggin’ love Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara.
I really liked it, I can’t really tell you why but I just felt connected to the characters and I wish they had a chance to at least wrap it all up.
Yes, people watched the show. I watched every episode from the first and I love it. I looked forward to every season. They are all incredibly talented actors, the show had very interesting stories unlike anything else on TV. I will miss it, I am angry. It deserved another season and a proper send-off, they give Shameless, which has become an embarrassment, another season and cancel a quality drama like Ray Donovan? That is shameful.
All snark aside, I kind of see where the showrunner is coming from. The show wasn’t some newbie drama that failed, it was a pretty long running drama that presumably made money for them. If you can’t give them a proper final season or even something like a wrap up movie, at least telling them before the last episode was finished would have been generous.
I’d be interested to see if any studies have ever been done that shows that properly wrap up their runs do better in syndication and streaming that shows that end on cliffhangers. I know I sometimes hesitate to even start a show that ended on a cliffhanger.
Why did AV Club assign a writer to write about a show he has contempt for? He also mocked and generalized its viewers and fans. I’m a Black woman who enjoyed the show, Jon Voight, Liev Schreiber and Pooch Hall being my favorites. Does William Hughes also think all Black women only watch Insecure and Queen Sugar? Stop generalizing people.
But now we’ll never see Ray leave his past behind and escape his family by becoming a lumberjack in Canada, thus setting up the Dexter crossover the world didn’t need but would enjoy watching in trainwreck fashion.
Yes, yes, Ray Donovan was terrible. My husband and I watched through the whole run. There were certainly times I was ready to bail, and I really cannot stand Jon Voight’s Mickey. However, it’s weird to me how Showtime treated this program. They were going to end it with one more season – something tells me there was something else going on. I really would have liked some sort of ending for characters. Perhaps just an hour of Ray, Bunchie, and Terry beating Mickey to death. That would have worked for me.
Micky is the greatest character I’ll forever love this show I’m so sad it’s cancelled, now that powers over maybe Starz can pick it back up
Ironically, I only starting watching this final season and was pretty well hooked less by the plotlines than by the parade of awesome character actors (Sandy Martin, Peter Gerety, yeah that right-wing asshole…). Formulaic or not, it was so much better than most original programming on cable these days. RIP, RD.
I am genuinely bummed out by this news. Was it the best show? No, but it was interesting and I always found myself captivated each season. I really wish they had one more season to wrap things up, there were so many good characters and I feel like I am just left hanging here.
This article is a microcosm of the smugness epidemic in our culture. Only a little snark kitten like this would take the time to write an article about a show you don’t like. The type of people who enjoyed Ray Donovan just shut off shows they don’t like. Like adults. May you drown in your infantilism.
There is something so quintessentially white male about a guy who complains about how hard it was for a major cable network to give him the opportunity thousands of aspiring writers dream of and spend seven years throwing money at him to make his own television show. Maybe this is his lopsided way of admitting that the burden of coming up with anything but warmed-over, repetitive melodrama was beyond his abilities?
Trump 2020!! This site is full of libtards bahaha
Reading between the lines of the interview, they were going a cash bump for Season 8 and Showtime sold them to get lost. Always come down to money.