A year after Last Man Standing was canceled by ABC, the multi-camera comedy starring Tim Allen is plotting a comeback on a new network. Last Man Standing producer 20th Century Fox TV is in talks with sibling Fox Broadcasting Co. for a new season of the series, which would be its seventh.
Fox actually seriously considered rescuing Last Man Standing last May, following its surprise cancellation by ABC after six seasons. Fox brass tried to fit Last Man Standing into the schedule but couldn’t find a way to do it. Fox had been out of the multi-camera business for a while and didn’t have a multi-camera comedy to pair Last Man with. This development season, Fox put an emphasis on multi-camera comedies with several pilots, Rel, Cool Kids and the just ordered untitled Rob McElhenney & Rob Rosell project, which also is set in middle America.
Last Man Standing stars Allen as Mike Baxter, a senior executive at an outdoor sporting goods store in Denver, and revolves around his work and family life as a husband and father of three daughters. With a central character — played by Republican Allen — who is a political conservative and devout Christian adhering to traditional American values, Last Man Standing, like Roseanne, is relatable to viewers in the Heartland.
Allen referenced fans’ outpouring of support in a tweet this morning about LMS‘ possible return.
Last Man Standing could bring sizable viewership to Fox. The sitcom was a sturdy ratings performer on ABC. Airing on the low-trafficked Friday night, it averaged 8.1 million viewers in Live+7 for its most recent sixth season, ranking as ABC’s second-most watched comedy for the 2016-17 season only behind Modern Family. That is far more than the audience for any Fox comedy series and would rank as the network’s second most watched series behind 9-1-1. LMS also had been doing well in broadcast syndication, so another season could make financial sense for 20th TV as long as the studio can re-sign the actors at reasonable salaries.
Additionally, with Last Man Standing, Fox would get its own multi-camera sitcom revival, joining Roseanne on ABC, Will & Grace on NBC and Murphy Brown on CBS.
Fox has a similarly-titled single-camera comedy series, The Last Man On Earth, which is heavily on the bubble and currently not looking very likely to return. For now, there is little chance that The Last Man On Earth and Last Man Standing would co-exist next season though that would certainly be amusing.