Cancelled After 2 Seasons, Steven Spielberg’s Forgotten Sci-Fi Show Departs Netflix

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Published Jan 25, 2026, 7:20 PM EST

Rahul Malhotra is a Weekend News Writer for Collider. From Francois Ozon to David Fincher, he'll watch anything once.

He has been writing for Collider for over two years, and has covered everything from Marvel to the Oscars, and Marvel at the Oscars. He also writes obsessively about the box office, charting the many hits and misses that are released weekly, and how their commercial performance shapes public perception. In his time at Collider, he has also helped drive diversity by writing stories about the multiple Indian film industries, with a goal to introduce audiences to a whole new world of cinema.

Swing and a miss > measured victory. Also, #JusticeForHan. (He/Him).

A host of network television shows are leaving Netflix in the United States this February, mainly for rights reasons. Among them is a science-fiction drama that ran from 2014 to 2015 — effectively during the peak of TV's "Golden Era" — before being canceled after just two seasons. The series was titled Extant, and was executive produced by Steven Spielberg. It featured Halle Berry in the lead role, alongside an eclectic cast that included The Walking Dead's Jeffrey Dean Morgan, and Shōgun's Hiroyuki Sanada. The show earned mostly positive reviews during the course of its run, but declining viewership and the emergence of streaming could've had something to do with its cancellation. However, it's currently available on Netflix, so if you haven't yet had the opportunity to check it out, now would be a great time.

The show revolved around an astronaut who returns to Earth following a year-long mission, only to realize that she has inexplicably become pregnant. Extant was praised for Berry's leading performance, but was also criticized for being derivative of sci-fi classics such as Ridley Scott's Alien. It's now sitting at an overall rating of 77% on Rotten Tomatoes, with the first season scoring a "certified fresh" 83% rating. The second season's consensus on the aggregator reads, "Extant amps up the action in Season Two, adding much-needed stamina to shore up Halle Berry's compelling performance." The show has spent several months on Netflix, having been released on the streamer back in August. It originally aired on CBS.

Steven Spielberg Had a Hand in Several Short-Lived Shows During the Same Time

Spielberg executive produced a handful of short-lived network shows during the 2010s, including an entirely forgotten Minority Report sequel series that was canceled after a single season, the Fox show Terra Nova, and ABC's The Whispers, which were also canceled after one season each. Perhaps the most successful show that Spielberg was associated with during this period was Falling Skies, starring The Pitt's Noah Wyle, which made it to five seasons. Spielberg is making a return to the sci-fi genre this year as director with the upcoming Disclosure Day, his first sci-fi film since Ready Player One, which was released in 2018.