‘The Last Frontier’ Frozen Out by Apple
Haley Bennett and Jason Clarke in 'The Last Frontier' [Apple TV+]
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Apple has produced some incredibly popular Apple TV originals like Pluribus, Severance, and Ted Lasso. However, not everything turns out to be a breakout hit, and it seems the company is much more willing to cut its losses than it was in the early years of its streaming service.
Such is the case with The Last Frontier, a thriller that debuted in October to much anticipation but clearly didn’t get the traction Apple hoped for. According to Variety, Apple has canned the series only two weeks after its season 1 finale aired on December 5.
Apple announced The Last Frontier in early 2023, with Jason Clarke taking on the role of Frank Remnick, a lone US marshal who finds himself faced with a collection of violent criminals who escape after a prison transport plane crashes in the Alaskan wilderness.
However, as season 1 unfolds, Remnick comes to believe there may have been more to the crash than first appearances suggested, raising the stakes from protecting his town to facing a “well-crafted plan with far-reaching and devastating implications.”
Sadly, the show may have underdelivered on its premise. While the original trailer released on September 18 gave people high hopes, it ultimately landed with a mere 46% on Rotten Tomatoes after critics panned it for feeling somewhat rudderless — unable to decide whether it was a gritty survivalist thriller or a political conspiracy drama.
For example, Variety described “an entertaining bait-and-switch” in the first episode that gave it the promise of going in “a much goofier direction,” before getting “bogged down in a serialized plot that’s more convoluted and generic than the simple pleasures of maniacs running amok and small-town cops chasing them down.”
Sadly, even the strong cast wasn’t enough to save it. Clarke, who’s best known for Oppenheimer and Zero Dark Thirty, was joined by Dominic Cooper (Preacher, Mamma Mia!), Haley Bennett (The Girl on the Train), Simone Kessell (Yellowjackets), Dallas Goldtooth (Reservation Dogs), Tait Blum (Sweet Tooth), and Academy Award nominee and multi-Emmy Award winner Alfre Woodard (Luke Cage, Clemency).
The cancellation also seems to have come as a surprise to the show runners, Jon Bokenkamp (The Blacklist) and Richard D’Ovidio (The Call), who told Variety earlier this month that they were already spitballing a second season. Had that gone forward, it would have potentially included an entirely new location, possibly on a beach, as they felt they’d “pretty much exhausted a lot of stories in Alaska.” However, now that Apple has consigned it to the chopping block, it seems we’ll never know what direction the show could have ultimately taken.
The Last Frontier is far from the first Apple Original series to fail to move beyond a second season. More promising recent entries like 2024’s Constellation and the Lisa Kudrow-led resurrection of Terry Gilliam’s cult classic film Time Bandits all failed to cross the threshold to justify a second season. The Completely Made Up Adventures of Dick Turpin also faced a surprise cancellation, but Apple actually signed that one for a second season that failed to finish when the star, Noel Fielding, simply stopped showing up.
Perhaps the most heartbreaking example of this trend is Sunny, a mystery thriller that ran for the usual ten-episode run from July to September last year. Despite a glowing 91% critical rating on Rotten Tomatoes and an outstanding performance from Rashida Jones, the show was officially axed at the end of last year. While critics raved about its “neon-noir” aesthetic and its unique exploration of grief through a robotic lens, it failed to attract a solid audience, ending on a massive — and now unresolved — cliffhanger.
Still, while these cancellations seem to be happening more frequently since Apple reportedly began tightening its purse strings last year, it also might simply be the result of the company attempting more productions. After all, analysts say Apple isn’t afraid to lose money on Apple TV, and not everything is going to stick.
Apple had its share of “one-season wonders” from the very beginning, starting with Little Voice, the J.J. Abrams and Sara Bareilles musical drama that was announced as part of the debut show lineup when the streaming service was unveiled in early 2019. While the show didn’t arrive until 2021, it became its first official cancellation after failing to reach the “prestige hit” status that Apple was hoping for. It was soon followed into the void by the 2021 dramedy Mr. Corman, which struggled to find a broad audience despite Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s star power. Others that have failed to get a second season include High Desert (2023), and the crime and action dramas City on Fire (2023) and Shantaram (2022).
