“This is absurd - best new show”: Rosie O’Donnell reacts to Octavia Spencer’s Ride or Die cancellation at Prime Video

Ride or Die has been canceled by Prime Video after just one season, as confirmed by Variety. Octavia Spencer, who is now fifty-six years old, and Hannah Waddingham, who is now fifty-two years old, led the buddy dramedy together as lifelong best friends whose relationship gets turned completely upside down after one of them turns out to be a secret international assassin.

The series premiered on the streamer in July of this year, though it was back in December 2023 that Spencer and Waddingham were first reported to be teaming up for the project. The show followed the two women as they found themselves forced onto the run together across Europe, with law enforcement, trained assassins and dangerous criminals all chasing them down at the same time.

Rosie O'Donnell, who is now sixty-four years old, didn't hold back when she caught wind of the cancellation news. The television personality shared her reaction on Threads, where she has built up a following of more than two hundred thousand people.

"This is absurd - best new show," shared O'Donnell.

How Ride or Die dominated Prime Video's charts before getting axed:

As per a report shared by Deadline, Ride or Die quietly hit the number one slot in the daily U.S. rankings right out of the gate. It even eclipsed the big-budget film Masters of the Universe, and it did so without much noise at all.

The action comedy logged nine hundred and twenty-seven thousand views on Luminate's weekly U.S. rankings with just two days of release. That was twice what Elle pulled in over the same window, and more than four times Every Year After's numbers in that period.

Things didn't slow down from there. Ride or Die zoomed to number one in U.S. minutes watched in its first full week on Luminate, a trend that carried into week three. On the Nielsen Weekly Top 10, the series debuted at number three among streaming originals with eight hundred and sixty-nine million minutes viewed, then climbed to number two in week two with nine hundred and twenty-two million minutes.

Over its first fourteen days, Ride or Die stood as Prime Video's most watched new scripted series in the U.S.

How Ride or Die won over critics, audiences and global charts before getting canceled:

Globally, Ride or Die held the number one spot as the most watched Prime Video original series for its first three weeks running. For context, Elle had held that same slot for two weeks and Off Campus for five. That is the company Ride or Die was keeping.

The show also made a strong impression with both critics and audiences. As per Rotten Tomatoes, the series logged a ninety-six percent score with critics and eighty-five percent with audiences.

Variety's Aramide Tinubu was among those who praised it. In her review of Season 1, she wrote that

"'Ride or Die' works best when it fully leans into the 'Thelma & Louise' aspects of the central storyline... Spencer and Waddingham have a robust and genuine chemistry, a companionship that will undoubtedly resonate with countless viewers. Moreover, watching Waddingham as a full-fledged action star is something everyone should be witnessing on a daily basis."

The series was created by Tessa Coates, who also served as executive producer and showrunner alongside Matt Miller and director Peyton Reed. It was produced by Paramount Television Studios and Amazon MGM Studios, among others. The cast also included Ed Skrein, Calam Lynch, Savannah Steyn, Jamie Parker, Jacky Ido, Sylvia Hoeks and Bill Nighy.

The leadership shake-up at Amazon MGM Studios that happened months before Ride or Die was canceled:

Three months before the cancellation news broke, Amazon MGM Studios had already been going through some significant internal changes. As per a report shared by The Wrap, television head Peter Friedlander reshuffled leadership roles across the department, with Kara Smith stepping up to head of drama and reporting directly to him in that capacity.

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Smith had previously worked across some of the studio's bigger titles, among them Reacher, Mr. and Mrs. Smith and The Summer I Turned Pretty, with Blade Runner 2099 and The Challenger still ahead of her on the slate. The reshuffle went beyond just Smith's promotion. New heads of comedy and young adult scripted TV were also brought on board, joining a leadership structure that already had Blair Fetter, Jenn Levy and Melissa Wolfe running worldbuilding, nonfiction and animation respectively.

Several executives didn't survive the changes, though. Chambers, Michael McDonald and Odetta Watkins all departed Amazon as part of the restructuring, with their respective responsibilities redistributed across the newly formed genre-based verticals.

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