Why Was ‘the Owl House’ Canceled? The Show Has a Shortened Final Season

Spoiler alert! This article contains plot details for The Owl House on the Disney Channel.

It’s nearly time to close up shop at The Owl House. The animated series on the Disney Channel first premiered back in January 2020 and went on to receive critical acclaim. The show has been praised for its serialized narrative, diverse characters, and inclusive LGBTQ+ storylines.

The series follows Luz Noceda, a human girl who ends up in the magical world of the Boiling Isles. She soon winds up learning magic from notorious witch Eda Clawthorne and her small companion, King, and she strives to become a great witch while finding her way back home.

The show went on for two seasons but was eventually cut short with a truncated third and final season that didn’t even have a full episode count, which had not gone unnoticed by Dana and her team. Why was The Owl House canceled?

Ahead of the second season premiere in 2021, Deadline reported that The Owl House was renewed for a third season. However, the season was also confirmed to consist of three 44-minute specials instead of multiple 20-minute episodes, which was already unusual for any series.

It was later confirmed that Season 3 would serve as the show’s last. The show was not picked up for a fourth season and the story is set to be wrapped up during the specials.

In October 2021, series creator Dana Terrace actually took to Reddit to explain why she felt the show was effectively canceled after only three seasons. She took time to address fan theories that Disney took umbrage with the LGBTQ+ representation in the series or that the COVID-19 pandemic had forced them to cut off the show’s budget. She revealed that despite “good” ratings, The Owl House didn’t seem to mesh with some of the studio executives in charge.

“There are a few business people who oversee what fits into the Disney brand and one day, one of those guys decided that TOH didn’t fit that ‘brand’,” Dana posted on Reddit. The story is serialized, our audience skews older, and that just didn’t fit this one guy’s tastes.”

While Dana wasn’t exactly pleased with the show technically getting canceled, she is still proud to share new episodes, especially as we fast approach the finale.

As if the truncated third season wasn’t weird enough already, the release schedule for the specials is similarly confounding. The first special for Season 3 aired on Oct. 15, 2022, showing Luz and her magical friends seeking refuge in the human world with her mother after the Boiling Isles is overtaken by the godlike entity, The Collector.

The second special premiered several months later, showing Luz and her friends returning to the Boiling Isles to save the parallel world.

The third special — ie., the series finale — will come out on April 8 on Disney Channel and Disney XD at 9:25 p.m. EST. The first two seasons as well as two of the three Season 3 specials are currently streaming on Disney Plus.