There Better Be a ‘GLOW’ Season 4 After That Season 3 Finale

If, like me, you binged all of GLOW Season 3 in close to one go, you’ve got to be desperate for more. The season ends on something of an emotional cliffhanger as the girls part ways for the holidays — and Debbie (Betty Gilpin) and Ruth (Alison Brie) have quite the disagreement about their futures. The GLOW Season 3 finale sets up a GLOW Season 4 full of drama, heartache, hilarity, and success. And I need it. I need GLOW Season 4 now. I need to find out what happens to Sam (Marc Maron) and Justine (Britt Baron), Bash (Chris Lowell) and Rhonda (Kate Nash), and most importantly, Debbie and Ruth’s relationship. I need GLOW Season 4, and yet I can’t shake the feeling that I’m never going to get it.

Call me paranoid, but I suspect that Netflix is about to cancel GLOW. Even though the streaming service has the show’s third season splashed across its homepage (along with a brag about star Betty Gilpin’s Emmy nomination), it’s hard not to sense that GLOW is on borrowed time. Like Tuca and Bertie and The OA, GLOW is a sublime show with something of a niche audience. The aforementioned shows were recently unceremoniously canned by Netflix, which suggests the streaming giant is getting more ruthless with its cancellations. GLOW feels like the kind of show — loved, respected, admired, but not universally talked about — that Netflix would axe.

In fact, Netflix has already almost killed the show. The Wall Street Journal reported that Netflix’s tech teams wanted to give GLOW the axe after Season 1: “The tech side argued the show should be canceled because of lackluster viewership, people familiar with the situation said. The Hollywood side felt it was worth continuing the show, given the importance of [producer Jenji] Kohan to Netflix and the critical acclaim GLOW had received.”

The importance of that critical acclaim can’t be overstated. GLOW has been nominated for a slew of Emmys, holds a 90% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and it was named Decider’s best show of 2018. However, it also hasn’t won a vast amount of awards, as it has been consistently edged out by The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel in major categories. This year, it failed to even earn a Best Comedy nomination for its incredible second season. Considering that critics collectively have given the show’s third season its worst reviews yet — a still fresh 79% — I have to wonder if this time around the tech team at Netflix will win out.

Creatively speaking, there’s definitely still story to tell. While GLOW Season 3 manages to leave most of the characters in some sort of place of catharsis, Ruth Wilder’s story feels woefully unfinished. GLOW starts with Ruth as an actress struggling to find her way, flailing at finding love, and betraying her best friend. GLOW Season 3 ends with Ruth struggling to find her way, flailing at finding love, and, uh, not betraying, but certainly letting Debbie down. While it’s not unheard of, it is odd for a show as cleverly written as GLOW to fail at giving its protagonist any sort of closure. GLOW needs to finish Ruth’s story. Otherwise it feels like a work in progress.

The scary thing is that Netflix has already proven that it’s willing to kill a show even if the story is unfinished. The OA’s second season ended on something of a cliffhanger, and it was still killed. Tuca and Bertie only got one critically-acclaimed season to play in its wacky world. Even American Vandal, a show that won a Peabody, was canceled after two seasons. All this portends doom and gloom for GLOW‘s future. So if you haven’t found time to binge Season 3 yet, get on it. Because GLOW Season 4 might very well depend on GLOW Season 3’s debut ratings.

And like I said, I personally need a GLOW Season 4. This show must go on.

GLOW Season 3 is now streaming on Netflix.

Watch GLOW on Netflix