TNT may be happy that Andre Braugher just scored his second consecutive Emmy nomination, but not enough to let him compete for a third. The network has canceled Men of a Certain Age after just two seasons.

The show recently ended its second season, which is now a series finale, and averaged less than 2 million viewers. That might sound OK for cable, but not compared to TNT's bigger shows like The Closer, which gets over 7 million.

The problem may be that TNT does better with female-skewing shows. The Closer, Rizzoli and Isles and HawthoRNe are doing fine, while some of its more male-based dramas have failed, like Dark Blue, Raising the Bar, Trust Me, Saved and Heartland, none of which lasted more than two seasons.

I'm sure Men of a Certain Age was a good show if you fit into the show's rather narrow demographic (which, ironically, is the name of the show), but since I'm a 29-year-old man and not of a certain age, I never understood the appeal. It seemed fine as a quirky independent movie, but not as an on-going TV series, and it certainly didn't fit within the successful model of TNT's other procedural, female-centric shows.

I don't want to jump on Men of a Certain Age's grave, but I'm mostly happy that Braugher won't get another Emmy nomination. It feels like he's only nominated because voters still remember and love him from his brilliant time on Homicide: Life on the Street, so without him, more deserving people could possibly get in (see: Joel Kinnaman from The Killing).

For now, without Men of a Certain Age, TNT will have to get by with Rizzoli and Isles, The Closer (and the upcoming Closer spin-off), Memphis Beat, HawthoRNe, Leverage, Falling Skies and the upcoming Dallas remake. I'm sure TNT will be fine, and if not, that's just one more hour for repeats one of the 20 or so crime procedurals the network syndicates.


(Image courtesy of TNT).