The first casualty of the fall TV season is here. NBC has canceled The Playboy Club after just three episodes. Meanwhile, the network has given full season orders to two new comedies, Up All Night and Whitney.

The cancellation of The Playboy Club isn't a huge surprise. The show premiered with just over 5 million viewers, making it the lowest-rated new series premiere of the season not on the CW. The ratings then dropped more than 20 percent for the second episode, and fell again to 3.4 million in the third episode.

The vacated time slot Mondays at 10pm will temporarily be filled by repeats of Prime Suspect until Brian Williams new news show Rock Center premieres October 31.

The cancellation continues NBC's impressive streak of complete failures Mondays at 10pm. For the last five fall premieres, NBC has tried to launch Chase, My Own Worst Enemy, The Jay Leno Show, Journeyman and Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Now with The Playboy Club, NBC has six straight failures with its Monday at 10pm fall premieres.

As for the comedies, Up All Night and Whitney may not be getting huge ratings (about 5.5 million), but other than The Office, they are NBC's two highest-rated comedies. Up All Night is a critical darling thanks to stars Will Arnett, Christina Applegate and Maya Rudolph while Whitney has been promoted so heavily that failure is not an option. The lack of news about the other new NBC comedy, Free Agents, is most likely a bad sign for the show.

The fall season is starting out strong for comedies since Up All Night and Whitney join FOX's New Girl as the first three shows to get full-season orders.


(Image courtesy of NBC)