Series cancellation
Before the season finale aired, Miller and the writers proposed the storyline for season two to ABC and to Warner Bros. They pitched the idea of season two exploring the ramifications of Jo or another character, aside from Abe, learning about Henry's immortality, romance, and the pleasures associated with immortality. They also planned to introduce several new characters to the series. In an interview with Entertainment Weekly's Natalie Abrams, Miller stated that ABC appeared to like the direction of the show's second season. On May 7, however, ABC announced the series' cancellation. Gruffudd's wife Alice Evans told fans about the cancellation on Twitter; Gruffudd posted a letter on Instagram detailing his reaction to the series' cancellation and thanking the show's fans for their support a few hours later.
In the meantime, Warner Bros. and Miller began to shop the series to other networks. On July 7, Miller posted a letter to fans on Twitter stating that, as of that date, Warner Bros. had been unable to find another studio to produce the series and that the studio was still shopping it around to the networks. During a Twitter question-and-answer session on September 17, 2015, Miller revealed the characters that he wanted to introduce (biological children viewed in flashbacks), and that the character who would learn of Henry's immortality in season 2 was to be Lucas.
Officially, the network cited that Forever's live ratings was the main factor behind the series' cancellation. The pilot episode drew 8.26 million viewers live, but the finale drew 4.13 million live. On average, the series drew 4.93 million viewers live and a 1.12 adults 18–49 demographic weekly. In term of the Nielsen ratings' Live+7 Day ratings, Forever averaged 7.034 million viewers and drew a 1.7 adults 18–49 demographic. About 3.23 million people, or about 68% of Forever's audience, watched the series within seven days of the episodes original broadcast. Forever had the 19th-highest lift in total viewers for the 2014–2015 television season. In addition, Forever had the 7th-largest increase in adults 18–49 from DVR viewing during the season. It was among the top 20 programs that received the largest increase in adults 18–49 within the first three days of viewing, and it received the 14th-highest increase in adults 18–49 from Live+3-Day to Live+7-Day viewing.
Television critics believed that live ratings was not the only factor in ABC's cancellation of Forever. The Orange County Register's Michael Hewitt and Adweek's Jason Lynch noted that several of ABC's other low-rated shows, in particular ABC's limited series American Crime, received renewals in spite of ratings that were similar to Forever's. American Crime had an average audience of 4.98 million viewers live and a 1.16 adults 18–49 demographic weekly; its Live+7 Day audience, however, averaged 6.697 million viewers and a 1.7 adults 18–49 demographic. Verne Gay of Newsday, Nellie Andreeva of Deadline Hollywood, and Stephen Battaglio of the Los Angeles Times pointed out that ABC renewed series produced by ABC Studios as a part of the network's decision to increase ownership of their series to compete with Netflix and Hulu. Forever, produced by Warner Bros., was one of three cancellations for the network, the other two being Resurrection and Cristela. Kate Stanhope of The Hollywood Reporter and Matt Roush of TV Insider felt that Forever's time slot was a factor for the low ratings. Stanhope mentioned that Forever was airing opposite NBC's Chicago Fire and CBS' Person of Interest, both established series on their respective networks while Roush believed that Forever did not have a strong lead-in in. John Sica, a reporter for The Rockaway Times who had worked on the series, cited a lack of promotion and an inconsistent scheduling of episodes during Forever's run as factors that led to the series cancellation.
Before the series' cancellation, Forever placed fourth in USA Today's 18th annual "Save Our Shows" poll. When ABC announced the cancellation of Forever, fans were outraged, and some left angry messages on ABC's Facebook page. Using the hashtag #SaveForever, others began a social media campaign on Facebook and Twitter to save the series. An online petition on Change.org generated over 6,500 signatures within two days of being created, and it generated over 12,600 signatures in three days. By May 27, it had generated nearly 27,000 signatures. Some have had requested that Netflix or another network take over the production of the series. By November 5, 2015, the petition generated 107,150 signatures.
The cancellation generated a discussion on social media. When TVLine posted a story about the cancellation, it generated 2,175 comments, making it the third most talked-about story in the site's five-year history. About 43.70% of Entertainment Weekly online readers voted it as the most-missed cancellation in Entertainment Weekly's online poll.
A fan-made, non-profit, unofficial graphic novel, titled "Forever & Ever!", debuted on Facebook on January 5, 2016. According to one of the comic series' co-creators, the novel expands the fictional universe created by Miller by introducing new material and new characters.
