After much speculation, CBS has officially axed long-running crime drama The Mentalist, which will hang up its proverbial hat with a truncated 13-episode season in the early stages of 2015.
The news was first announced by Entertainment Weekly, which confirmed that the show will indeed have its final bow this fall season. It’s unclear yet whether Warner Bros. will choose to shop around to find a new home for The Mentalist, but given that the show has borne the brunt of cancellation rumours for some time, it seems as though Patrick Jane may have solved his last case.
When the show returns for its seventh and final season on Sunday, November 30th, the crime drama will occupy the 9pm slot in lieu of The Good Wife. This will continue for five weeks before The Mentalist shifts to Wednesday nights, a slot it will keep for the remainder of its duration.
Having hit the small screen back in 2008, The Mentalist follows Simon Baker’s Patrick Jane, who leaves behind his career as a fake psychic medium to join the California Bureau of Investigation. And while it had a solid debut thanks largely to the gravitas brought by Baker, the ratings have been gradually slipping with each passing season.
As it were, it seems as though the writing was on the wall for some time.
The seventh and final season of The Mentalist will premiere on November 30th, and is expected to run through until February, where it will go off air for good following a two-hour finale.