Pablo Schrieber as Master Chief in ‘Halo.’
Adrienn Szabo/Paramount+
Master Chief has fought his last battle at Paramount+.
The streamer has canceled its video game adaptation Halo after two seasons. The series, based on the Xbox franchise and starring Pablo Schreiber as Master Chief John-117, finished its second season in March.
“We are extremely proud of this ambitious series and would like to thank our partners at Xbox, 343 Industries and Amblin Television, along with showrunner and executive producer David Wiener, his fellow executive producers, the entire cast led by Pablo Schreiber as Master Chief and the amazing crew for all their outstanding work,” Paramount+ said in a statement. “We wish everyone the best going forward.”
Sources say the show’s producers — Amblin, Xbox and 343 Industries — will look to land the series at another outlet for a third season. Paramount+ is said to be supportive of a possible move.
“We deeply appreciate the millions of fans who propelled the Halo series to be a global success, and we remain committed to broadening the Halo universe in different ways in the future,” reads a statement from 343 Industries. “We are grateful to Amblin and Paramount for their partnership in bringing our expansive sci-fi universe to viewers around the world.”
Halo took a long path to Paramount+. After years and multiple efforts at developing a feature film based on the game, work on a series began at Showtime in 2014, with a formal series order coming in 2018. The series was then moved to Paramount+ in 2021, a year before it debuted. The series also underwent several behind-the-scenes changes, including the departure of its original director and showrunner changes; David Wiener took the reins for season two after Kyle Killen and Steven Kane shepherded the first season.
Per usual with most streaming series, viewing figures for Halo are hard to come by. The show spent five weeks in Nielsen’s rankings of the top 10 original streaming series as season two streamed in February and March, collecting about 1.8 billion minutes of viewing in the United States over those weeks.
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