• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, December 12, 2023

“Luck,” “Lucky,” “Mr. Lucky” and now “Lucky Hank” all fell to the curse of “luck” -- a word in their titles that seems to bring bad luck every time.

“Lucky Hank,” starring Bob Odenkirk, was just cancelled after a single season, according to trade press reports late last week.

Consisting of eight episodes, it premiered last March on co-owned AMC+, AMC, BBC America, IFC and SundanceTV.

In the show, Odenkirk played a tenured English professor at a fictional small college in Pennsylvania. 

The character was an outspoken cynic who was fed up with what he called the “mediocrity” of the college’s academics, administrators, teachers and student body.

It was the third AMC series for Odenkirk, following “Breaking Bad” and “Better Call Saul.” Those two shows ran for multiple seasons, earned critical acclaim, and won awards.

For what it’s worth, the TV Blog liked “Lucky Hank” very much. “ ‘Lucky Hank’ is another feather in the cap for lucky AMC Networks,” wrote the TV Blog last March. Oh, well, so much for that.

The cancellation revived memories of two other shows with the word “luck” in their titles that I also liked very much, but both bit the dust anyway.

One of them, the HBO series called “Luck,” suffered the worst bad luck of all the “lucky” shows. 

It was a series set in the world of horse-racing in which three horses died during production of the show, two of them euthanized following inoperable leg fractures.

It became impossible for the show to continue in the face of the public outcry that erupted when the news spread of the animals’ deaths.

Created and written by David Milch, the show had an A-list cast headed by Dustin Hoffman, and including Nick Nolte, Michael Gambon, Kevin Dunn, Richard Kind, Ted Levine and others.

The show’s one and only season, consisting of nine episodes, ran from December 2011 to March 2012, and was then out of the running. For the record, I thought it was a great show.

Another bad luck show that I liked was called “Lucky,” a comedy which starred John Corbett as a compulsive gambler.

The show also starred Craig Robinson and Billy Gardell. Supporting actors included Seymour Cassel and Dan Hedaya. 

The show’s 13-episode first and only season aired on FX from April to July 2003 when its luck ran out.

Going back much farther, to the 1959-60 TV season, a CBS show called “Mr. Lucky,” about a gambler who owned a floating casino, also lasted just a single season.

The show was said to be doing well in its first season, but according to Wikipedia, it lost its sponsor, Lever Brothers, and in the world of television back then, that was all she wrote.

Will future shows with “luck” or “lucky” in their titles fare any better? Don’t bet on it!