The Mentalist, starring Simon Baker as psychology expert and detective Patrick Jane, may not air a seventh season on CBS – or at all.

The Mentalist Canceled?

After a sixth season in which ratings slipped, CBS executives are considering canceling The Mentalist. Warner Bros., aware that CBS chief Les Moonves might be axing the show before talking to advertisers about the network’s fall schedule, has been shopping the series around to both broadcast and cable networks, reported Entertainment Weekly. Since The Mentalist in syndication on TNT, it could be a fitting home for the show’s seventh season and onward.

If the sixth season is to be The Mentalist’s last, series creator Bruno Heller says the finale will be a satisfying one for fans. Heller also stated that, should the series continue, they’ve left plenty of story left to tell.

“It will be a very pleasing and satisfying series finale if that’s what happens and if not it’s a very pleasing and satisfying precursor to a new season,” he says. “Obviously that’s the goal. Killing off Red John … turned out to be a brilliant idea and it loosened everybody up and gave us fresh legs and blue skies.”

The Mentalist’s fifth season ended with Jane killing the man he’d been chasing the entire run of the show, Red John. With that massive arc out of the way, The Mentalist was able to reinvent itself. For the sixth season, the show jumped ahead two years in time and moved the bulk of the action from Sacramento, Calif., to Austin, Texas.

While the show continues to do well, raking in 11.6 million viewers, its viewership declined 9% from last year, spelling even bigger ratings dips as the show moves forward. However, The Mentalist is still fairing better with viewers than CBS's critically acclaimed The Good Wife, starring Julianna Margulies.

The Mentalist airs Sundays on CBS at 10/9c.

– Chelsea Regan