DWTS shocker: ABC skips spring cycle after controversial season 27

Bobby Bones will have to keep that Mirrorball trophy well-polished for a full year.

Dancing With the Stars, which has long aired two seasons per calendar year, is skipping a Spring 2019 cycle, TVLine has confirmed.

Though it’s not yet clear what prompted the competition series to sit out a midseason run, Dancing is coming off a controversial 27th season. After multiple well-scored frontrunners were eliminated prematurely (including R&B singer Tinashe and Fuller House actor Juan Pablo Di Pace), the Mirrorball was ultimately awarded to country radio DJ — and very dark horse — Bobby Bones, who had scored much lower than his three fellow finalists.

The finale results caused an uproar among DWTS viewers, prompting many fans (and us!) to call for a change to the show’s voting structure.

Dancing With the Stars is expected to return to ABC’s lineup in Fall 2019. There’s no word yet on the fate of DWTS: Juniors, which wrapped its first season on Dec. 9 after pint-sized skateboarder Sky Brown was crowned the champion.

In other midseason news, ABC announced Wednesday that its freshman drama A Million Little Things will move to Thursdays in January, where it will claim the post-Grey’s Anatomy time slot at 9/8c. The slot’s current occupant, Grey’s spinoff Station 19, will take back the perch in March when Million Little Things completes its Season 1 run. (See the network’s full midseason rollout plan here.)