Ripper Street to return? - Telegraph Only last week, Ripper Street was axed due to poor ratings. But it now looks set to return, as the BBC says it is "looking at partnerships that could enable Ripper Street to return but at better value to licence fee payers." According to BleedingCool.com, the BBC and the makers of the Victorian crime drama are said to be in talks with LoveFilm about funding a third series. Hints of a recomission come after the show's star Myanna Buring praised an online petition for the series to return. "We've all been really touched," she said at the Moët British Independent Film Awards, and added that more people should sign the petition. "Power to the people, we can do this," she said. The news of the show's cancellation was revealed by actor Jerome Flynn, who plays Sergeant Bennet Drake in the series, in an interview with presenter Simon Lederman on radio station BBC London 94.9. "We're all in absolute shock," said Flynn of the original decision to cancel the show. It's a wonderful job and we feel like it's kind of this unfinished work. So we're hoping it will turn around if anyone from the BBC is listening. The BBC said the decision to axe Ripper Street was taken because "the second series didn't bring the audience we hoped." The arrangement for a video-on-demand company to fund a series return has precedent in the United States, with Netflix funding a new series of Arrested Development. Ripper Street, which also stars Matthew Macfadyen, is set in Whitechapel in the era of Jack the Ripper. Under current plans it will end when the second series reaches its finale on Monday December 16.