Amazon's revival of the hit sci-fi series 'The Expanse' will debut in December

Amazon Prime Video

"The Expanse" season 4

• "The Expanse" will return for its fourth season on Amazon Prime Video on December 13.
• The show was canceled last year by Syfy, but quickly revived by Amazon.
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Amazon revealed the release date for its revival of the sci-fi series "The Expanse" on Saturday, and it released the first trailer.

"The Expanse" will return December 13 for its fourth season exclusively on Amazon Prime Video where the first three seasons are already available to watch. It's based on the sci-fi book series by James S.A. Corey. Season four is expected to focus on the fourth book in the series, "Cibola Burn."

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The show's original network Syfy canceled the show last May, but it was quickly picked up that same month by Amazon for season four.

Reports at the time indicated that ratings factored into its cancellation, as Syfy only owned first-run linear rights to the show in the US, according to Deadline and The Wrap. That put extra pressure on the show to perform well as it aired live in its original time slot. 

Showrunner Naren Shankar told IGN in an interview published Wednesday that streaming offers the show more freedom. 

"We're no longer bound by the archaic content, language, and runtime restrictions you're constantly forced to deal with on broadcast and basic cable," Shankar said. "The shows on Amazon Prime speak for themselves: this is a platform that values complex, layered storytelling, and we're thrilled to be on it - it's the perfect home for 'The Expanse.'"

"The Expanse" is critically acclaimed, with a 90% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes. For season three, Indiewire wrote that it's "undeniably confident about the story it's telling, and more importantly the kind of stories it wants to tell."

The first trailer for season four is below: