Fox pulls low-rated ‘Utopia’ from Tuesday nights

Don’t go looking for “Utopia” -- at least not on Tuesday nights, anyway.

Bowing to awful ratings, Fox just yanked the ambitious reality series from its Tuesday slot and replaced it with “MasterChef Junior.”

Fox said in a release emailed to reporters Wednesday afternoon that it will keep airing “Utopia” on Friday nights. The network had originally planned to air “Utopia” on Fridays only for the first few weeks, with Tuesday its permanent home.

“Utopia,” the latest from “Big Brother” creator John de Mol, strands a group of people drawn from various walks of life in a remote area so that they can build their own society. A Dutch version of the show was a hit earlier this year, although ratings subsequently cooled.

For the Fox version, “Utopia” started out with bad ratings and just got worse. Tuesday night’s show drew barely 2 million total viewers, according to Nielsen. That put it a distant fourth place among broadcasters, behind CBS’ “NCIS” (18.8 million), NBC’s “The Voice” (13.7 million) and ABC’s new comedy “Selfie” (5.3 million).

Unfortunately for Fox, “Utopia” came with a big price tag that some reports indicated were as high as $50 million, although executives denied it was quite that much. And it was also a linchpin for the network’s new fall rollout of other shows.

What do you think of “Utopia”?

Twitter: @scottcollinsLAT