Like "Banyon", an earlier and similar American series set in Los Angeles, "City of Angels" was short-lived. Only 13 hour-long episodes were produced before NBC decided to cancel the program. Critics argued that the TV audience did not easily connect with Rogers as a tough, wise-cracking gumshoe. "TV Guide"'s Cleveland Amory wrote: "Altogether, Mr. Rogers does not seem completely at home in his part, but he does assault the Bogart-style dialogue with appeal, if not aplomb. When, in the first episode, a starlet (Meredith Baxter Birney) can't afford to pay him, she offers him her rings and he says he'll have them appraised. 'You aren't very subtle,' she says. 'You want subtlety,' he says, 'it'll cost 10 bucks a day more.'"