Sophomore Contraction: Why So Many Popular Streaming Series Produced Fewer Episodes In Season 2
When Netflix’s The Diplomat returned for a second season in October, a year and a half after the release of its breakout first season, fans’ excitement was mixed with some disappointment as Season 2 consisted of just 6 episodes, down from 8 in Season 1 and a season length typically associated with British series and rarely seen in American ones.
The Diplomat is not alone. A number of popular series which released their second season over the past few months — or are set to do so in January — are coming back with fewer episodes. Like The Diplomat, fellow Netflix drama The Recruit‘s upcoming second season includes just 6 episodes, down from 8 in season 1. The upcoming second season of Netflix’s comedy XO, Kitty has 8 episodes, down from 10 in Season 1.
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The trend is not limited to Netflix. Hulu’s thriller Tell Me Lies‘ recent second season consisted of 8 episodes, down from 10 in Season 1.
The just concluded Season 2 of Apple TV+’s Bad Sisters also had 8 episodes, down from 10 in Season 1. The same also happened to HBO’s House Of The Dragon, which also went from 10 to 8 episodes in Season 2.
The reasons vary. Some of it comes from creatives who plot shorter chapters. Timing is an issue too, especially for global streamers which need a lead time of several months to dub a new season of a series in different languages. That adds to the already lengthy gaps between seasons. The problem was exacerbated by the Hollywood strikes of 2023 that delayed the delivery of new seasons by as much as six months, with all of the series listed above impacted by the work stoppages.
While that is not that big of an issue for long-running hits such as Netflix’s Stranger Things or a global phenomenon like the streamer’s Squid Game, for promising newcomers with serialized storytelling, a lengthy hiatus could be detrimental amid a fast-moving pipeline of new content vying for viewers’ attention. That happened to FX’s The Old Man, which was on a similar timetable with most of the mentioned dramas and had its second season delayed by the strikes for a gap of two years and three months between Seasons 1 and 2. That proved too long for fans, Season 2 could not match the strong ratings for the original installment, and the series starring Jeff Bridges was recently canceled.
The Recruit, Bad Sisters and Tell Me Lies’ second seasons also are launching two or more years after the first seasons dropped. For The Diplomat, House of the Dragon and XO, Kitty, the gap is 18+ months.
And then there are the budgetary concerns which are factoring into pickup decisions amid an industry-wide belt tightening, with streamers looking to trim costs even on their most popular series, with a reduced episode order among the options.
Often, it is a combination of factors.
As Deadline reported in March 2023, Season 2 of House of the Dragon had initially been envisioned as another 10-episode arc, matching Season 1. That eventually changed, leading to script rewrites. Amid rumors that the decision was tied with the cost-cutting mandate following HBO parent company’s acquisition by Discovery, a spokesperson stressed at the time that the episode count trim was story-driven, with a portion of the plot originally intended for Season 2, including a major battle, moving to Season 3.
Earlier this year, House of the Dragon writer-executive producer Sara Hess indicated that the call was made by HBO, telling EW that the episode count reduction “it wasn’t really our choice.” According to sources, the decision was made by the network in early 2023, at least in part with strike production contingency preparations in mind, so the series could make its summer 2024 premiere date. Season 2 debuted in June, 22 months after the Season 1 launch.
I hear the decisions on the Season 2 sizes of The Recruit, XO, Kitty, Tell Me Lies and Bad Sisters also came from the streamers.
The wishes of the creatives were factored in at least for some, including Tell Me Lies — which is keeping the episode count (8) for its recently ordered third season — along with extraneous circumstances. For The Recruit, whose Season 2 six episodes are being released 23.5 months after the first eight dropped, that included an ownership change, with its producing studio eOne acquired by Lionsgate over the stretch. The series also navigated a complex shoot across continents, with a major portion of Season 2 taking place in Korea.
Meanwhile, Season 1 of House of the Dragon‘s fellow hit HBO genre drama series The Last Of Us, based on the popular video game, was 10 episodes in length (It formally consisted of 9 episodes after the first two were combined into a supersized 90-minute premiere and Episode 3 ran for 72 min). The upcoming Season 2 will be made of 7 episodes.
The decision was made by series co-creators/executive producers Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann who explained to Deadline earlier this year that mapping out the story material from Part II of the game across seasons, “the natural breakpoint felt like it came after seven episodes.”
The contraction is not permanent, with Season 3 designed to “be significantly larger,” Mazin said.
Also expected to get back to normal in Season 3 is Netflix’s The Diplomat.
Series creator Debora Cahn told TVLine in an interview this fall that “It was my decision” to go down to 6 episodes in Season 2, noting, “[Netflix] was not happy. They wanted the full eight.”
I have heard from sources too the streamer’s brass were not thrilled by the reduction, with next season expected to go back to 8 episodes.
“I was really tired,” Cahn said in the same interview, adding, “It was a time thing. It felt like there wasn’t enough time to turn around eight of them. It was a lot to do in what appeared to be a short period of time.”
The Diplomat was renewed for a second season the day before the May 2, 2023 start of the WGA strike. Cahn and her writing team had raced to finish the scripts by then, and Season 2 started filming in June. It shut down just a couple of weeks when SAG-AFTRA also went on strike in July 2023. Production resumed in December.
Also delayed by the strikes, filming on the second seasons of The Recruit and Tell Me Lies both started in January 2024. XO, Kitty kicked off production on its second season in April 2024 vs. March 2022 for Season 1, with both seasons wrapping in June — 2024 and 2022, respectively — due to the shorter length of Season 2.
The six-month pause due to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA work stoppages created a pipeline logjam at most streamers, including Netflix, for the second half of 2024 and 2025, further lengthening the gaps between seasons.
“Had we known it was going to be a year and a half before we got back on the air, it would’ve been different,” Cahn said about the Season 2 episode count.
To help shorten the gap between Seasons 2 and 3, The Diplomat got a head start on Season 3 with an early renewal before Season 2 had debuted. Netflix also recently did the same with its hit The Night Agent whose Season 2 debut was delayed to January 2025 from the original 2024 release plan for a 22-month gap between the two installments — though its order remained at 10 episodes.
There occasionally are examples in the other direction, Apple’s Shrinking just wrapped its second season, which was comprised of 12 episodes, up from 10 in Season 1. Onyx’s Reasonable Doubt for Hulu went from 9 to 10 episodes in Season 2 which also ended recently. Both series have been renewed for a third season.
So far, the series with shortened second seasons have done well too, and going smaller does not seem to have hurt them. It’s too early to tell for Bad Sisters, whose finale dropped this week, but the other three shows whose second installments have debuted, The Diplomat, Tell Me Lies and House of the Dragon, all have been renewed for a third season.
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