Reservation Dogs Ending With Season 3
Taika Waititi is ending Reservation Dogs after Season 3, considering it the right creative choice for the series.
Reservation Dogs, the coming-of-age comedy hit from FX and Hulu, will conclude with its upcoming third season. Variety reported the news, which was shared on Instagram by the show’s co-creator Sterlin Harjo. The post was bittersweet, acknowledging the sadness of ending the series and the joy of closing the story on the team’s own terms.
“[I]t’s the correct decision creatively for the show,” Harjo wrote. “I always knew what the end of this story would be, I just didn’t know when it would arrive. As we continued to break stories and write scripts this season, it became clear to the producers, Taika and me that the season three finale is the perfect series finale.”
Reservation Dogs debuted on Hulu in 2021 to widespread critical acclaim. Set and shot in Oklahoma, the series offers a unique look at modern Native American life and culture. It follows a group of teenagers growing up on a reservation as they grapple with the loss of a close friend and the challenges standing between them and their dream of moving to California.
Harjo co-created the series with Thor: Ragnarok director Taika Waititi, who took a support role in order to let Harjo bring the perspective the show needed. As an Oklahoma native, Sterlin Harjo was delighted to spotlight reservation life in a fun, honest way because no one else ever truly has.
“When we came up with the idea for Reservation Dogs,” he wrote, “I didn’t think the show would ever get made, but thankfully it did.”
Many critics have heralded Reservation Dogs as the best show of the past few years and by others as one of the most important television series ever made. The vast majority of the show’s cast and crew, including Harjo, are Indigenous people, making the series a historic milestone for Indigenous representation in media both on and off-screen.
Adding to the show’s authenticity is its location. Reservation Dogs is shot where it is set in northeastern Oklahoma. It was the first major television series to shoot entirely in the state, which is becoming a hub of film production in the United States.
On top of a vibrant independent film scene, several major productions, including Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon and the Sylvester Stallone series Tulsa King, have shot in Oklahoma. Twisters, the sequel to the 90s tornado thriller, is in production there now.
FX Productions, the studio behind Reservation Dogs, expressed in a statement that the power of the show cannot be overstated and that it looks forward to continuing a working relationship with Sterlin Harjo and Taika Waititi.
Harjo is working as a producer on Rez Ball, a film about a Native American high school basketball team from New Mexico. He is also a co-creator of the upcoming drama series Yellow Bird.
Adapted from the book by Sierra Crane Murdoch, the Paramount+ series will follow a woman attempting to solve the mystery of an oil worker’s disappearance and reconcile with her family on a reservation in North Dakota.
Reservation Dogs has already found its place in history, and it will retain control of its destiny by marking its own conclusion. The third and final season of Reservation Dogs kicks off on August 3 on Hulu.
