Popular Science Fiction Series Actually Surviving Cancellation?
It isn't official yet, but the head of Amazon TV seems pretty confident The Peripheral Season 2 is on the way.
Fans of The Peripheral haven’t necessarily been too confident about a Season 2 materializing, but it looks their doubts may have been for nothing. The Peripheral‘s inaugural season concluded earlier this month with no word so far on a second season. While he fell short of officially confirming that the show’s second season had been green-lit, Amazon‘s TV chief recently made comments that sounded confident the science fiction series had made the cut.
Speaking to Collider, Vernon Sanders — Head of Television for Amazon Studios — said the streaming platform was happy with The Peripheral‘s performance and that talks for Season 2 had begun. He also talked about exactly who’s been watching the series.
“We were thrilled to see real engagement and a lot of crossover from The Lord of the Rings fans. So, it’s kind of what we were hoping, that we were getting a bunch of people into the service for that show, and that they would go on to watch our next show. They’re so different in tone, and obviously one’s fantasy and one’s sci-fi.”
-Vernon Sanders, Amazon Studios Head of Television
As anyone who watched The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power episodes as they dropped on Amazon can attest, The Peripheral was heavily promoted as Rings of Power premiered and that apparently helped The Peripheral get a Season 2. That probably isn’t too surprising to fantasy and sci-fi fans, considering all the crossover between the fandoms for those genres. Elf warriors may fight with swords and Jedi may instead fight with lightsabers, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t both fun to watch.
Still, if nothing else, the growing list of cancellations from streaming powerhouses like Netflix and HBO Max — particularly in the realm of sci-fi and fantasy where the budget tends to go large — no doubt contributed to any fears that The Peripheral Season 2 was doomed. In fact, one of the biggest surprise cancellation announcements this year, for HBO’s Westworld, has a strong connection to The Peripheral. Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan, who created the Westworld series, serve as executive producers on The Peripheral.
What’s even more impressive about The Peripheral presumably earning itself a Season 2 is that it doesn’t enjoy a lot of the big star power other premiere TV shows from the more prominent streamers can boast. The biggest name is its lead, Chloe Grace Moretz, who is best remembered as playing Mindy, aka Hit Girl, in the Kick-Ass films.
While a lot of critics went after The Peripheral for valuing a complicated science-fiction plot of characters, the apparent approach of Season 2 would indicate audiences took to it better than reviewers. The entire first season — eight episodes — is currently available to stream on Amazon Prime Video.
