Fans of the Rings of Power will undoubtedly not have to wait a full 24 months to see Middle-earth again. The fantasy series won’t likely return until about 2024, though. Given that each of its seasons only has eight episodes, the lengthy wait period may seem outrageous and unexpected.
However, House of the Dragon on HBO viewers are in the same situation. The first season of the Game of Thrones prequel just finished airing last week, but work on season two won’t begin until early in 2019. HBO president Casey Bloys recently told Vulture, “Don’t anticipate [season two] in ’23, but I think sometime in ’24.”
The same is true with Andor, the most recent Star Wars phenomenon on Disney+. When questioned about the second and final season of the program, showrunner Tony Gilroy said to The Wrap, “I have two more years to go.” “[Season two] will be filmed from November to August. Additionally, our last post-production took nearly a year.
Epic series is progressively making viewers wait an epic amount of time for new episodes, even if none of these shows have officially announced a launch date. It’s almost come to be accepted as the norm for a particular class of lavishly produced plays. While many in the television industry are required to release a season of material once a year, a small number can slow their roll (out) to once every 16 to 24 months. These productions usually need up to 10 months for filming and an additional 10 months for postproduction visual effects.
The concept of a two-year break isn’t novel, to be sure. The last season of The Sopranos on HBO was infamously delayed by two years in 2006. Similarly, the special effects-heavy. However, Game of Thrones last season was what appeared to signal a tidal change. The first seven seasons of the fantasy drama from 2011 are broadcast once a year. After then, viewers had to wait until 2019 for the season’s eighth and climax season. Many criticized the last run’s creativity, but the six episodes were visually stunning and set viewership records. The season may have established a new benchmark for the number of resources, time, and money that can be put into a season. It also demonstrated that viewers wouldn’t stop watching a highly anticipated program after a lengthy wait.
At the same time, the magnitude of this industrial transition cannot be overstated. Broadcast networks launched several serialized dramas in the aftermath of ABC’s Lost’s breakthrough in 2004, but every time they had to suspend their weekly rollout, they chewed their nails. Any pause was viewed as a high-stakes bet that might ruin a show because there was no simple method for fans to catch up on previous episodes. After showing ten episodes of its post-apocalyptic thriller Revolution, NBC faced criticism in 2012. At the time, Salke was NBC’s head of entertainment, and he promised a reporter.