Sophie, could u address this, maybe? just gonna lay out some things I've heard and would like to get your take. I've been hoping amc might have secretly renewed TVL for season 4 already. But Mark Johnson said this in Collider when he was asked about doing more shows in the immortal universe "We're very lucky in that AMC has not given us a mandate. It's not like we need four shows, and these are the dates on them. It's much more natural and organic. Most importantly, given that we're having this conversation, we want desperately and are doing our utmost to think about a Season 4 of the show we're talking about right now. I have to believe it's inevitable. What do I know? But there's no way we can't continue this, this saga, we can't continue Lestat and Louis... We have two or three that probably I shouldn't announce quite right now, but we are robustly developing, and hopefully we'll have, before you know it, a third show and hopefully a fourth."
That sounds like it hasn't been renewed officially, though I know it's hard to take everything they say about that at face value. Then there were some people at ATX who said that Rolin suggested that AMC had been really unsure about all the big swings of the season, but that he said there'd been a really big change (he meant a positive change) in the several weeks lead up to ATX. And then there were a couple people at the Beacon concert who heard Rolin talking about season 4 in a way that sounded very confident to them, though he wasn't confirming anything. A lot of people also felt Hannah was talking about season 4 in interviews in a way that sounded confident.
Sam said in this RT interview that Rolin had to convince the network to let him take some of these big swings, and they didn't want to. Which perhaps isn't shocking when it's such a shift. So if there was some big change in the weeks leading up to ATX, and then people felt Rolin seemed confident in NYC, could it be that AMC was like, okay we're really not sure about this, this is a big swing and a big risk, so we're going to let you do it, but we're really concerned it's going to fail---and then they started to get word of how screeners were reacting and what the critical buzz was, and that assured them that the swings had been successful?
It's just so hard for me to see them canceling the show because wouldn't that mean the failure of the immortal universe? Any new show they got from that IP would come with articles talking about the failure of the flagship show, and wouldn't a lot of iwtv fans not want to watch those other shows? And I know that rave reviews don't necessarily make the network money, but to cancel a show that once again is one of the best-reviewed shows of the year would surprise me. I could see them limiting the episodes or winding up the series faster than season 5 or 6 (the show Looking got canceled but got a 2-hour movie to end things properly), but outright just not doing anything else with it? Rolin and Hannah said they made 3.07 work as a series finale just in case, even with cliffhangers, which was true of 2.08 as well, but that wouldn't change the awareness of AMC canceling it.
I would just love to get a renewal sooner rather than later. Dark Winds was renewed before the 4th season started. But IWTV wasn't renewed until right before the finale for season 2. And just now, Widow's Bay was renewed right before the finale.
Apologies for yammering on, and if this is kind of spiraling. I felt like this with season 2 too, there was a lot of parsing of comments and trying to figure out if the show had been renewed or not. I remember Sam saying that he wanted the wolfkiller cloak in the season in case they didn't get season 3, and people were really alarmed by that. But yep would love your take.
Mm, I mean, it wouldn't be the failure of the flagship show, really. Three seasons is a respectable innings, and AMC kind of has a get out of jail free card with how they've chosen to adapt them now to be able to make the case that IWTV was its own very successful adaptation, and this season will be a very successful adaptation of TVL, which it already is in terms of critical response, media attention and, it seems, audience numbers. AMC could pretty easily at this point position a cancellation as a completion of a series and still have the opportunity to revisit other books which don't feature Louis or Lestat, or feature them in a cameo capacity down the track. There's a path for AMC there, if they chose to take it.
That said, I don't think they will. I think AMC is pretty clearly committed to it as the flagship show at this point, and while they are navigating a complex political and economic ecosystem right now which does seem to be trickling down in some ways creatively, I don't think that's going to change. If it was, this season likely wouldn't have been made at all, much less with the louder, more bombastic marketing campaign that it's really embraced.
There are probably still discussions happening behind the scenes, but I do think it's likely at this point from the way they've been talking that they've been quietly given the thumbs up, but things like viewing numbers and public attention are being monitored to determine how much they're willing to spend on an s4. A part of everyone hedging on the press tour in the way they are does feel to me partially about encouraging viewership, but it is hard to know for sure, of course. I do hope we get proper confirmation soon though, and I feel like there's a good chance we will :-)
