This article was published on 3/28 and republished on 3/29 and 3/31.
I think Netflix is going to have to consider this one a miss. 3 Body Problem, reportedly Netflix’s most expensive first season of a show at $20 million an episode, has already been replaced at #1 on Netflix’s Top 10 list after spending just a couple of days there, which does not bode well for its future prospects.
The new show on top is Testament: The Story of Moses, a biblical docudrama series that I am guessing has roughly 0.01% of 3 Body Problem’s budget, and that show’s performance is a legitimate concern given its high cost. From the data we know it had 11 million viewers its first four days, but at a reported cost of $160 million. Compare that to Avatar: The Last Airbender’s 21 million in 4 days on a $120 million budget. And a show like 1899 had 11 million views on a $62 million budget, and was cancelled.
It’s not just budget to view ratio, as Netflix also looks at things like how many people actually finished a series, indicating how likely they would be to return for a second season. But as I’ve already explained in past pieces, Netflix is in a really tough spot here because it would be embarrassing for them to put this much investment into a project and only adapt one book out of three. And there’s the fact that the show underperformed when it’s from Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and DB Weiss, part of a pricey overall deal with those two. If anything, that relationship could float 3 Body Problem as Netflix may be more likely to give a show some leeway in that situation, but again, we’re talking about a series that could cost half a billion dollars for all three seasons, which is a tough sell unless it’s a high viewership megahit.
The rest of the list is not especially interesting right now. The Gentlemen is down to #5, far and away a much more clear success story than 3 Body Problem spending two full weeks as the #1 show on the service. It has not been renewed for season 2 yet, but unlike 3 Body Problem, it seems like a guarantee. In that case, yes, high viewership, low cost. And I’m guessing more people will have finished that show over the much more obtuse 3 Body Problem.
We’ll see what happens over the next few weeks. I think Netflix is going to be in a very tough spot when it comes to making a decision to fully pot-commit to 3 Body Problem or not, as if you do a second season, you almost have to do a third to finish the trilogy instead of leaving it in your “canceled show” graveyard with so many others. That would be one of the worst examples yet.
Update (3/29): The creators are now talking more about “the last season or two” when it comes to this show, operating under the assumption that it will indeed be renewed in order to cover the last two books, assuming those books would not be broken into multiple seasons themselves. They actually say that they envision a four season structure, but they’re not sure.
They talk about what they hope to do when they get to those later seasons:
“As the story goes on, those things increase both in number and just what the f***? intensity. There are more of those things in the second book than the first, and much more in the third book than the second. If we do justice to those things onscreen, by the time you get to the last season or two of the show, we would be giving people an experience they’ve never had before. We’re very hopeful we can get there, because it just gets wilder and wilder as you go. The three of us would love to tell the story to its glorious culmination.”
The problem, as mentioned, is whether viewership merits continued investment. They’re right, the books only get even more insane from here, and as such, much more VFX heavy and likely more expensive. This is already a hugely expensive show at $20 million an episode and it seems impossible for those costs to go down with the content that needs to come, so this would be quite the investment for Netflix to continue the series. Even keeping the costs exactly the same somehow, it would be half a billion dollars for three seasons and closer to $640 million for four seasons, if they stretched it that far. That seems somewhat insane given what else gets cancelled over there, but they just might do it anyway. We’ll have to see.
Update (3/31): Checking back on the list, despite being just three episodes, Testament: The Story of Moses has still not fallen from the #1 spot, meaning 3 Body Problem stays at #2 for a few days and will likely not return there. Moses may be getting a boost from religious viewers for Easter (Moses was not involved in Easter, but still a biblical figure), and that may be keeping it up there when it might have moved down otherwise.
The Gentlemen is still holding strong at #4, now approaching a month since its release, though Netflix has still not made any comment about season 2 of that show, despite it seeming like a guarantee. My guess is that Netflix will take a little while to make a final decision on 3 Body Problem, namely to figure out if it might have long term legs. But if we see it continue to drop as expected without making it back to #1, that’s not a good sign. Word of mouth can sustain many shows in time and actually spark renewal, but 3 Body Problem is just reviewing “okay,” and that seems like it won’t be a huge force here. It has a 77% from critics and an 81% from audience (which has increased over time) but this isn’t One Piece we’re talking about here with its 95% audience score.
As I’ve said, it’s also likely that if Netflix agrees to season 2, they are pot committed for both season 2 and season 3, and possibly even a season 4, as the showrunners have expressed they may have to break the last book in half, given its size. Its argued that those are the “better” books, and no doubt fans would love to see the entire thing realized. But it will cost Netflix to see this through. Really, they can pick whether they have a complete picture of one of the most famous sci-fi trilogies ever with a full adaptation series, or they can choose to save another $400-500 billion by just ending it now. I hope they go for it, but I don’t think it’s a sure thing given what’s happening.
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