Shadow and Bone has been an ambitious fantasy series by Netflix based on Leigh Bardugo’s popular Grishaverse books. The showrunner is Eric Heisserer and the cast features Jessie Mei Li, Archie Renaux, Freddy Carter, and Ben Barnes.
The first season of the show premiered on Netflix in April 2021, and season 2 arrived in March 2023. More than three months have passed since the release of the second season but there has been no official word regarding the renewal of the series nor the rumored spinoff, Six of Crows.
The renewal of any Netflix series comes down to sheer numbers. Netflix analyzes its internal data to understand how the audience is interacting with a particular series. As opposed to the hours of viewership, Netflix has now shifted its focus to the completion of a series.
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Let’s take a look at Netflix’s data about Shadow and Bone.
According to Netflix’s hourly top 10 data, Shadow and Bone featured in the top 10 for five weeks, accumulating a total of 160.79 million hours watched. Here’s a breakdown of the viewership from week to week:
– March 12th, 2023, to March 19th, 2023: 50.4 million hours viewed (Rank 2, 1 week in the top 10)
– March 19th, 2023, to March 26th, 2023: 55.03 million hours viewed (+9%, Rank 2, 2 weeks in the top 10)
– March 26th, 2023, to April 2nd, 2023: 27 million hours viewed (-51%, Rank 3, 3 weeks in the top 10)
– April 2nd, 2023, to April 9th, 2023: 16.74 million hours viewed (-38%, Rank 6, 4 weeks in the top 10)
– April 9th, 2023, to April 16th, 2023: 11.62 million hours viewed (-31%, Rank 9, 5 weeks in the top 10)
The show seems to have been very popular in the beginning but that popularity declined over time. This decline in viewership may have contributed to Netflix not renewing it immediately.
i know he's the darkling but this photo is pure sunshine pic.twitter.com/YFQEesmi02
— Shadow And Bone (@shadowandbone_) May 5, 2023
However, there are other factors at play. The Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike is responsible for the uncertain future of a lot of shows. Also considering that another season will take two more years to come out, the interest might completely wane out.
Sophie Holland, the casting director for the series, expressed hope for a third season in an interview with Deadline in late May 2023. She said, “We’re really hoping for a third season. It seems to have a huge fan base. It’s a fresh, up-and-coming cast, and the story is very faithful to the books, which is refreshing. It’s all about that first month’s performance on Netflix, I guess, so we’ll find out soon if it’s being recommissioned. It’s a tricky time, as you noted, so we’ll see.”
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