NBC has renewed “Hannibal” for a second season.
The Bryan Fuller-produced drama, starring Hugh Dancy as criminal profiler Will Graham and Mads Mikkelsen as infamous serial killer Hannibal Lecter, has easily been NBC’s best new show of the season, and perhaps the best-reviewed new show on any of the broadcast networks this season. But because it premiered so late in the spring, and because the ratings have been modest at best, the network held off on deciding to renew or cancel at the upfronts earlier this month.
Instead, the good news came tonight, only a few hours before the next new episode airs at 10 p.m. The renewal is for another 13-episode season, to debut “no earlier than midseason.”
Tag: hannibal
NBC, are you trying to kill Hannibal?
First NBC refuses to air the fourth episode of their very good Hannibal series and now they’re cutting a full 15 minutes out of the eighth episode of the series. 15 minutes removed means that the actual show will be about 30 minutes long which isn’t a lot of story time for a series like Hannibal.
I get that NBC is trying to extra-extra supersize the last episode of The Office, but why do it at the expense of one of their new dramas? Why not extra-extra-extra supersize The Office, air something like the very first episode of The Office after and then show the COMPLETE Hannibal the next week? C’mon!
What I’m Watching, April 2013
Sunday:
- Game of Thrones (HBO): Game of Thrones is the best of the best series in a spring season of a lot of great dramas.
- Veep (HBO): I don’t think there’s been a lot of good comedies on TV recently but Veep is a big exception.
- Mad Men (AMC): I think Mad Men‘s finest days might be behind it, but it’s still a great show.
Wednesday
- The Americans (FX): I honestly didn’t think that The Americans was going to be a good show, let alone a great one when I first heard about it. How happy I am to be wrong.
Thursday
- Hannibal (NBC): Even if NBC has decided not to air all episodes of Hannibal I still think this is the finest network TV drama in a loooooooong time. It’s the one network show I actually look forward to watch each week.
Saturday
- Doctor Who (BBC America): Episodes of Doctor Who this year have been spotty at best but I still dig the Doctor and his new companion.
On the DVR
- Orphan Black (BBC America): I watched one episode of Orphan Black and liked it but never got into it enough to check out other ones. All episodes are still on my DVR and I think I’ll end up watching them someday soon.
Looking forward to…
- Arrested Development (Netflix, May 26): I think the return of my all-time favorite TV series of the last decade is a very big deal, not only for the return of the Bluth family but also for Netflix’s continuing commitment to quality original series.
- The Bridge (FX, July)
- Low Winter Sun (AMC, Summer)
Hannibal is too good of a show for NBC
The hour, which features a storyline about children killing other children, was removed from the network’s schedule in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing. The hour, titled “Ceuf,” has instead been released as a six-part web series and released Wednesday, a day before the fifth episode of the series.
I get that NBC is trying to be sensitive to recent events, but why pull the episode instead of delay it? With NBC’s fortunes currently in the toilet it seems to me that they should be taking risks exactly like they’re doing with Hannibal to improve their chances rather than taking what they don’t like about the show, editing it for content and hiding the remains on the web for a few to see.
I’m really digging Hannibal, but a move like this by NBC makes me question the future of the series.