Snowpiercer to run out of steam with its fourth season on TNT
The series, based on Bong Joon-Ho's 2013 post-apocalyptic parable, will wrap up with its next season
Aux News Snowpiercer
Deadline confirms tonight that Snowpiercer, the TV adaptation of Bong Joon-Ho’s post-apocalyptic dystopia of the same name, will wrap up its run with its upcoming fourth season on TNT. The show’s cast, which includes Daveed Diggs, Jennifer Connelly, Mickey Sumner, Sean Bean, and Alison Wright, has apparently had the options on their contracts lapse, usually the death-knell for any series that’s sitting on the bubble of a possible cancellation.
Like the film, Snowpiercer takes place (at least, initially) on a single endlessly running supertrain that appears to be the last bastion of human life in a world where the planet has frozen. The series focused much of its energy on Connelly’s Melanie, a high-powered member of the group that runs the train, and Diggs as Andre Layton, a detective hoping to overthrow the oppressive government Melanie represents.
Snowpiercer the show has, understandably, pushed this story quite a bit further from the not-especially-complicated class parable of Bong’s film, ending its recent third season on a cliffhanger showing that, yeah, there are probably other people out there somewhere amidst the tundra. The show’s fourth season is currently in production, which suggests that the series’ creators might have enough time to steer the train to a safe station, so to speak. The show previously announced that it was adding Clark Gregg and Michael Aronov to the cast of what’s now going to be its final season.
TNT released a statement about the show’s ending today, saying, “We can confirm that Snowpiercer will end after a successful, multi-season run on TNT. Its talented writers, actors and crew took an extraordinary premise and brought it to life in thrilling ways. It was critically acclaimed, had a significant impact on the post-apocalyptic genre, and now remains in the hearts and minds of fans forever.” Which is a pretty grandiose claim there at the end; we can’t wait for our own descendants, years from now, to pass on the oral traditions of the TNT Snowpiercer show, providing some comfort to each other as they cope with their own climate-induced apocalypse.
18 Comments
This is the rare show that has gotten better with each season. That said, I’m not surprised that it is nearing the end. It is somehow more grounded, yet not quite as good as the movie.
Half the train, and it’s passengers, are literally grounded now.I’m not sure where they’d go after this coming season.Sorry it’s ending, but it’s probably just as well.Wish AVClub would follow/review it again.
The 2nd season was far better than the 1st but I don’t think the 3rd season was as good. With the talent of the cast, the show needs better writers.
This is good. I like this show, but it needs an end before it goes off the tracks.
before it goes off the tracks.Too late. For Layton’s group anyway.
Yeah their storyline has been derailed.
I never watched an episode (if the original pilot had aired, that would have been another story), and I’m impressed it lasted four seasons after all the behind-the-scenes complications.
Plus it being a hot mess of a show to watch.
I’m sure the writers have been writing this as a series finale for a while now. There’s no way you can look at Zaslav killing almost every scripted live-action show on the various Warner channels and think your show is going to escape for very long.
Once Snowpiercer ends, that’s it for TNT as far as scripted live-action stuff goes. They’ll still have NBA, AEW, and stuff like that, but no more dramas from them. TBS will likely follow suit soon, as well. Their only scripted shows right now are American Dad, Chad, and Miracle Workers, and I very much doubt the latter two will be continuing for very long.
Yes, I think this is the main story here – the extinction of scripted shows on TNT (and probably TBS soon). I know we have a lot of options with streaming but it’s still unfortunate that the WB/Discovery merger appears to be cutting creative tasks for cheap, reality shit in all likelihood.
Yeah, American Dad was already renewed, but if WB/Discovery somehow wiggles out of that agreement, the show will probably end up on FXX or Hulu.
If the deal Warner signed with Fox Animation (now 20th Century Animation) allows it, there’s also the possibility it could be moved to Adult Swim the Sunday night premieres of new American Dad episodes on AS apparently pull in better ratings than they did the previous Monday on TBS. There’s a story going around about animators at 20th Century Animation planning unionize and it specifically names the animation team behind American Dad as some of them, so it sounds like they have no plans to go anywhere in the foreseeable future.
I’m glad they will know it is the final season so they can give it a proper ending. The premise is ridiculous (I thought it was ridiculous when I saw the movie and still think it is) and it isn’t a perfect show but I like it.
Why is the premise any more ridiculous than all the various “stuck on a space ship/station” shows? And it’s far LESS ridiculous than some shows that got more than 4 seasons (Stargate, Sliders, 12 Monkeys, etc.)
“Ridiculous premise.” Guess you are unfamiliar with the Bible. It has people living in whales.
Two premises can both be ridiculous.
The cable prestige drama is going to be entirely dead in a couple of years.
It’s good they will be able to hit the finale the want, but the end of season 3 felt like it was the perfect one. (Spoilers ahead) with the group being able to go outside and the other being on the train subject to doom. Also, finally killing the serial killer.