“Carnival Row” will end after just two seasons at Amazon, with the streamer set to launch the new and final installment of the fantasy drama in early 2023.
Season 2 of the series will launch on Feb. 17, with new episodes dropping weekly thereafter. The season will consist of 10 episodes. “Carnival Row’s” first season aired on Amazon back in August 2019. It was renewed for a second season in July of that year ahead of the series premiere. Amazon did not release any kind of viewership data on the show, but it received mixed reviews from critics upon its launch. The first season holds a 57% critical approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
In his review for PvNew, Daniel D’Addario wrote, “This new series reaches for credibility with gruesomeness and exaggeration, falling flat at every turn. It’s painful proof that a genre success cannot be reverse-engineered.”
The sudden conclusion of the series marks the end of the long road the project took to the screen. The series is based on Travis Beacham’s original feature script “A Killing on Carnival Row,” which first appeared on the Black List in 2005. It was initially put into development as a series at Amazon around early 2015, with Amazon ordering it to series in 2017. Production had begun on Season 2 not long after the debut of Season 1, but was forced to shutdown upon the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Production did not officially end on the second season until September 2021.
Per the official description of Season 2, it “picks up with former inspector Rycroft Philostrate a.k.a. Philo (Orlando Bloom) investigating a series of gruesome murders stoking social tension. Vignette Stonemoss (Cara Delevingne) and the Black Raven plot payback for the unjust oppression inflicted by The Burgue’s human leaders, Jonah Breakspear (Arty Froushan) and Sophie Longerbane (Caroline Ford). Tourmaline (Karla Crome) inherits supernatural powers that threaten her fate and the future of The Row. And, after escaping The Burgue and her vengeful brother Ezra (Andrew Gower), Imogen Spurnrose (Tamzin Merchant) and her partner Agreus Astrayon (David Gyasi) encounter a radical new society which upends their plans.”
Beacham is an executive producer on “Carnival Row” along with Bloom, Delevigne, showrunner Erik Oleson, Brad Van Arragon, Sarah Byrd, Jim Dunn, Sam Ernst, and Wesley Strick. The series is co-produced by Amazon Studios and Legendary Television.
