Calls for Pantheon Season 3 have reached a crescendo as the series makes its Netflix debut.
The adult animated sci-fi series originally aired for two seasons on AMC and Amazon Prime Video from 2021 to 2022. After the first season aired on AMC+, the show's second (and possibly final) batch of episodes arrived on the Amazon-owned streamer.
Pantheon told an ever-more creepy tale steeped in technological paranoia, exploring the consequences of uploading one's consciousness to the cloud.
Pantheon Season 3 Outcry Reaches a Fever Pitch
Following Pantheon Season 2's debut on Netflix in the U.S., fan demand for a potential Season 3 grew significantly online.
The AMC sci-fi series finally debuted its second season (from 2022) on Netflix, leading many to make their pleas for more episodes. The original series was only greenlit on a two-season order (via Variety) from AMC before technically being canceled, but long have fans wanted it to return in some form down the line.
Speaking with Book and Film Globe at the time of Season 2's debut, author Ken Lui (who wrote many of the short stories the series is based on) said they had deliberately set up the end of Season 2 knowing it was bringing the entire story to a close:
"'Seven Birthdays' was not originally part of the 'Pantheon' package of stories. However, when we were working on the show, Craig wanted to work out the cosmic implications of UI over a long period of time. 'Altogether Elsewhere, Vast Herds of Reindeer' had a huge time jump going from the world of Maddie to CloudWorld, and Craig wanted to do something similar (but even grander) for the big cosmic jump at the end of season two. He settled on 'Seven Birthdays' as a nice way to circle back to the beginning, to connect what will be with what was, and so that story was added to the set of stories late in the development process."
Ultimately, the choice to not renew the series at the time came down to viewership numbers. In that same interview, Lui admitted he "wish [the show] had gotten a bigger audience:"
"I’m so glad that I got to be part of 'Pantheon.' Everyone, from Craig and the writers to the animation artists and voice actors and…all put their heart and soul into it, and I really think the result is something we can all be proud of. I wish it had gotten a bigger audience, but the audience we did and do have are the best, smartest thinkers I could wish for. Few artists get to have that, and I’m glad that I got so lucky."
While Season 3 felt like something that would never happen when Season 2 came to an end, that is not to say its revival is entirely impossible.
In recent years, the appetite for smart sci-fi series like Pantheon has only grown. Hits like Silo, Dark Matter, and Scavenger's Reign (which is awaiting a renewal of its own) have all proven to be both critically acclaimed and moderate viewership success stories.
Now that the series is on Netflix in its entirety, a whole new audience has been opened up to the idea of Pantheon. If this new lease on life for the show were to boil over into something greater, then surely conversations of a revival would at least have to be had at a cursory level.
In the past, Netflix has brought back series that managed to capture an audience after their back catalog of episodes on the streamer. Hit shows like Arrested Development, Lucifer, and Dreamworks' Dragons series have all gotten the revival treatment, potentially pointing to something like Pantheon getting the same.
That could only happen though if the series were to reach a level of success the streamer deems worthy of being brought back from the dead (think something like the upcoming King of the Hill reboot).
Pantheon is now streaming on Netflix.
