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HBO has ordered a second helping of The Leftovers.
The premium cable network announced Wednesday that it has renewed the Damon Lindelof drama for a second season.
“We are thrilled to bring back The Leftovers for a second season with the exceptional talents of Damon Lindelof and Tom Perrotta,” HBO programming president Michael Lombardo said. “It has been truly exciting to see the overwhelming response to their provocative and original storytelling. We look forward to continuing the journey as the show delves deeper into the lives of those who remain.”
The drama, based on Perrotta’s best-seller and starring Justin Theroux, enjoyed a solid (if not altogether exciting) premiere audience in June when it opened to 1.7 million viewers. That figure put it nearly half a million south of HBO’s previous drama debut, True Detective, from January. But as is the case with most HBO shows, the series has been reaping its biggest ratings from time-shifting, encores and streams on the HBO Go app. The series has surged to nearly 8 million weekly viewers once all platforms are taken into account.
The Leftovers hails from Warner Bros. Television, HBO’s first outside studio buy. The cabler, which typically owns all its original programming, is also developing another pilot from WBTV (Westworld) as well as one from 20th Century Fox Television (Ryan Murphy‘s Open).
HBO originally picked up the rights to The Leftovers in 2011 after Lindelof read the book and tracked the rights back to the network. After signing an overall deal with WBTV, he met with Perrotta and started talking about what a series take would look like.
For HBO, The Leftovers comes as the cabler is poised to say farewell to three dramas. True Blood, The Newsroom and Boardwalk Empire will all end their respective runs with their upcoming seasons. Meanwhile, megahit Game of Thrones has already been locked up for seasons five and six as HBO prepares a second season of anthology True Detective as well as new comedies including The Comeback, Ballers and The Brink, among returning fare Silicon Valley, Getting On, Girls, Veep and more.
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