Is The Idol Getting a Season 2 Renewal Despite Ratings Drop?

HBO's show starring Abel 'The Weeknd' Tesfaye and Lily-Rose Depp is on everyone's mind right now. The Idol has not only garnered some great ratings after its pilot was released, but also caused a huge controversy with thousands of people threatening to boycott the series due to an outrageous amount of explicit content and nudity.

However, it seems that even abysmal reviews from esteemed critics can't stop people from watching the show, as the ratings for the second episode are still quite respectable.

Episode 1 of The Idol had 913,000 viewers glued to their screens, which is a great number for a new series. The second episode was in turn watched by only 800,000 people, and a 12% drop in viewership numbers is no joke for HBO. But can it really hurt The Idol to get a second season renewal?

Not at all, as the second episode retaining 88% of the pilot viewers is actually a fantastic result. Considering that The Idol's Season 1 will only have six episodes, people won't get tired of the show and will surely want to see the story continued in Season 2 and beyond.

'They lost 12% only on linear (HBO live programming). Viewership on the streaming service, max, stayed steady for Episode 2,' one fan pointed out.

However, this still doesn't mean that HBO will decide to continue the story after the first season, as The Idol was always billed as a limited series, specifically created to fit into a six-episode narrative structure.

Also, due to all the controversy surrounding the show, it's somewhat unlikely that Lily-Rose Depp and other actors would want to return to their roles in Season 2, as The Idol is already affecting their public image and careers, and not in a good way.

To figure out HBO's plans for the future of The Idol, we'll have to wait until the final episode of Season 1 airs on July 9, 2023. If it ends with a cliffhanger, this would be a good sign that the network wants to renew the show. Besides, The Idol's ratings are still quite high despite all the controversy, so a renewal is not out of the question.

The next episode of The Idol will air on June 18, 2023.

Source: Reddit.