Months After HBO Canceled The Idol, We're Still Talking About It

It's hard to deny that HBO's The Idol, co-created by The Weeknd and Sam Levinson, was one of the biggest duds of 2023, as everyone from critics to fans panned the show throughout its first season. People were not okay with the amount of nudity and violence the co-creators put into the series, and the fact that the two actually fired a previous showrunner and reshot the whole installment from scratch only made things worse.

While the first season of The Idol clearly left a lot to be desired, as the characters resembled paper cutouts more than actual characters, I think HBO jumped the shark a bit by canceling the show right after the first season, and here's why.

The New Puritans

While it's true that the first season featured tons of nudity and violent scenes that often degraded Lily-Rose Depp's Jocelyn as a person, that doesn't mean that the actress was treated poorly on set. On the contrary, Depp seemed more than happy with the final material, as she was willing to give her all to make the show as good as possible.

And even though the show turned out to be a mixed bag, the amount of hate The Idol got for showing nudity was just ridiculous. Directors have been using nudity for almost a century at this point, and there's nothing offensive about it, as the human body is an extremely vulnerable thing to display unclothed, so nudity can really help the movie or show tell the story it needs to with much more power and passion.

Season two was a necessity

I'm not trying to convince anyone that The Idol was a misunderstood masterpiece; on the contrary, the first season was a huge missed opportunity and a colossal train wreck. However, The Idol clearly showed a lot of potential for future development, and HBO should have let Levinson and The Weeknd tell their story.

Singer Grimes recently shared the same sentiment, so perhaps The Weeknd and Levinson could still get a shot at continuing The Idol on another network.