3 Body Problem Showrunners Explain Confusing Renewal News

Earlier this month, Netflix announced that one of its newest hit series, 3 Body Problem, had been renewed but the announcement wasn’t exactly straightforward. Instead of being a standard new season announcement, the adaptation of Cixin Liu’s bestselling sci-fi trilogy was getting additional episodes, more specifically that “Netflix will bring this epic story through its mind-blowing conclusion”. Now, showrunners D.B. Weiss and David Benioff are clarifying what the announcement means for the series.

Speaking with The Hollywood Reporter (via ScreenRant), the showrunners said that they plan to work on the episodes for the next three years as they spent four years working on the first season, but the number of episodes and seasons has not yet been confirmed.

“We knew going into this how many hours we need to tell the rest of the story because we’ve got a roadmap through to the end,” Weiss said. “And we have what we need to get to the end as intended from where we started.”

“By the time we finish with the show, it will be seven years we’ve devoted to it,” Benioff added. “We’re not at a place where we get to tell the rest of the story, and, yes, we have enough time to tell the rest of the story the way we want to and that’s immensely gratifying.”

What is 3 Body Problem About?

Netflix’s 3 Body Problem is an adaptation of Cixin Liu’s bestselling sci-fi trilogy. Here is how Netflix describes the series: “A young woman’s fateful decision in 1960’s China reverberates across space and time to a group of brilliant scientists in the present day. As the laws of nature unravel before their eyes, five former colleagues reunite to confront the greatest threat in humanity’s history.” The series stars Game of Thrones alum Cunningham, John Bradley, and Jonathan Pryce along with Jess Hong (Inked), Benedict Wong (Doctor Strange), Eiza González (Baby Driver), Jovan Adepo (The Leftovers), Alex Sharp (The Trial of the Chicago 7), Saamer Usmani (Succession), Rosalind Chao (Mulan), Marlo Kelly (Joe vs. Carole), Sea Shimooka (CW’s Arrow), Ben Schnetzer (Warcraft), and newcomer Zine Tseng.

Benioff and Weiss Have Been Planning For More Episodes

Well before the official renewal announcement was made, Benioff and Weiss revealed that they were planning for more episodes of 3 Body Problem with Weiss explaining at the time that the show requires them to hit the ground running in order to make things work.

“We don’t have a second season, but we need to keep pushing forward full steam ahead as if we did,” Weiss said earlier this year. “Because if we do get a second season, we’ll need to hit the ground running in terms of pre-production and production to get it out to people in some kind of reasonable time. A show like this takes a long time to make and you can’t wait to get started thinking about it until somebody gives you the greenlight.”

“I think we have a pretty evolved sense of where it’s going,” he added. “We’ve been doing some work on that front and the subsequent seasons after that are a lot hazier because once you really get into the weeds on a season of television it really takes all of your waking hours, and there’s not much time left to be simultaneously plotting a third or a fourth season. So, the short answer is yes, we’ve got a second season that is being formulated and kept on deck in the event that we get to go ahead.”

3 Body Problem is now streaming on Netflix.