Apple TV’s Big New Sci-Fi Series Is Already Planning More Seasons

We’re still a couple of weeks away from the premiere of Murderbot, but the series creators Chris and Paul Weitz are already hopeful about the chance for future seasons. The show adapts Martha Wells’ series of novellas and novels The Murderbot Diaries, and it sounds like this debut season will only adapt the first novella in the series, so there’s definitely enough to keep the show going for years. In an interview with io9 published on Wednesday, the Weitz brothers said that they would be eager to tackle more of SecUnit’s adventures on the Corporate Rim. For now, it all hangs on the response to Season 1, which premieres on May 16th on Apple TV+.

The Murderbot Diaries start with four novellas published in 2017 and 2018, followed by a full-length novel, another novella, and the latest novel published in 2023. We know that Season 1 of the TV series draws only from the first novella, All Systems Red, but Paul Weitz told io9: “We would love to adapt more of them. [We would] make sure that Martha liked what we were thinking, for sure. We love that there’s a real ending to the first season, but also the ending is the beginning of something Murderbot [as a character].”

“If people like the first season, there’ll be a desire to see Murderbot reunited in some fashion with the [other characters it meets],” added Chris. “I think that that would be something that we’d really want to look at in terms of figuring out what a second season would look like.”

[RELATED: Murderbot: Everything You Need to Know About the New Apple TV+ Scifi Series]

Even the barest hint of more seasons caused a big stir among fans online, as many of most beloved characters and sci-fi elements of the story aren’t explored until the second novella or later. On social media, fans are already hard at work debating their dream cast for future storylines that they hope to see adapted. At the same time, many appreciated the Weitz brothers’ deference to Wells in this interview, and their commentary about working so closely with her.

That’s not say that the storyline from All Systems Red is a bad way to start the TV show. This first season will be a perfect introduction to SecUnit and its relationship with this brutal future it lives in. The story is set in a time when humanity has spread out into space to colonize planets and moons, and to live on space stations between them. However, power is heavily concentrated among corporations, and both humans and artificial constructs like SecUnit live under their thumbs.

Murderbot hits Apple TV+ on Friday, May 16th. There’s no official word on a possible renewal yet. Wells’ Murderbot Diaries books are available now in print, digital, and audiobook formats.