Big Little Lies Season 2 Isn’t Coming Until 2019

A sincere apology to everyone who enjoyed HBO’s journey to Monterey, California, last year in Big Little Lies—because the drama’s second season will not be airing anytime soon. In fact, the series is not returning until next year. With Game of Thrones also on the shelf until 2019, as well as the third season of True Detective, this year might be a little rough for the premium cabler.

To be clear, 2018 will be far from a barren wasteland for HBO—Silicon Valley will return, as will Insecure, Ballers, and Westworld. But none of those series bring in even close to the viewership numbers that HBO enjoys with Game of Thrones, and the return of Big Little Lies or True Detective would have helped soften that blow.

HBO programming president Casey Bloys dismissed doomsayers in a Friday interview with The Hollywood Reporter, saying, “Everyone wrote last year about how we’d be in trouble without Game of Thrones [at the Emmys] and we did just fine. This is an old story because every year, ‘Oh, my God! What is HBO going to do?!’ Last year, that was it—we were going to die at the Emmys without Game of Thrones.”

Coming this year to HBO will be the return of several comedies, including Silicon Valley, Ballers, Insecure, Divorce, Crashing, and Veep—which will ring in its final season—as well as the new family drama Here and Now, the Bill Hader vehicle Barry, and the political drama Succession. HBO will also premiere several original movies, including an adaptation of Fahrenheit 451 starring Michael Shannon and Michael B. Jordan. A trip back to Monterey might not be possible this year, but for disappointed Big Little Lies fans, at least there’s no shortage of backup destinations.

Get Vanity Fair’s HWD NewsletterSign up for essential industry and award news from Hollywood.Laura BradleyLaura Bradley is a Hollywood writer for VanityFair.com. She was formerly an editorial assistant at Slate and lives in Brooklyn.

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