Why ‘The Diplomat’ season 2 on Netflix was cut to just six episodes

On By Littum

One of Netflix’s best sleeper shows in a while, The Diplomat, returns for Season 2 this coming Thursday on Halloween, despite its lack of spookiness. But when viewers log on, they’ll notice something unfortunate that Season 2 has been cut down to just six episodes, down from the eight we got for Season 1.

Of course, everyone’s first instinct will be to blame Netflix, as this wouldn’t be the first time we’ve seen episode orders cut, likely for budgetary reasons. It is an understandable conclusion. However, that is not what happened here. This is actually a judgment call from the creator of the series Debora Cahn, who actually told Netflix a lot did not want this:

“It was my decision,” Cahn told TVLine“(Netflix) wasn’t happy. They wanted the whole eight….I was really tired. It was a time thing. It felt like there wasn’t enough time to turn around eight of them. It was very to do in what appeared to be a short period of time.”

But as it turned out, it didn’t actually have to happen. Originally, Cahn was told they had less time to turn around Season 2, but that ended up being a timeline that was expanded to a new, slightly industry-standard 18 months. Cahn says that from the start, if she knew, she might could has made the eight episodes Netflix (and fans) wanted. So it is clear that something has gone wrong here.

Hopefully that won’t happen for Season 3, and yes, there will be a Season 3 since Netflix really likes the show and it’s already been renewed two weeks ago ahead of Thursday’s Season 2 premiere. Production has already started, indicating that things may be back on track, and with a proper timeline, an eight-episode season will likely return. Season 3 is also headed to New York City instead of DC, it seems.

This also represents how weird television has become, where it still hardly seems possible for these showrunners to turn around eight episodes of a show in over a year that doesn’t need some sort of extensive VFX work. Bridgerton’s creator has also said at a minimum that they can really only do it every other year. Times have certainly changed from 22 episode seasons ever in the broadcast era, and it doesn’t look like we’re ever going back.

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