Half Bad: The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself – Picture: Netflix
Coming out of Netflix UK is Half Bad: The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself, adapting the Sally Green book, and with all eight episodes added on October 28th, 2022. Despite high praise from critics and audiences alike, Netflix has opted to not renew for a second season.
The book was adapted for Netflix by Joe Barton, who has previously made iBoy and Giri/Haji for Netflix and is currently working on Our Man from Jersey.
On RottenTomatoes, the show has a 92% from critics and a 91% from audiences. IMDb is similarly favorable with a 7.6/10 rating.
Has Netflix Renewed Half Bad: The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself for a season 2?
Official Renewal Status: Canceled as of December 9th, 2022
Just a month after its release, Netflix has decided to not renew the show for a second season.
Confirming the cancelation via Twitter were Joe Barton (the showrunner) and the production company behind the series, Imaginarium.
Half Bad is a show we are incredibly proud of, which gained stellar reviews, along with a fiercely loyal global fanbase. While we are disappointed not to continue the story, we have loved working with such a talented cast and crew on bringing our beloved show to life. pic.twitter.com/kt3nAhvrew
— Imaginarium (@ImaginariumUK) December 9, 2022
In a statement, Joe Barton said:
“Sadly, yes, Netflix have cancelled this. Very proud of it and really liked the people I got to make it with. Sorry not to be able to finish the story…”
Also reacting to the news was Jay Lycurgo on Twitter saying in a Tweet:
“Oh how there was so much more to tell. Me, emilien and nadia felt very emotional about the shows end. We weren’t emotional about the decision. These things happen. But
more emotional that we won’t be able to tell the story of Nathan, Gabriel and Annalise again. What a brilliant world Joe and Sally created. And these characters had a lot more to tell. But we move. Let’s be proud of the story already told. And thank you so much for the support from every single one of you and thank you also for the critical acclaim. It’s been an incredible experience.I can’t tell you how grateful I am! Let’s always find the positives, and remember sometimes the bad times are the good times xx”
Given the show’s early performance, we ordinarily would have predicted a likely cancelation. Still, given that the title comes out of Netflix UK, the barrier to renewal could’ve been lower, but sadly that doesn’t seem like the case.
In an interview with RadioTimes, the cast said there’s “more to explore” with a second season. Jay Lycurgo told them:
“My point with a season 2 is that we’re in a really great place in a world where we’ve only looked at a small chunk of it. There’s so much more to explore.”
We should note that some eagle-eyed viewers spotted that Netflix changed the show’s name and assets following its release. When it launched, the show was titled The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself, but it has now had Half Bad added to the front of the title.
When the show was in production it simply went by the name of Half Bad and was later renamed so this is, in fact, the third name change for the series.
This is rare for Netflix, but putting our conspiracy theory hat on for a second, we have three theories as to why Netflix would do this:
- They wanted the title to reflect the title of the book the show is based on more in the hopes that there’s some name recognition
- The title is underperforming and making people search “Half Bad” over “The Bastard” is much easier and sanitizes the name a little.
- They plan for the series to continue but with a different subtitle per season (after all, the main book series is called Half Bad).
Given the cancelation, this likely was number 2.
How well is Half Bad: The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself performing on Netflix?
The show featured in Netflix’s global top 10 charts for two weeks picking up 44.72M hours watched before dropping out in week three.
| Week Period | Hours Viewed(M) | Rank | Week in Top 10 |
|---|---|---|---|
| October 23rd, 2022 to October 30th, 2022 | 13,830,000 | 7 | 1 |
| October 30th, 2022 to November 6th, 2022 | 30,890,000 (+123%) | 7 | 2 |
Although it didn’t feature in week 3, we do know that it scored less than 18.17M views meaning it fell nearly 60%. We’ve noted previously that shows that suffer a 50% drop from weeks 2 to 3 often spell disaster.
The Bastard Son and Devil Himself vs. Heartstopper and The Midnight Club
Looking at the raw top 10s provided by FlixPatrol, we can see exactly where the show is performing best and it looks like countries like India, Brazil, and Germany are where the title is finding the most traction.
Their data suggests the show peaked early on its run (around 4 days), and nearly 20 days on, it has nearly disappeared from the top 10s altogether.
In the UK, the show’s home country, the title only featured in the top 10s for 13 days before dropping out.
Popularity heat map for The Bastard Son & the Devil Himself
What to expect from Half Bad: The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself season 2 on Netflix
As a recap, here’s what happened in the final episode:
“Soul goes on a rampage at Wolfhagen, eager to finally hunt down Marcus. Nathan, Annalise and Gabriel race to stop him before it’s too late.”
Naturally, there’s a lot of source material to cover but on the whole, the show has been going in mostly a different direction from the books.
That’s something that Joe Barton has confirmed himself, referring to the series as more of a spiritual adaptation.
Three books were produced in total, with a companion story also available.
With that said, here’s a rundown of what happened in the second book, Half Wild, and by the sounds of it, it’s very much the same position our Nathan is in:
“Nathan is hunted from all sides: nowhere is safe and no one can be trusted. Now, Nathan has come into his own unique magical Gift, and he’s on the run–but the Hunters are close behind, and they will stop at nothing until they have captured Nathan and destroyed his father.”
Let us know in the comments down below if you wanted to see a second season of Half Bad: The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself on Netflix.