‘Poker Face’ renewed for Season 2 at Peacock

No nonsense here: Poker face returns for a second season.

The Peacock series created by Rian Johnson and starring Natasha Lyonne has been revamped at the streamer. The renewal comes as the first season of the T-Street and MRC Television series rolls out, heading into the March 9 finale. A premiere date for season two has yet to be announced.

The murder mystery drama follows Lyonne as Charlie Cale, a Columbo-inspired murder-solving fugitive who, thanks to her special ability to identify when someone is lying, consistently yells “bullshit” about the murderous liars she encounters.

The series experimented with the release format by releasing four episodes at a time, followed by a weekly Thursday release of the first season of 10 episodes. Each episode functions as a standalone murder mystery – complete with a new location and cast – with Charlie (Lyonne) anchoring the series as it follows her on the run after the events of the first episode.

Poker face marked Johnson’s first TV series, as the Knives out And Star Wars: The Last Jedi filmmaker previously only directed episodes of television. With co-showrunners Nora and Lilla Zuckerman, the Glass onion director said he was in the writers’ room throughout the process and that the series’ howcatchem format (harking back to 1980s and 1990s detective shows that he and Lyonne grew up watching) helped attract the show’s top-notch roster of guest stars .

Each episode begins with a near-perfect murder that stars Adrien Brody, Lil Rel Howery, Judith Light, Chloë Sevigny, Ellen Barkin, Tim Meadows, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Nick Nolte, Cherry Jones, Ron Perlman, and more. The guest stars can enter one episode and play killer or victim. Benjamin Bratt joins Lyonne as a season-long character, as he hunts down the former Las Vegas casino waitress.

The first season has been met with critical acclaim — The Hollywood ReporterDaniel Fienberg, TV’s chief critic, called it a “mystery fan’s delight” in his review – as well as a collective thumbs up. The first season currently has a 99 percent fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

“It has been fantastically executed. We are over the moon,” Susan Rovner, president of entertainment content at NBCUniversal TV and streaming, recently said THR. While the streamer doesn’t share viewership, Rovner praised Poker face for “punching above his weight” and said Peacock was ahead of the libraries Columbo And Murder she wrote actually helped the streamer land the series.

In a statement accompanying the renewal news, Rovner added: “Poker face is one of those rare, undeniable shows that we all fell in love with from the start, but the critical acclaim and viewer response was beyond our wildest dreams. Working with the creative genius of Rian Johnson, Natasha Lyonne and Ram Bergman, along with our partners at MRC and T-Street, has been a spectacular ride and we can’t wait to hit the road for another season as we continue to build momentum across the original slate from Peacock.

The T-Street and MRC Television series is executive produced by Johnson and Ram Bergman, the Zuckermans, Lyonne under her Animal Pictures banner, Nena Rodrigue and Iain B. MacDonald. Maya Rudolph and Danielle Renfrew Behrens are Animal Pictures co-producers.

When speaking to THRtold Johnson he hoped to live through old age Poker face, especially since the format lends itself to going on forever and ever, just like the past procedures that inspired the show: “Natasha and I keep talking about getting old doing this. I can imagine Jessica Fletcher doing it. And I would be happy. … this is clearly built with an engine to keep going.”

Lyonne also summarized her hopes for the show as about Charlie standing up “for the little guy or the misfits and the outsiders and the dark horses and kind of having a voice for all those people, a truthful one that sort of cuts through.” sea ​​of ​​falsehood. And that’s what I find so exciting Poker face is that, thanks to Rian, that voice comes through in a super clear, very inclusive, inviting way to an even wider audience.”

Together with Poker faceLyonne (who made a brief cameo in Johnson’s Glass onion) has the excellent season of Russian doll season three, which has yet to get the green light from Netflix. And Johnson has the already announced third Knives out next movie on Netflix.

The renewal comes at a pivotal time for Peacock, which recently hit 20 million subscribers and ended its free tier for new users amid projected losses of $3 billion for the year. The innovation adds Poker face to the list of Peacock original series recently renewed for second seasons, inclusive Pitch Perfect: Bumper in Berlin, Bel-Air, Wolf Like Me, Killing It, Dr. Death And We are Lady Parts.