Adult Swim: The Future Of “Final Space” Looks In Doubt As Show Creator Laments Network Struggles

One thing you have to admit about Final Space creator Olan Rogers is that, by all accounts, he’s the most honest and open producer working in animated television today. But, if the producers of Amphibia thought that they had it rough, they probably wouldn’t have lasted a week in Olan’s shoes. After being green-lit in 2017 with then network president Kevin Reilly’s promise to produce more adult animation, Final Space had went from TBS to Adult Swim with a stopover at the nearly defunct VRV streaming service for good measure.

Even with the move, the show had been met with a myriad of network notes that ultimately led to a less than well-received season two. Despite all of this, Final Space was largely able to keep it’s average .50-.60 overnight ratings numbers making it a solid ratings winner which was really only due to the fact that Olan Rogers did everything himself to promote it. No commercials, not even a billboard, Adult Swim largely didn’t give a shit about the franchise, though, Olan couldn’t have picked a worse time to be part of Time Warner’s transition to that of WarnerMedia, a subsidiary of AT&T that would eventually be spun-off and sold to Discovery Networks. Because of this, most of the executives that were part of those TBS/Adult Swim teams had moved on or retired leaving this franchise as an almost “lame duck” for the new heads of the network. Furthermore, no broadcast to streaming strategy had been put together after WarnerMedia’s run with Hulu expired, as a result, no next-day streaming premieres for franchises like The Jellies, Tigtone, and Final Space, all shows that could’ve benefited from the increase in streamers that had gone into overdrive once the Covid-19 pandemic hit. Despite having premiered three years ago, Final Space didn’t see a decent streaming home(no, I’m not counting VRV) until HBO MAX did just that in March of 2021, and even with that, there’s nowhere to stream Final Space season three unless if you have a cable gate unlocked.

The result was a season three of Final Space that was originally supposed to be the Sunday Night premiere schedule that Birdgirl got, only to be buried on late Saturday Nights with, again, almost no marketing to promote the fact. With the season’s production now officially in the can, Olan had this to say about the potential future of the franchise:

It does seem that Olan has also confirmed that Lion’s Blaze doesn’t appear to be moving forward anywhere at the moment, so right now, Final Space is it, thought the prolific producer says he is working on a bunch of pitches as we speak so hopefully we’ll get some more pickup news soon. As for the Adult Swim original series, the network has been green-lighting feature-length send-offs for franchises, so even if the show WERE to get canceled, my bet is the groundswell of #SaveFinalSpace fans would absolutely show up and demand SOME sort of continuation.