'Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist': Is the Show is Getting a Season 3?
Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist is about to bring its current season to an end, but NBC has not yet announced whether there will be a Season 3. The show has a very passionate audience, but ratings for the musical series remain low, meaning that the show's future is very much hanging in the balance.
Will Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist get a Season 3?
Showrunner Austin Winsberg described himself as "cautiously optimistic" about the show's future. He told TV Line: "I know that there have been plenty of nice articles written about us and potential awards consideration. I know that we have a really passionate fanbase that really cares about the show. I know we have a lot of internal support at NBC."
In that same interview, he revealed that there had been some talk about moving Season 3 off of NBC and on the streamer affiliated to the network, Peacock. He said: "I know that that has been one of the discussions on the table, but I've heard nothing concrete."
Recently, the show won polls, both on TV Line and on USA Today, that asked which show viewers most wanted renewed. Despite this, the show's ratings remain low, with TV Series Finale reported the it gets an average viewing audience of around 1.9 million people per episode. Of the 19 scripted shows NBC aired in the 2020-21 TV season, Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist ranks 17th, between two shows that were canceled this season–Connecting and Superstore.
The viewers it does have, however, are dedicated. The show lost just 6 percent of its audience between Season 1 and Season 2, the lowest drop-off of any NBC show suggesting that people who do watch it love it.
The show may also be slowly picking up a bigger fanbase. Things look slightly better for the show if we look at the ratings more widely. If you factor in viewers who caught up with the show within 24 hours (per TV Line), the show gets 2.3 million viewers a week, a 300,000-viewer increase from the first season. This and the show's devoted social media following may be why TV Line called the show "a safe bet" to be renewed despite underperforming in the ratings in general.
In another TV Line interview, Winsberg revealed that he had not planned the Season 2 finale to also end the series. He said: "There are certain things that are answered at the end of the season, and then there are still a few big cliffhangers that we leave open for major storylines in Season 3. At no point in the process did anybody tell me to not do that. I wanted to end the season on a hopeful note, not on a bad note."
Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist Seasons 1 and 2 are streaming on Peacock. The Season 2 finale airs on Sunday, May 16 at 9 p.m. ET / 8 p.m. CT on NBC.
