Skip to main content

Netflix is bringing The Punisher back for a second season

Netflix is bringing The Punisher back for a second season

/

Plus six new DreamWorks animated shows, including a reboot of the 1980s cartoon She-Ra

Share this story

Photo by Jessica Miglio / Netflix

The first season of Netflix’s The Punisher arrived at an awkward time in America’s history with gun violence, but that isn’t stopping the streaming service from bringing it back for a second season. Netflix made the announcement today in a post on the show’s Facebook page, simply noting that “Season 2 is coming.” The Marvel series follows Frank Castle (Jon Bernthal), who takes the law into his own hands — along with a whole lot of guns.

Almost as an unintended contrast to the news about the psychopathic anti-hero, Netflix also announced today that it has ordered six new original series from DreamWorks Animation Television. The titles range in subject matter, from Trolls: The Beat Goes On!, a sequel series to the 2016 feature film, to The Epic Tales of Captain Underpants, based on the Dav Pilkey book series. Both shows will debut in 2018, as will the second season of Guillermo del Toro’s Trollhunters, the science fiction adventure 3 Below, and the new series Harvey Street Kids.

There’s also a heavy dose of nostalgia in the animated series order: DreamWorks and Netflix are rebooting the 1980s cartoon series She-Ra. The original show premiered in 1985 as a spin-off to the successful Masters of the Universe series. In the original, She-Ra was the twin sister of Prince Adam, who also went by the name He-Man when summoning the powers of Castle Greyskull to fight evildoers. The new She-Ra is being created by writer and cartoonist Noelle Stevenson, who has won Eisner Awards for her webcomic and graphic novel Nimona, as well as the collaborative comic book series Lumberjanes. Already prolific in television, Stevenson has also written for the shows Wander Over Yonder, Lego Star Wars: The Freemaker Adventures, and the new DuckTales. Her She-Ra re-imagining is set to premiere next year.

Taken together, the announcements serve as a reminder of the wide variety of programming Netflix continues to pursue with its original-content ambitions. With competitors like Disney’s as-yet-unnamed streaming service on the horizon, it’s going to be imperative for Netflix to provide the widest variety of programming possible. The battle isn’t over who can be the best good-enough source for a few original shows; it’s what service can offer enough all-in-one value to warrant customers paying a monthly subscription fee. And that’s becoming progressively clearer as Disney inches toward closing its acquisition of 20th Century Fox.