American Gods: all the news, updates, trailers, and commentary for the Starz show

The second season of American Gods just premiered on Starz this past week, and fans can breath easy: Deadline reports that the network has renewed the series for a third season, and has brought on Hemlock Grove and Walking Dead producer Charles Eglee to serve as showrunner.

Based off of the classic fantasy novel by Neil Gaiman, American Gods follows a former convict named Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle) who is pulled into an epic battle between factions of old and new deities when he’s hired by a mysterious man, Mr. Wednesday (Ian McShane) to act as a bodyguard and driver.

Spoiler warning: This review reveals major plot points from season 1 of American Gods, and lays out season 2 storylines.

Neil Gaiman’s 2001 novel American Gods tells the story of awesome, magical beings brought low by the loss of faith and the cold realities of the modern age. Now the same tragic fate has struck Starz’s American Gods TV adaptation, which returned for season 2 on March 10th. Conflicts about the show’s budget and adherence to Gaiman’s story led showrunners Bryan Fuller and Michael Green to leave after season 1, which led to the loss of standout cast members Gillian Anderson and Kristin Chenoweth. Gaiman chose Jesse Alexander to take over as showrunner, but he was “exiled” from the show last fall, and Starz still hasn’t named a successor. “I’m not what I once was,” the goddess Bilquis (played by Yetide Badaki) says in season 1, and the same can be said about the American Gods show.

Spoilers ahead for the overall theme of American Gods, the season 1 adaptation and the fantasy novel it’s based on.

Starz’s long-overdue second season of its fantasy series American Gods finally has a release date: March 10th, 2019.

Today at New York Comic Con, Starz hosted a panel for the upcoming second season of its fantasy show American Gods, and showed off our first look at what’s to come in the show when it returns in 2019.

The trailer shows off the continuing story of Gaiman’s novel, which looks to be picking up even more fantastic elements — and gods, old and new —as Shadow (Ricky Whittle) and Mr. Wednesday (Ian McShane) continue their road trip across America. Also teased is the pending clash between the old gods of mankind’s past and the new gods, like Media and Technology, of the future. But mostly, American Gods seems content to just show off all the returning players from season one, which will have to suffice to tide fans over for now.

Last May, Starz announced that it had renewed its fantasy series American Gods for a second season, only to run into a significant bump later in the year: showrunners Michael Green and Bryan Fuller left the show, reportedly over issues about its budget. After a search, the network has now hired a their replacement: Jesse Alexander, a producer who has worked on several other projects with Fuller, such as Star Trek: Discovery and Hannibal.

In January, Starz CEO Chris Albrecht said that Greene and Fuller were still involved in the show, but that “it a little bit up in the air what their exact role will be.” Fuller has since begun work to develop a television adaptation of Anne Rice’s Interview with a Vampire. Albrecht noted that author Neil Gaiman would work in a “traditional showrunner role,” alongside a more experienced producer. Alexander appears to be that: in addition to working on Hannibal and Star Trek: Discovery, he also worked as a producer on Lost, Alias, and others. Gaiman tells The Hollywood Reporter that Alexander “loves and understands the book, he loves and understands the TV series and he’s dedicated to making future seasons of American Gods as good and as beautiful and as unique as they can be.”

“I believe,” Shadow breathes in the final episode of season one of the Starz series American Gods. Ricky Wittle, who plays Shadow, wears a beatific smile as he speaks; it’s supposed to be the emotional climax of the series. But the smile looks overdetermined and vapid, like the grin of a car salesman, not a Buddha. Shadow’s belief is vocal but unbelievable — especially after watching the recent season-two finale of the much more theologically cynical AMC show Preacher. American Gods touts the virtues of faith, but that faith is so vague, it ends up being meaningless. Preacher’s blasphemy, on the other hand, carries conviction. You don’t bother to hate God unless you really think he’s there. 

From a brief description, American Gods and Preacher sound like similar shows. Both are road-trip buddy shows built around the concept “What if gods were real?” In American Gods (based on the 2001 Neil Gaiman novel) this means all gods. The show includes mythological figures from Scandinavia, Ireland, Central Europe, Egypt, West Africa, and who knows where else. In Preacher (based on the late-1990s comic book by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon), the frame is singularly Christian. Jesse Custer (Dominic Cooper) is mysteriously inhabited by a mystical entity called Genesis, which makes people obey his every command. In the series’ second season, Jesse, his girlfriend Tulip (Ruth Negga), and their Irish vampire hanger-on Cassidy (Joe Gilgun) set off in search of God so Jesse can use his power to force God to answer some tough questions.

Recently, both Starz’s American Gods and Hulu’s The Handmaid’s Tale wrapped their debut seasons. Both shows have been acclaimed for their focus on relevant political issues, such as women’s rights, the spread of fascism, and the dangers of religious extremism. But what makes both shows pressingly important in 2017 is that they’re driven by a single focus: demonstrating the danger in the creeping normalization of a hostile ideology.

On their faces, both shows share some basic similarities: they’re both adaptations of classic speculative fiction novels, and both explore the role religion plays in the United States. Handmaid’s Tale author Margaret Atwood has explained that her novel, in which a religious regime turns fertile women into sexual slaves called Handmaids, isn’t a dramatic leap from reality. As she conceived of its story, she incorporated historical statements and behavior. Meanwhile, American Gods explores the generational gap between traditional, mythological gods and the new generation, as the prayers of believers shift from one to the other. Essentially, both shows acknowledge unsettling futures, then set out to ask, “How did we get here? How did this become the status quo?”

American Gods, Starz’s new fantasy series about deities and their sex lives, has been renewed for a second season. The news comes just two weeks after the series premiered to rave reviews, and Deadline reports that the new season is expected to launch in mid-2018.

“Bryan Fuller, Michael Green and Neil Gaiman have evolved the art form of television narratively, structurally and graphically with American Gods, and we’re thrilled to be working again with these artists as they continue to build the worlds and wars of the gods,” Starz programming president Carmi Zlotnik said in a statement.

American Gods, the new Starz series based on Neil Gaiman’s 2001 novel of the same name, is unlike anything else on television. The series touches on ideas about worship and godhood, and is alternatingly abstract, meditative, and really, really bloody.

It tells the story of ex-convict Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle) who, thanks to the machinations of the mysterious Mr. Wednesday (Deadwood’s Ian McShane), finds himself caught up in a war between the manifestations of Old Gods like Loki (Jonathan Tucker) and Anansi the Spider (Orlando Jones) and the so-called New Gods of media and technology, like the goddess literally named Media (The X-Files’ Gillian Anderson).

In the premiere of American Gods, a woman named Bilquis (Yetide Badaki) is out for drinks with a man she met online. They’re an odd couple. She’s young, beautiful, and exquisitely dressed. He’s a frumpy, awkward dad. As the date progresses to the bedroom, something begins to feel a little off.

American Gods has that name for a reason, and Bilquis is hardly your average woman. Shortly into their oddball sex session, it becomes clear that this unlucky man is literally losing himself in her; his entire body is sinking into her vagina like a spaghetti noodle into a slurping set of lips. As he starts to climax, Bilquis places her hand on his head and deftly stuffs him inside of her. Whew! Time for a lay down.

Starz has released a new trailer for American Gods. The footage is the most extensive and violent look yet at the adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s classic fantasy novel.

Our first look at the show last year introduced Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle), who is recruited by Mr. Wednesday (Ian McShane) to help in a coming war between the gods of the old world and those of the new. This minute-long preview gives a better idea of the stakes: the older gods face an existential crisis, and Shadow will help with the fight.

When Neil Gaiman’s American Gods comes to television next month, it’s going to look a little different than fans of the book remember — and its creators hope they’ll take away a subtle political message alongside the myths and magic.

“Our first task of adapting is to make the show that we wanted to see as an audience member,” said Bryan Fuller, one of the showrunners. But “it’s definitely a different show than we set out to make, because the political climate in America shat its pants,” he said. “We are now telling massive immigration stories in a climate that vilifies immigrants. And so we have a strange new platform to start a different kind of conversation.” Fellow showrunner Michael Green agreed. “The book is joyful, it celebrates a lot of things that we love about America, and have since become weirdly odd about America,” he said.

The TV adaptation of American Gods is coming to Starz next month, but anyone eager to get the story now can always pick up the book. Neil Gaiman’s best-selling fantasy novel is getting a new edition courtesy of The Folio Society, a publisher known for putting out amazing special editions of classic books.

I’ve gushed about The Folio Society’s books in the past, particularly with their edition of I, Robot last year. The publisher’s editions are elegant, and come with additional specially commissioned illustrations and artwork. This new edition of American Gods contains 12 new illustrations by artist Dave McKean, who’s worked closely with Gaiman on the long-running comic Sandman and their movie Mirrormask. McKean also provides a new introduction to the book, alongside Gaiman’s own introduction and afterword.

The television adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s best-selling fantasy novel American Gods finally has a release date. We’ve been eagerly waiting for news on the show, which will air April 30th on Starz.

The show is written by Bryan Fuller (of Hannibal and Pushing Daisies fame) and Michael Green (who co-wrote the dark new Wolverine movie Logan). It stars Deadwood’s Ian McShane as Mr. Wednesday, and The 100’s Ricky Whittle as protagonist Shadow Moon. The show will run for eight episodes, and will first screen during this year’s SXSW festival on March 11th.

American Gods, the TV adaption of Neil Gaiman's acclaimed novel, is actually happening. Like for real, really actually happening, after years of being kicked back and forth. And now Starz has put out a first preview of the show. It's a short first look at the show that focuses on the conflict between the deities of traditional religions and so-called new gods, which represent modern society's infatuation with capitalism, technology, media, and drugs.

Bryan Fuller, of Hannibal and Pushing Daisies, is one of the series' showrunners, so there's plenty of reason to keep hopes high here. And at San Diego Comic-Con today, Fuller took the stage with Kristin Chenoweth, where it was announced she'll play the character Easter, a member of the old gods. (Her traditional name in mythology is Ostara, the Germanic goddess of the dawn.) The series is supposed to start next year.

A year after finally going into development, Neil Gaiman's award-winning novel American Gods is officially Starz' latest series. Deadline reports that the long-gestating adaptation has gotten a straight-to-series order. Hannibal and Pushing Daisies creator Bryan Fuller is on board to write the series, with Gotham executive producer Michael Green as showrunner and Gaiman himself as executive producer.

"I am thrilled, ‎scared, delighted, nervous, and a ball of glorious anticipation," Gaiman said in a statement. "The team that is going to bring the world of American Gods to the screen has been assembled like the master criminals in a caper movie: I’m relieved and confident that my baby is in good hands."