5 Reasons Why ‘The Alienist’ Needs a Second Season

Creators of the TNT period crime drama don’t have any plans to continue the show, but here’s why we want it to stay.

Any true crime fan knows that it’s an investigation in itself to find a crime drama show that stands out amongst the countless mediocre detective shows on air today. When a show with interesting characters and a fascinating crime comes along, we naturally want more of it. The Alienist is no exception to that. Its premiere season was an unapologetically disturbing investigation into brutal murders of young boys in late 19th century New York City. The psychological series received six Emmy nominations last Thursday, including Outstanding Limited Series.

Despite its success, executive producer Rosalie Swedlin told Indiewire that it was conceived as a limited series and will likely stay as such. In an interview about the finale of the first season and the possibility of a second she said, “We love the characters, and our goal when we set out to make the show was to tell the story of the book, which has a finite ending when they catch Beecham. At the moment, there are no plans for a further installment, but the whole process has been a great joy. So, who knows?”

The Alienist wouldn’t be the first show to abandon its status as a limited series after demand for a second season, considering HBO’s wildly popular limited series Big Little Lies is having a second season its huge success with fans and critics alike. That being said, we’re hoping that Swedlin and the rest of The Alienist crew changes their minds to leave the powerful story after one season. Below is a recap of the first season and the five reasons why we desperately don’t want the season finale to be the end.

4. It has the best twists.

If you watch a lot of crime shows, you are familiar with the ebbs and flows of detective fiction. Maybe you can spot red herrings before the detectives or know when a character is fooling the audience, but The Alienist does a wonderful job of keeping the audience on its toes. From following the wrong suspective for most of the show to killing off surprising characters, The Alienist is harder to predict than most crime dramas and fans of the genre always want to be outsmarted.

5. Understanding the psychology of killers is fascinating.

The mystery of why people commit such horrific, demented crimes like in the show is what draws people to crime shows in the first place. Just as Mindhunter does so well, The Alienist sets out to understand the minds of the killer its investigating and those with similar mental traumas. The term “alienist” comes from the fact that people believed those with mental illness were alien from society and those who studied them like Dr. Lazlo Kreizler titled themselves alienists.

The investigative team doesn’t just try to figure out the thought process of the killer by looking a the crime itself, they interview other famous killers of the same caliber to understand people like them. The interview between character Jesse Pomeroy, who was a real person who became a sadistic serial killer at 14 years old, was one of the most terrifying scenes in the whole series. You can listen to a great account of his crimes and his involvement in The Alienist show’s story on this episode of the podcast My Favorite Murder. If the creators of the show don’t want to follow the sequel of the book, they could use the real crimes like Pomeroy’s to shape a whole new season, considering there are plenty that fit in the time period. It’s clear that the show values the fascination of the psychological aspect of crime and capitalizes on it in a sophisticated way, unlike other serial killer dramas like Criminal Minds.

We’re hoping TNT changes its mind about The Alienist and brings it back for a second bone-chilling season soon.

 

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