7 TV Shows With Disappointing Second Seasons
6. The New Pope
When offbeat cult hit The Young Pope finished, few expected a second season. With lead character Lenny Belardo (a.k.a Pope Pius XIII) collapsing and likely dying, it was assumed that this surreal study of the Vatican was a miniseries.
Fast forward to earlier this year and a sequel set of episodes arrived. Lenny is now comatose and Jude Law does little for the first 6 episodes before finally waking up. Instead, we get Pope John Paul III, a John Malkovich looking guy who doesn’t like John Malkovich and speaks with a ridiculous posh English accent.
The series descends into various miserable subplots including Esther’s financial woes forcing her into a life of sleeping with the deformed sons of wealthy elites. Meandering and often pointless, The New Pope undoes much of what made its predecessor so compelling and offers next to nothing fresh to make up for it.
By the time Lenny returns, it is a case of too little too late and the show rushes into a messily plotted finale that almost feels like an apology for the eight episodes preceding it.