Wynonna Earp showrunner hopes to continue the show after season 4
By Dan Selcke
The current fourth season of Wynonna Earp is the final one to air on SyFy, but if showrunner Emily Andras has her way, it won’t be the last one fans see.
The fourth season of Wynonna Earp is airing right now on SyFy. Is it also the final season? That question is up in the air.
Wynonna Earp is a supernatural horror western about the great-great-granddaughter of legendary gunslinger Wyatt Earp, who spends her time fighting the shades of the outlaws her ancestor killed and sending them back to Hell. “It is a cult show with a passionate audience from all over the world,” showrunner Emily Andras told The Hollywood Reporter. “It speaks to people in particular who maybe don’t see themselves represented on television and certainly not in genre very often. Which is to say women and the LGBTQ community. That all being said, it has never been a ratings hit. It’s hard to measure the success of a cult show if you are just looking at Nielsen ratings.”
That may have been part of the reason the show ran into financial trouble between its third and fourth seasons. The team spent a year dealing with that, getting a huge boost from the passionate fanbase, which sent letters, bought billboards and did pretty much everything it could to get SyFy to make more episodes. It worked, but then the pandemic hit in the middle of shooting season 4, which resulted in yet more delays. At that point, as Andras puts it, “I guess they made the decision that they had had enough demon-hunting cowgirl show.”
That said, Andras is hopeful that season 4 won’t be the end. “I still have lots of Earp story to tell. What will be, will be. I hope that the fans are satisfied with the end of season four. I think it’s wonderful. But hopefully we will find a way to tell more stories.”
"I hesitate to say it’s the end, but I’m extremely proud of the season and I’m extremely proud of the last episode of season four. There are worst feelings to be known for, when someone reads a book and gets to the end and says, “Oh my gosh, that was so wonderful but I wish there was more.” If that’s the feeling people have at the end of season four, that’s pretty rare on television."
Andras and her team are already courting streaming services and other outlets to pick the show up. “All we need is a U.S. broadcaster, which is not as much moving around the chess pieces as it even was in Season 4,” she said. “All the big people are in play, from IMDbTV to Paramount+, Hulu. Name a streamer, they have gotten a call from us.”
"My feeling is, if you are the savior of Wynonna Earp, it’s such a great story and you will have this built-in audience that you’re bringing to your service. We’re working to convince people of that."
There’s been a particularly big push to get the show picked up by Paramount+, but Andras will consider anything if it means she get to act on her ideas. “I’d really love the privilege of coming back in a few years, if nothing else, Deadwood-style, and doing a movie and picking up the characters years later,” she said. “I know what that would look like and it’d be interesting to tell a story about legacy and aging. But yes, I’m happy with the end of season four and I hope the fans will be too.”
From Arrested Development to Community to Lucifer and beyond, it’s hardly unusual for a show to get cancelled by one outlet only to be picked up by another, so if you’re looking forward to more Wynonna Earp, there’s no need to despair yet.
New episodes of Wynonna Earp air Fridays on SyFy.
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