Good news, 3 Body Problem fans! We've just learned that season 2 of the hit Netflix sci-fi series will return earlier than expected! During the recent Netflix Q2 2025 earnings call, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos name-dropped the show when detailing the upcoming slate expected for the latter half of 2025 and 2026.
You can watch the full call embedded below. Sarandos begins by detailing the 2025-2026 slate around the 10:20 mark and then mentions 3 Body Problem specifically at around 12:20, in between discussig the return of Emmy-winning series Beef and other Netflix staples like Outer Banks and Love is Blind.
This comes as a surprise, because earlier reports suggested that 3 Body Problem would not return until 2027, and now it sounds like it will be back significantly sooner.
What's on Netflix previously reported that seasons 2 and 3 would be filmed back to back. Based on confirmation they received from Netflix, the filming for seasons 2 and 3 will mostly take place in Hungary. Filming was expected to start in June 2025 with a completion date of February 2027.
Most outlets assumed that meant season 2 wouldn't come out until production wrapped on both seasons, but now it looks like that won't be the case. I assume Sarandos would have amended his slip-up if he realized 3 Body Problem wasn't returning in 2026 (at one point in the call he refers to the Netflix show Running Point as Point Break and quickly fixed his mistake).
It actually doesn't seem all that weird, since Netflix was (still is?) planning to release The Witcher season 4 while filming is still ongoing on its fifth and final season. Unfortunately, we still haven't heard any updates about when The Witcher comes back, so it's possible that one is going to be on hold.
As for 3 Body Problem season 2, if filming did get underway (and some sources have claimed production moved to July 8) already, then they'll need to finish season 2 pretty quickly to get it into post-production and air it in 2026.
I'm a little curious how that's going to work, especially since the second season of the show is expected to adapt one of the most exciting sequences from The Dark Forest, one that will likely require extensive CGI to achieve.
3 Body Problem is an adaptation of Liu Cixin's Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy, with the first season adapting The Three-Body Problem along with setting up several critical storylines from The Dark Forest and Death's End that we should see come to fruition within the next two seasons.
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