It's been a minute since we've seen Game of Thrones star Lena Headey in a TV project, but that changed on Dec. 4 with the release of the new Netflix Western series, The Abandons.
In Kurt Sutter's The Abandons, Headey, who starred as Cersei Lannister in Game of Thrones, plays Fiona, an Irish woman living in Oregon during the 1850s with her found family. She gets into a land dispute with a more wealthy family, led by matriarch Constance Van Ness (Gillian Anderson).
As she is in Game of Thrones, Headey is terrific in the series. I wish she was in more movies and shows! Since Game of Thrones ended, we've only seen her crush it in a handful of roles, including Beacon 23.
While the reviews for the series are not particularly good, according to Rotten Tomatoes, The Abandons had a good opening week on Netflix. While competing with Stranger Things 5, The Abandons posted a decent debut rating of 7.3 million views, according to Netflix. That's just in the show's first four days on the platform, too.
The Abandons continues to climb up the Netflix TV Top 10 in its second week on Netflix. Right now, it sits at No. 3 behind Stranger Things 5, obviously, and Sean Combs: The Reckoning, which is the surprise of the month on Netflix. It will be interesting to see how many people continue to tune in over the next week or so.
I've been covering Netflix for a decade, and one thing remains to be true about Westerns: People generally watch them. I don't know why Netflix doesn't make them often, but American Primeval was a big hit earlier this year. The Abandons is on a similar path, although it's not getting quite the reviews that series did.
We've seen renewals ordered with less viewership, but I'm guessing that we'll need The Abandons to post a big rating this week, its second on the platform, to get things set up for a season 2 renewal. I will say that the ending lends itself to a second season. That's not a spoiler, but there's definitely more to this story. Will Netflix let them make it? I really hope so because, as I mentioned, we just don't see casts like this. And, while there are some flaws, I'm hopeful the ship can be righted as the series continues.
Most importantly, I just want to see Headey and Anderson go toe-to-toe in another season. These are two incredible performances, and I appreciate the greatness, honestly. I could watch them in anything.
We're about to hit a great stretch for Game of Thrones stars in new movies and shows. We obviously have Headey's series on Netflix right now. Kit Harington returns for Industry season 4 in January on HBO. We also have Emilia Clarke in a new Peacock show called Ponies next month, along with Sophie Turner's new series Steal on Prime Video.
Stay tuned for more news about Game of Thrones stars and their new projects.