This Is How Long Y: The Last Man's Showrunner Thinks The Series Should Run
When most people think of comic book adaptations, their first thoughts likely turn to superheroes. Those stories tend to be the most profitable, but the truth of the matter is that all kinds of tales in a wide breadth of genres have materialized within the pages of a comic book. Some of these have gone on for years at a time, meaning there's ample inspiration for TV writers and directors to pull from. We're about to get our next adaptation based on one of the most critically acclaimed series of the 21st century — "Y: The Last Man."
The base premise involves a virus that kills anyone with a Y chromosome. The only cisgender man to survive the outbreak is an amateur escape artist named Yorick (Ben Schnetzer), and he'll have to navigate a strange, new world where different factions have risen to the surface, trying to find order within this society.
It's an intriguing set-up, especially in the current political climate and after civilization is still amid its own deadly virus. Provided the show's a hit, it could continue to reflect our ever-evolving landscape. If the stars align prosperously, showrunner Eliza Clark has a good idea of how many seasons she'd like to see out of "Y: The Last Man."
Clark thinks Y: The Last Man could last 'around five or six seasons'
The "Y: The Last Man" comic books ran from September 2002 to March 2008, producing 60 individual issues in the process. That's plenty of storylines for the FX on Hulu series to pull from, and naturally, the show can go in different directions and explore characters and ideas left on the cutting room floor for the books. Based on an interview with ComicBook.com, Eliza Clark is incredibly interested in taking on this brave new world, and she's not inherently interested in sticking with a game plan for the time being.
"I'm very interested in explanations for what happened, but I'm not that interested really in what the answer is, because ultimately, the answer is science fiction," Clark explains. "I think that this show and the book are about what happens to people when something like this happens, and what do they believe and how does their belief inform the way they create a community? The way they think about themselves, the way they think about the world, and the way they behave? And I think the same is true for the series." With that in mind, the series may not necessarily end once they discover the root cause and cure for the disease. It could very well carry on, exploring what happens when half of the population dies.
However, don't expect this show to carry on with double-digit seasons. Clark continues, "I love this world; I don't want it to end. I feel like, generally speaking, television shows are best that around five or six seasons, and I'll leave it at that." That would be more than enough time to flesh out the story's characters and themes, so make sure you get the show started on the right foot by checking it out when it debuts on Hulu on September 13, 2021.