Ryan Murphy is one of the biggest and most prolific names in the entertainment industry, having been responsible for a string of massively popular TV shows including Nip/Tuck, Glee, American Horror Story, sister series American Crime Story, 9-1-1 and Pose. Not content with churning out some of the best network titles of the modern era, though, Murphy signed the largest development deal in television history with Netflix, and almost immediately hit the ground running.
In the last eighteen months alone, he’s produced documentaries Circus of Books and A Secret Love along with movie The Boys in the Band, created and launched The Politician, Hollywood and Ratched, while his first feature film as a director in ten years arrives next week when star-studded musical comedy The Prom hits the streaming site. If that wasn’t enough, the 55 year-old has a further three miniseries in the works for the platform, all of which are set to debut in the next twelve months or so.
Out of all Murphy’s Netflix content, Ratched managed to capture the biggest audience as the One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest prequel series drew in a massive 48 million viewers in the first four weeks it was available, making it the second biggest new show of the year behind The Queen’s Gambit. Unsurprisingly, then, we’ve now heard from our sources – the same ones who told us The Witcher was getting a prequel spinoff long before Blood Origin was announced, and that The Umbrella Academy would be receiving a third season – that Ratched has reportedly been renewed for another run.
As well as a typically solid Sarah Paulson performance in the lead, one of the main ingredients behind the show’s success is that it managed to avoid many of the tropes and pitfalls associated with Murphy’s often self-indulgent work to draw in viewers who aren’t typically enamored with his output, something any further seasons of Ratched would look to continue. And while it’s still unclear what we may see next, you can be sure that the creator has some more delicious surprises up his sleeve for us.