Posted in: Preview, TNT, TV, YouTube | Tagged: action, animal kingdom, bleeding cool, cable, california, codys, drama, pope, season 5, Smurf, streaming, surfers, surfing, television, thriller, tnt, tv

Animal Kingdom: We Have Some Thoughts on TNT Drama's Season 5 Delay

For those of you in the know, you get that it's awesome and you've been waiting for news on the fifth season ever since season 4 wrapped. For those unaware, Animal Kingdom is not a nature documentary, but instead a "lively" TNT action-drama about Southern California's best family of bank robbers. Think of it as the cool surfer cousin of Sons of Anarchy. All that aside, I'm not here to convince you to watch it this time or even to review it.

Or even to tell you a date for the season five premiere, and that's a real problem. Why? Because we don't know when season five is coming. That's right: it's been a summer series up until now, with seasons airing late May and running through mid-August. So…summer is in full swing so where is my favorite summer series? One word: Corona. No, not the beer I'm relaxing with, we're talking the virus. Of course, this show fell victim to the COVID-19 production shutdown like pretty much everything else did.

Now, don't get me wrong – I'm not complaining about Hollywood being safe and there being a lack of content. I just want a little bit of communication as to when I can expect my favorite Cody boys (which are all of them except Pope) back on my TV screen. As much as the network might like building up anticipation, it also comes with the danger of a backlash. Their official twitter bio simply says "Season 5 coming soon to @TNTDrama", which was put up back in February and hasn't changed since. The production started up at the beginning of January and was shut down early-mid March, likely leaving roughly the last half of the season's episodes unfinished. That's all we have officially, so now it's time to speculate!

If I was a development executive at TNT looking to fill a schedule made barren by the lack of sports, shortened seasons with no return dates, and now cop shows being "no-no's," I'd be looking to bolster my fall slate however I could. Enter Animal Kingdom. Sure it was a summer series, but could the network be pushing it to the fall to fill in one of the gaps left by shows that can't return? It would work out since the handful or so of episodes they already have done would give enough lead time for the show to safely return to production and finish out the remaining episodes in time to air as a single cohesive season (at least based on how production return guidelines are looking as of this writing).

So it's cop shows out, criminal surfers in, with Animal Kingdom the perfect remedy for both a bare fall schedule and a brilliant replacement for police procedurals. I rest my case, so now you can go catch up on Animal Kingdom: Season 5 might just be here before you know it.

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!

Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!