Why I Know What You Did Last Summer Was Canceled & What Almost Happened In S2
As the market for streaming platforms continues to expand, there are always franchises from the past that can be brought back with a fresh new spin. This was no doubt the idea behind Prime Video's "I Know What You Did Last Summer" reboot, a series that offers a new take on the tragic accidental killing of the original film and plumbs the idea to intriguing new depths as a result.
However, despite a somewhat fresh take on the plot of "I Know What You Did Last Summer," the series failed to resonate with critics and viewers alike, garnering less-than-stellar ratings that would ultimately contribute to the show being canceled after only a single season.
Still, despite the fact that "I Know What You Did Last Summer" was canceled, showrunner Sara Goodman explained to Bloody Disgusting that she had been workshopping ideas for Season 2. "Season 2 was originally pitched as Bruce and Clara, and the cult, and what they had done," Goodman said. "It was using the night in the cave, where Clara told Dylan everything, as a way of getting back into that world so that we could have also had some closure about what really happened there."
The idea was originally to make it an anthology-type show
In fact, Sara Goodman said that the original pitch for "I Know What You Did Last Summer" in general was something more akin to "American Horror Story." Each season would focus on some other mysterious or tragic event that had occurred in the town in previous generations and add more depth to the previous seasons as a result. "I pitched an anthology series that all took place in this town in Hawaii, where everyone for generations previous and for generations future had done something wrong, and someone knew about it," Goodman recalled. "So it was kind of this generational trauma, and these generational lies and generational secrets."
However, the showrunner admitted that they began to pivot away from the idea of making a fresh start for every season of "I Know What You Did Last Summer" as the team behind the show began to get attached to certain characters and felt a desire to bring them back as a result.
"As the show got written and shot, everyone really didn't want to completely lose the characters of this first season," Goodman explained. "So as we were shooting ... I was having to pitch future seasons and the finale and make changes." Unfortunately for fans, we'll likely never get to see where things might have gone in subsequent seasons of "I Know What You Did Last Summer."