The future of Netflix's Mindhunter has been in question ever since the crime series was put on indefinite hold in early 2020. Now, David Fincher has stated that he hopes the extended hiatus will reignite his desire to return to the series.
In October, Fincher cast doubt on the likelihood of seeing Mindhunter return for a third season partly due to his need for a break from the series after the exhausting production schedule of season 2. As the filmmaker recounted, the original scripts for the second season were scrapped and re-written early on during production, which required him to spend roughly six to seven months each year in Pittsburgh to oversee the series.
Another obstacle standing in the way of a third season renewal for Mindhunter is the cost of production. "I don't know if it makes sense to continue," Fincher said during an interview with Variety. "It was an expensive show. It had a very passionate audience, but we never got the numbers that justified the cost." While Fincher has initially hoped to release a new season of Mindhunter every 12 to 14 months, he reiterated his need to spend some time away from the show after the production issues that occurred during the second season. "We had all hands on deck to finish [season two] and we didn't have a ton of scripts and a ton of outlines and a bible standing by for season three. I'll admit I was a little bit like 'I don’t know that I'm ready to spend another two years in the crawl space,'" he explained.
The first two seasons of Mindhunter featured segments introducing viewers to Dennis Rader, the serial killer infamously known as the BTK Killer who murdered 10 people between 1974 and 1991. During this period, Rader sent messages detailing his gruesome murders to police and managed to avoid being identified until he was arrested by authorities in 2005 after resuming the letter writing a year earlier. "At some point, I'd love to revisit it," Fincher said, confirming he hasn't closed the door on the series entirely. "The hope was to get all the way up to the late '90s, early 2000s, hopefully, get all the way up to people knocking on the door at Dennis Rader's house."
Fincher's desire to step away from Mindhunter is what to prompted him to bring Netflix the script for what would become his next project, Mank. Written by his late father, Jack Fincher, the film depicts the tense relationship between Citizen Kane writer Herman J. Mankiewicz and director Orson Welles.
Regardless of whether or not Fincher follows Mank with another season of Mindhunter, the filmmaker's projects will have a permanent home at Netflix for the foreseeable future. Fincher recently revealed that he's signed a four-year exclusive deal with the streamer.
Source: Variety