Beyond the Laugh Track: When Comedy Universes Mutate and Go Dark
If there is a running theme in the entertainment industry right now, it’s that no profitable universe ever really stays dormant. But what is genuinely fascinating is how these beloved comedy worlds are mutating as they expand, taking some seriously weird detours away from their original formulas. Case in point: we’re suddenly staring down the barrel of a surprisingly grim take on the Big Bang Theory, while simultaneously gearing up for a long-overdue, canine-centric pivot in the What We Do in the Shadows franchise.
Let’s start with the nerd-sphere. On July 9, the streaming gods officially handed down a series order for a Big Bang Theory spinoff starring legacy cast member Kevin Sussman. We’ve known for over two years that Chuck Lorre was kicking the tires on a new project derived from the flagship CBS juggernaut. It eventually came to light that this was a brain trust situation between Lorre, original co-creator Bill Prady, and feature writer Zak Penn. But the actual footage for Stuart Fails To Save The Universe? It reveals a fundamentally darker, stranger offshoot than anyone probably expected.
The suits are predictably hyped about it. Casey Bloys, the head honcho over at HBO and HBO Max Content, tipped his hat to Lorre and Prady’s storytelling chops, noting that bringing Zak Penn into the fold injects a distinctive voice into an already stacked creative team. Warner Bros. TV boss Channing Dungey echoed that sentiment, emphasizing that Penn’s narrative heavy lifting is meant to capture the original show’s DNA but with a completely fresh, almost jarring twist. They’re basically banking on us wanting to see this universe continue, just through a much murkier lens.
Meanwhile, on the completely opposite end of the tonal spectrum, one of my absolute favorite comedy properties is finally dusting off a sequel I’ve been waiting on for twelve years. Ever wonder what a vampire roommate setup looks like? What We Do in the Shadows nailed that premise twice—first as a brilliant indie feature and then as a killer TV show. It completely weaponizes horror tropes for laughs. You’ve got unwary cameramen getting snacked on, emergency roommate town halls, and epic nights out getting derailed just because a bouncer didn’t explicitly invite them inside the club.
The original 2014 movie, spearheaded by Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi, laid the groundwork. Five years later, the TV adaptation took the baton and ran with it until wrapping up its six-season run in 2024. Both projects orbit different supernatural households navigating the sheer mundanity of immortality, generational gaps, and modern-world speed bumps. The movie introduced us to the original crew living under one roof: Vladislav (a spry 870 years old), Viago (379), the relatively young Deacon (183), and the terrifyingly ancient, 8,000-year-old Petyr. The FX series pivoted to a new batch of bloodsuckers: Nandor (762), Nadja (500), Laszlo (310), and the 100-year-old energy vampire Colin Robinson.
Despite the different setups, they share the exact same universe—even crossing over on occasion—all shot in that deadpan, The Office-style mockumentary format that practically prints fresh tomatoes on aggregate sites. So it’s awesome to hear there’s still plenty of blood left in this very specific, weirdly cozy franchise. Jemaine Clement himself recently spilled to Collider that he and Waititi are actively hammering out a new movie.
Calling it “new” might be pushing it, honestly. A theatrical follow-up was supposed to happen right after the 2014 original dropped but got totally stuck in development hell. Now, though, the wheels are actually turning. You just have to brace yourself for a massive pivot: we’re ditching the vampire dynamic to follow a pack of werewolves. Specifically, the We’re Wolves movie is going to focus on the same polite but fiercely territorial lycanthropes that Vladislav, Viago, Deacon, and Nick kept beefing with in the first film.
The real sticking point for the production comes down to process. Clement pointed out that the first movie was a bizarre, lightning-in-a-bottle experiment: a sub-million-dollar budget, a loose story skeleton, and 100 percent improvised dialogue. They basically just goofed off for a month, shot it, and then slapped some wirework and flying VFX on it in post. It was a massive challenge compared to the TV show, which operated on a locked-in script with only a sprinkling of improv.
Now they’re at a crossroads. Do they wrangle a traditional script this time around, or do they fly by the seat of their pants again? Having a tight production schedule is great, but as Clement noted, there’s a specific kind of magic in just rolling the cameras and seeing what kind of chaotic garbage you can come up with. Either way, seeing these two vastly different franchises take such massive swings just proves that sometimes the best way to honor a legacy is to completely mutate it.
