Some genuinely good animation news from the Warner Bros. Discovery corporation today—somehow—as Adult Swim has formally announced that it’s renewing its fascinating medical conspiracy comedy Common Side Effects for a second season.
Created by Joe Bennett and Veep‘s Steve Hely, the series centers on Marshall (Dave King), an accomplished mycologist who’s stumbled onto an exotic mushroom that possibly works as a cure-all for most kinds of injury or illness, and who has, thus, immediately put himself in the crosshairs of both Big Pharma and the DEA. Emily Pendergast, Joseph Lee Anderson, and Martha Kelly co-star, along with a very in-his-element Mike Judge, who executive produced the series with his King Of The Hill pal Greg Daniels. News of the renewal comes just a few days ahead of the show’s first-season finale.
This is especially relieving news for fans of Bennett’s last show, the Max series Scavengers Reign, which also had an extremely good first season that deliberately courted discomfort by blending genres and then injecting the whole thing with a visceral dose of halluciongenic absurdity, but with a much sadder outcome. That show (co-created by Bennett and Charles Huettner, and originally conceived for Adult Swim, by the by) ended up getting killed off after a single season, despite vigorous fan protests and hopes. Common Side Effects essentially grew up in the space left by its corpse, and now, hey, a season 2 has bloomed.
Adult Swim head Michael Ouweleen issued a statement with the renewal, acknowledging how rare good news like this can be: Praising Bennett and Hely for their work on the show, he then addressed the audience, saying, “You all did your job by showing up on Adult Swim and Max to support the show and lighting up your socials to spread the word. So, see? We CAN have nice things.” Bennett and Hely, meanwhile, acknowledged that “The opportunity to push the boundaries of animation and storytelling on Adult Swim is like a wonderful mushroom dream. Our goal with the show is to transform planet Earth and restore the human spirit. For now, we will settle for a second season.”
Common Side Effects airs on Sunday nights.
