Dash & Lily executive producer Shawn Levy hinted that Netflix canceled the award-winning young adult series, although the streaming platform has not announced the show’s future. After the show’s entire eight-episode debut season was released in November 2020, creator Joe Tracz said he hoped they could adapt the next books in the Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares series by Rachel Cohn and David Leviathan. Star Austin Abrams also said there were “conversations” about Season 2, but it appears those went nowhere.
In an interview with Collider last week, Levy was asked about the future of another show his 21 Laps produced for Netflix, I Am Not Okay With This. Netflix announced that the show was canceled in August 2020 after just one season because of the coronavirus pandemic. The lesson behind I Am Not Okay With This‘ cancellation was that even if everything goes right for a show, it could still struggle to find a wide audience, Levy explained.
“So that’s one of those shows, like Dash & Lily, which just won a bunch of Daytime Emmys where it’s like we, and the team at 21 Laps, feel like we made the show we promised,” the Free Guy director told Collider. “We made the show we wanted. Not enough people watched and it is a cruel metric in the age of the streaming wars. And sometimes, if you don’t get the eyeballs, you don’t get to make more of the thing. That’s what happened there [with I Am Not Okay With This].”
Based on his comments, it appears that Dash & Lily met the same fate as I Am Not Okay With This, but Netflix never got around to formally announcing its cancellation. Dash & Lily starred Abrams and Midori Francis as the title characters, two teens living in New York City who develop a romantic relationship by trading dares. Dante Brown also starred as Dash’s friend Boomer, while Troy Iwata played Lily’s brother Langston.
The series earned critical acclaim, including a 100% score on Rotten Tomatoes. The show was nominated for 12 Daytime Emmys, including Outstanding Young Adult Series. It won awards for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Daytime Fiction Program (Jodi Long); Outstanding Writing Team for a Daytime Fiction Program; and Outstanding Makeup for a Drama or Daytime Fiction Program.
After Netflix released the first season, Tracz told TVLine he was excited about adapting Cohn and Leviathan’s second and third books. “The third book was actually written on set. David and Rachel would visit the set, and they’d be working on their chapters for the third book,” Tracz said in November. “I love these characters so much and the city that they live in. Knowing that there is more story to be told, those are stories I’d love to tell.”
Abrams was also confident about the show continuing when he spoke with Us Weekly in November. “You know, [season 2] seems to be a conversation,” he told the outlet. “I don’t really know what’s going on with that. I think the way Netflix works is something needs to air and they look at numbers before they decide to jump on a renewal. So, I don’t really know what’s going on with it, but it definitely seems to be a possibility.” Sadly for fans of the show, Season 2 no longer seems like a possibility. Viewers will have to read Cohn and Leviathan’s novels for the further adventures of Dash and Lily.