Since American Gods came out in 2001, fans have been begging for author Neil Gaiman to continue telling his sprawling tale about the power of religion, belief, immigrants, and what makes America. And while Gaiman’s publisher has yet to confirm a publication date (since we’re surely years off from that), we can, it seems, obsessively speculate over seemingly throwaway lines in the series that may point to plot machinations in American Gods 2.
Back in April, Gaiman explained to Entertainment Weekly that, “There were moments, which they were very good about listening to, when I would say, ‘Okay, nobody but you two knows anything at all about the plot of American Gods 2, but I need to tell you that this line, which seems like a bit of dialogue that you could lose, will become important. Or this little scene — an indigenous scene — which seems trivial will become important one day and if we get to season 5, we’ll need it then, so let’s put it here now.'”
This is not the first time Gaiman has spoken of a sequel. Back in 2011, the author tweeted a desire to write it:
And for those asking, No, 6 years of AMERICAN GODS on TV doesn't mean just the 1st book. It means I need to write the 2nd now, for a start.
— Neil Gaiman (@neilhimself) June 13, 2011
He also discussed the plan with MTV at that time, saying it was always his intention to bring more of this story to life.
And now, in a new interview with BuzzFeed’s Keely Flaherty, Gaiman explained that, “Hopefully, by the time we got to that point, four, maybe five years from now, there would be another American Gods novel.” He also went on to explain that showrunners Michael Green and Bryan Fuller are actively involved in the process as it relates to the current series/story, going so far as not only discussing the book with the duo, but letting them know important threads to keep in the series.
“It was like taking somebody into your secret places, explaining things that would be in the next novel to Bryan [Fuller] and Michael [Green]. I’m going, Look, these apparently inconsequential lines of dialogue are really important. They set up for something that happens way down the line.”
This means one deeply exciting thing for obsessives such as us: hyper-scrutinizing every line of dialogue that’s in both the book and the TV show and frankensteining together some semblance of a story that will probably, ultimately, be pretty far off from the brilliance Gaiman comes up with. But hey: we don’t tell you how to have a good time! This is just what we like to do.
So who’s ready to rewatch the whole series with us and try and speculate what’s going on in the second book? Because we are, and we bet it has something to do with the oldest of the old gods in America — but what do you think? Let us know in the comments below.
Images: Starz
Alicia Lutes is the Managing Editor of Nerdist and creator/co-host of Fangirling. Find her on Twitter (because she’s an unfortunate slave to the new gods).Â
