Prime Video is slowly but surely cementing its authority in the young adult genre.
The streamer’s incredibly popular adaptation of Jenny Han‘s The Summer I Turned Pretty returned for its third and final season earlier this month to stellar viewership. From Season 1 to Season 3, the premiere week-audience has tripled.
TSITP is no doubt a juggernaut for Prime Video that, unfortunately, has to come to an end. But make no mistake, YA will continue to be alive and well at Amazon. In fact, the series returns in the middle of what feels like a moment for Prime Video’s YA slate, which has been growing slowly but surely over the past few years.
The streamer is currently home to titles including We Were Liars, Motorheads, Maxton Hall and Overcompensating, with more on the horizon including Legally Blonde prequel Elle, series adaptations of Elle Kennedy’s popular Off Campus college romance novels, and Rebecca Yarros’ fantasy epic Fourth Wing. There are also titles in the works that aren’t specifically YA but target a similar demo including The Better Sister, which launched in May, and upcoming works like The Girlfriend and Mike Flanagan’s Carrie adaptation.
Prime Video’s Head of TV Vernon Sanders tells Deadline it’s all part of a plan to build an ecosystem of content that keeps the fans top of mind.
There’s a “sense of community we’re trying to build at Prime Video that it’s not just the destination to watch content, but it’s a chance to connect with storytellers, creators and for audiences to build relationships with one another. So that’s our ultimate goal, and we’re seeing this summer the real fruits of those labors start to pay off,” he said.
In the interview below, Sanders talks more about the YA strategy at Prime Video and shares updates on several anticipated titles including many listed above.
DEADLINE: We knew TSITP was popular, but the numbers shared today truly are impressive. How have you used the success of that show and everything you’ve learned along the way to build the larger blueprint for YA television at Prime Video?
VERNON SANDERS: We knew that we had what we hoped was going to be a giant hit coming in Season 3. Credit to our PR and marketing teams who teamed up on a women-led campaign that started in spring and has spread through the entire summer. We were extremely excited to see the results on The Better Sister, which was a big hit for us. We’ve been really pleased with the build-up, whether it’s We Were Liars or Overcompensating or Motorheads. We have The Runarounds coming later this year. We have The Girlfriend. All of these were really strategically placed throughout the year. This women-led campaign has really sort of brought it all together. There was a giant event in New York where we brought the cast of not only our U.S.-led series and movies, but we also brought our international cast. So we had the cast of Culpa. We has Maxton Hall, which is another hit. We’ve really created what we think is this fan-led community, which is really sort of humming along. So I think smart scheduling, and also this fan/customer-led campaign, has really ignited us here. We’re very, very excited by the results.
DEADLINE: YA has always been a very enduring genre, but in the streaming era it struggled to find its footing. For a while, there no longer seemed to be a true “home” for YA content. Outside of just finding and bidding on good material, how do you build a library of titles in that space that feels cohesive and plants a flag establishing Prime Video as a streaming home for YA?
SANDERS: I think we’re unique in that Prime Video has, obviously, all the roots of that Amazon helped build. The company got started by selling books. Our relationships with readers and authors, I think, is quite unique. I think we may have stumbled upon a little bit of a recipe that’s really worked for us. Great adaptations lead to more book sales. More book sales lead to more conversation. That leads to success for all of us. I think it’s about the voice, and so it doesn’t have to just be an author who is adapting or a writer who’s adapting or a showrunner who’s adapting. We’re also leaning into creators. We’re trying to find those folks who just have something to say and and have had some success really resonating with that audience. So whether it’s Megan Park or Benito Skinner — we’re super excited by the results we’ve seen by from Overcompensating. Josh [Schwarz] and Stephanie [Savage] have had incredible success, and they’re bringing that success to us. Julie Plec … Mike Flanagan is doing an incredible adaptation of Carrie. We love working with Reese Witherspoon and Lauren Neustadter on Elle, which we think is going to be something that’s going to surprise everyone. So it’s really about the voice and building community, and that’s what we’re focused on for this part of our strategy.
DEADLINE: I really enjoyed Overcompensating. I hope to see more from that show.
SANDERS: We are hopeful. We’ve got some Season 2 writers rooms happening on several of our spring and early summer launches. We were always proud of Overcompensating, [and] just the reception of it has really, really given us even more encouragement. So stay tuned.
DEADLINE: When Season 2 of TSITP debuted, you mentioned Jenny Han was excited by the possibility of expanding the universe beyond the books. What’s the temperature now? Might we expect spinoffs in the future?
SANDERS: That was probably wishful thinking for me at the time, and Jenny has stayed really focused to getting these seasons right. We’re pursuing new and different things with Jenny right now. She’s presented some some other things that are related to this. So once the full season is launched, we’ll get into conversations, and we’ll ask her to pick from the many things that she’s surfaced. But we’ve moved away from those conversations.
DEADLINE: What about We Were Liars? Should we expect more?
SANDERS: Well, that’s one of the shows where the writers are hard at work, working on what a Season 2 would be. We’ve been really excited by the results we’ve seen there, and it’s one of the shows that I hope will have some positive news to report soon. They’re hard at work in presenting us with material on a Season 2, and there’s been quite a clamor from fans of that show to keep the story going. So we’ll see.
DEADLINE: I also wanted to ask about Motorheads. That felt like a very new and different offering from Prime Video in the YA space, and I’m curious what drew you to it and what void it’s helping fill in your content strategy?
SANDERS: We were just really wowed by the idea of the show. We were launching NASCAR this summer, and so having a show that actually spoke to fans of that genre [was an asset]. It was really just the characters. We feel like we lucked out getting into business with those showrunners as well. We are conscious of not wanting to repeat ourselves. So there’s a real breadth to what we’re trying to do. We’re always trying to make sure that we’ve got some shows that are earnest. We’ve got shows that have some darkness to them, [like] We Were Liars. And Motorheads has just really sort of resonated with us and struck us. What I’ve been excited to see on that show in particular is we’ve got such great completion rates. So folks who start that show tend to watch it all the way through, and that’s a great sign. So thanks for asking about that show. We’re quite proud of it.
DEADLINE: I know it’s film, but I feel obligated to ask about Red, White & Royal Blue. Anything you can tease on the sequel?
SANDERS: The film team would kill me if I revealed anything, so I’m gonna leave that to them, but that movie was an inspiration for all of us on the series side. It was so well done, and we took a lot of lessons and cues from that in terms of what we were doing.
DEADLINE: You also have Off Campus, another popular series. What can you say about where you are in that process?
SANDERS: I will share that we’ve been obsessively watching dailies, and we’re really excited by what we’re seeing. We should be getting our first cuts in the not-too-distant future, and that show is definitely going to be launching in 2026. So it won’t be this year, but it will definitely be next year.
DEADLINE: As we are discussing the current state of YA at Prime Video, what does the future look like? What should we expect in the next five or so years?
SANDERS: As I said, this is a part of our strategy. We’re also focused on young men, and we’ve had a lot of success with animation and some of our big tentpoles [have been] a real beacon for young male audiences. But for young women, I think it’s not only wanting to build a great library that if someone comes in for a show, they are sort of brought into a whole world of options and great stories that has all the elements. So, romance, horror, surprise. We’re excited about our adaptation of Fourth Wing, which we’re really working hard at. If you look at that, it has so many elements to it. It’s got a more smorgasbord of genres inside that. But I think the thing I’m most focused on, thanks to the teamwork between our marketing teams and our PR team, is this sense of community we’re trying to build at Prime Video that it’s not just the destination to watch content, but it’s a chance to connect with storytellers, creators and for audiences to build relationships with one another. So that’s our ultimate goal, and we’re seeing this summer the real fruits of those labors start to pay off.
DEADLINE: I know this one is probably early stages, but since you mentioned it, how are things on Fourth Wing?
SANDERS: We don’t have news to report yet, so I won’t be breaking anything here, but we’re hard at work. We love our relationship with Rebecca Yarros, who has been incredible, and we’re going to get this one right. So that would be my promise to the fans.
