Prime Video's Countdown has passed the halfway point of its first season in the 2025 TV schedule, and the action certainly isn't slowing down for Jensen Ackles' Mark Meachum. The show seems to be generating plenty of buzz, and Ackles has certainly proven himself as a leading man who can carry a project for multiple seasons. (See: a decade and a half of Supernatural with Jared Padalecki.) Season 2 has yet to be guaranteed, however, and I recall what creator/showrunner/executive producer Derek Haas shared with CinemaBlend about writing Season 1 and looking ahead to the future.
Haas came to Countdown with plenty of experience on long-running shows as well, as he was the showrunner on NBC's Chicago Fire for more than a decade, and the hard work that he (and Jensen Ackles) put in for stunts in fact reflects some of his comments about Fire often getting snubbed for stunts on the awards circuit. When I spoke with Haas for Countdown during Prime Video's press day, I had to ask: what benefits were there for him to have written all ten episodes of Countdown himself instead of sharing that load? He shared:
I'd never done that before on a TV show. I used to write novels, and this show almost lent itself to being like chapters in a book, of a novel. So I just wanted to try to do it that way and see what would happen. And so it was almost like a challenge, but it was really fun to do it. I felt very close to it all the way through, and then I got to hire this amazing cast to bring it to life, because it really is just words on a page until it gets three-dimensional, once you get this embarrassment of riches of a cast that I got to work with.
The cast who provided Derek Haas with his "embarrassment of riches" is made up of Jessica Camacho as DEA Agent Amber Oliveras, The Flash's Violett Beane as FBI Agent Evan Shepard, Elliot Knight as FBI Agent Keyonte Bell, Uli Latukefu as LAPD Detective Luke Finau, and Grey's Anatomy's Eric Dane as FBI SAC Nathan Blythe in addition to Jensen Ackles as LAPD Detective Mark Meachum. (This Is Us vet Milo Ventimiglia was very briefly part of the cast.)
Writing a full ten episodes is surely a lot of work for a new TV show no matter how talented the cast is and/or how experienced the showrunner is, however. So, I asked Haas if he would want to write all of the scripts himself again if Countdown is renewed for Season 2. He responded:
Oh, that's a great question. Honestly, I haven't thought past getting this first one launched. I really enjoyed doing it, but I also loved working with writing teams, which I'd done many times in the past. So that's a great question for the future. Ask me again in a year.
Well, it's technically only been about six weeks since I spoke with Derek Haas about Countdown Season 2 and got the suggestion to ask him again in a year, but can I be blamed for having high hopes for news of a second season coming sooner rather than later? Eight of the first season's ten episodes have released so far, to a fair amount of buzz. Jensen Ackles even used his post confirming a return to Tracker to hype the latest episode.
For now, keep checking out new episodes of Countdown on Wednesdays with a Prime Video subscription. At the very least, adding to the view count for the series can't hurt its renewal chances, and I for one would love the relief of an official order for Season 2 coming before the Season 1 finale. Most ideally, that Season 2 wouldn't take much longer than the year that Derek Haas mentioned!
