‘Animal Control’ Renewed For Season 3 By Fox Ahead Of Season 2 Premiere

EXCLUSIVE: Fox Entertainment has given an early Season 3 pickup to its workplace comedy Animal Control a month before the single-camera series starring Joel McHale is set to premiere its second season on March 6, paired with Family Guy.

Animal Control is Fox’s first fully owned live-action comedy — and only current live-action series — which is giving the company flexibility on renewal decisions. The comedy, which scored a record streaming debut for Fox, has lined up international sales in key English-language territories, including UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, bringing revenue for the company. (The network’s roster of fully owned scripted series also includes animated comedy Krapopolis.)

After seeing Season 2’s creative direction, including finished episodes, the Fox brass felt confident about ordering another season, which will be shot after a break following Season 2 wrap to accommodate talent schedules.

“Animal Control is an incredibly irreverent series that expresses everything viewers expect from a Fox comedy,” said Fox Entertainment’s President of Scripted Programming Michael Thorn. “It has an amazing amount of momentum behind it, and we’ve been so impressed by the work Joel, Bob, Rob, Dan, Tad, Jake and the entire cast are delivering for Season Two we wanted to reward them with the opportunity to deliver even more of this special show to fans next season.”

Created by Bob Fisher, Rob Greenberg and Dan Sterling, with Tad Quill serving as showrunner and the four executive producing alongside McHale and Jake Fuller, Animal Control follows a group of local Animal Control workers whose lives are complicated by the fact that animals are simple, but humans are not. McHale stars as Frank, an opinionated, eccentric Animal Control officer who may not have gone to college but is still the most well-read person in the room. A former cop, Frank tried to expose corruption in his department, but his efforts got him fired, which may explain why he’s so cynical and curmudgeonly. He has an almost superhuman ability to understand animals. Humans…not so much.

Michael Rowland, Vella Lovell, Ravi Patel and Grace Palmer also star, with Gerry Dee recurring. Season 2, which ushers in mating season – for both the animals and the officers who protect them – features guest stars Ken Jeong, Sarah Chalke as well as Krystal Smith who will be recurring.

The series premiere of Animal Control marked Fox’s most-streamed scripted debut and most-streamed comedy episode ever, averaging 5.2 million multi-platform viewers, including 2.6 million on Hulu, a lift of +302% from Live + Same Day.

Animal Control is produced by Fox Entertainment Studios and executive-produced by Fisher, Greenberg, Sterling, Quill, Fuller (Jax Media) and McHale. The series is distributed by Fox Entertainment Global, which has sold it in the UK to Channel 4, as well as Foxtel’s FOX8 in Australia, CBC and CBC Gem in Canada and TVNZ in New Zealand.