While fans were busy waiting to hear if and when there would be a new season of Louie, creator/writer/director/star Louis C.K. pulled a fast one on us and dropped a brand new series on the internet, without so much as a single pre-release heads up. The result, Horace and Pete, was a new comedy-drama series released exclusively on the internet, and starred C.K. and Steve Buscemi as the title characters, owners of a bar called Horace and Pete’s. The series drew tremendous praise from critics and featured a slew of guest stars, from Alan Alda to Jessica Lange to Edie Falco, but now, as the show has wrapped up its 10-episode first season, C.K. has announced that this is it for Horace and Pete.
In an email to the show’s subscribers, C.K. announced that Horace and Pete was a one-season deal:
Hi. So. That was it. I didn’t want to say, in the last email, that it was the last episode. Because I didn’t want you to know, as you watched the episode, that it would be the last one. But yeah, obviously, That was it.
C.K. revealed on Howard Stern recently that because he produced Horace and Pete himself, he has now found himself in “millions of dollars of debt,” although he’ll likely recoup most of that in short order via his lucrative stand-up career. Horace and Pete was an experiment, with C.K. wanting to release a show that everyone knew nothing about. While that resulted in a pure viewing experience, it also resulted in limited viewership, as is the case when you release a piece of media with literally zero marketing.
But now that the show is complete, it’s available to watch online in its entirety. And according to C..K., it’s worth it:
Thank you again to those of you who watched with us as we made it. To those of you who haven’t, I can tell you, now that it’s done, it’s a fucking good show. It really is. You can go and google it and read many terrific reviews.
However, if you’re thinking about binging, C.K. would rather you not:
Take your time watching it. Give it time. It doesn’t really follow any rhythms that you’re used to. So watch that one and wait a week and think about it. Then watch another one.
You can purchase individual episodes or the entire season over at C.K.’s website. In today’s landscape, pulling off what he did is kind of incredible, and seeing the saga of Horace and Pete unfold over the last few weeks has been quite interesting. With C.K. saying he’s unlikely to return to Louie anytime seen, this 10-episode gift is not a terrible substitute.
