By now, you’re totally hooked on the TV series American Gods, based on the book of the same name by Neil Gaiman. But did you know that before the show wound up at Starz, it was almost a series on HBO? It’s true; the cable channel first had interest in the property around 2011, but it took six years for the show to make it to the air on Starz. That’s just one of the facts packed into the latest episode of the ScreenCrush series You Think You Know TV?

Ian McShane is getting great reviews for his performance as Mr. Wednesday, one of the show’s gods. But originally, the series creators wanted Nicolas Cage to play that part. That would have been something. Cage ultimately decided he did not want to to commit to a long-term project like this kind of TV series, and eventually the role of Wednesday fell to McShane.

‘You Think You Know TV?’ is a ScreenCrush original series that dives deep into the worlds of your favorite TV series and freeze frames a few tidbits you might not have known, as with our other installments for The Wire, 1966’s Batman, The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, and many more. Our companion series ‘You Think You Know Movies?’ has already tackled everything from Star Wars to Suicide Squad, but now we’re headed out to meet the new American Gods. Watch more TV installments of ‘You Think You Know’ down below, and let us know what shows we should cover next!

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