5 Important Moments To Remember From Netflix’s ‘Wednesday’ Before Watching Season 2
After nearly three years, Wednesday finally returns to Netflix for a second season.
The “creepy, kooky, mysterious, spooky, and all together ooky” series broke records in its debut season, spanning generations of viewers from all walks of life. Who doesn’t love Wednesday Addams? Portrayed by Jenna Ortega, Wednesday spends Season 1 acquainting herself with Nevermore Academy and its pupils amidst a series of murders in the school’s town of Jericho.
Before going to Nevermore, Wednesday felt like an outcast. But Nevermore is a school for outcasts in a town with a dark history of tension between the “normies” and the “outcasts.” Not only that, but Nevermore was also where Wednesday’s parents, Morticia and Gomez Addams, met and fell in love (but not without some drama). Wednesday takes full advantage of its setting, history, and relationships to serve up a murder mystery, love triangle, and coming-of-age story that we should definitely remember before watching Season 2.
Wednesday follows a vision back to the past to learn about Jericho’s history.
As we learn throughout Season 1 of Wednesday, the Addams family has deep roots in the town of Jericho, where Nevermore Academy and its students live. When the students volunteer in Jericho as an attempt to keep peace between the outcasts and normies, Wednesday has a vision while inspecting the grounds of the town’s original meeting house. She meets Goody Addams, her ancestral doppelganger whose mother died at the hands of Joseph Crackstone, Jericho’s founder. In the old meeting house, Joseph would burn the town’s outcasts, and was coming for Goody before she killed him instead. We later learn that Goody also founded the Nightshade Society, Nevermore’s elite secret society.
One student tried to murder Wednesday unsuccessfully.
In the second episode, Wednesday finds herself gaining confidence, allies, and enemies at Nevermore. While at the town’s Harvest Festival, Rowan leads Wednesday into the forest before attempting to kill her with his telekinetic powers. However, the murderous monster actually saves Wednesday from Rowan before killing him. Rowan reappears, although we later learn that Principal Weems (Gwendolyn Christie) shapeshifted into him to avoid a PR disaster. However, Rowan’s motive was to stop Wednesday from setting the school aflame in a prophecy passed down to him from his parents—is it possible Rowan’s family could still have a vendetta against Wednesday?
Wednesday kisses one of her love interests at the school dance.
No good coming-of-age series is complete without a love triangle, even if the series in question is full of horror and whimsy. Despite queer undertones, Wednesday is caught in the middle between two suitors: Xavier Thorpe (Percy Hynes White), a psychic student who can bring his drawings to life, and Tyler Galpin (Hunter Doohan), a normie barista and the son of Jericho’s sheriff. Xavier also happens to be the ex of Wednesday’s nemesis-turned-friend, Bianca Barclay (Joy Sunday), a powerful siren, but he wants to protect Wednesday. Tyler takes a liking to Wednesday and even accompanies her to the school dance, where they share a kiss.
However, their kiss is where the story takes a turn, because it causes one of Wednesday’s visions. This time, the vision shows her that Tyler turns into a Hyde, a monstrous alter-ego that can be unlocked through trauma and hypnosis. Upon learning this, Wednesday is tasked with saving Jericho and Nevermore from possible destruction.
Wednesday’s roommate, Enid, finally “wolfs out.”
Throughout Wednesday, we cheer on Enid Sinclair (Emma Myers) as she tries to befriend Wednesday. Before we know it, they’re thick as thieves, even spurning a whole host of “and they were roommates” memes. Enid was always a positive orb of sunlight in Wednesday’s dark world, anchoring Wednesday to humanity and empathy. However, Enid has her own struggles. She crushes on Ajax (Georgie Farmer), and the two even partake in a classic teenage makeout scene. With all the heightened emotion during the dance, Enid finally “wolfs out.” Before the dance, she could never fulfill her family’s werewolf roots, unable to transform into a wolf. But when Wednesday is in trouble after such an exciting moment, Enid transforms and saves Wednesday from the Hyde in the season finale.
Wednesday’s botany teacher, a “normie” known as Marilyn Thornhill, turns out to be the season’s villain.
All the mysteries tie together in the finale, when we learn that the skilled hypnotist controlling the Hyde is actually the seemingly powerless botany teacher, Marilyn Thornhill, portrayed by Christina Ricci. (Christina also played Wednesday in the 1991 Addams Family film, giving the series a perfect nod to its roots.) We learn that Marilyn is actually a pseudonym for Laurel Gates, who faked her own death to infiltrate Nevermore after the death of her brother, Garrett Gates.
Through flashbacks and visions, we see that Garrett was part of Morticia Addams’ own love triangle. He loved Morticia so much that he attempted to kill Gomez, but ultimately failed when he succumbed to his own leaked nightshade potion, although it seemed like Morticia was responsible for his death. Regardless, Gomez took the blame until he was ultimately acquitted, but the townspeople of Jericho still blame him (and the Addams family) for the death of one of Joseph Crackstone’s distant descendants.
To get her vengeance for both Joseph and Garrett’s deaths, Laurel learned how to control and release a Hyde upon Jericho to retrieve body parts. In her evil plot to bring Joseph back from the dead, she needed a Blood Moon, various body parts, and the blood of one of Goody’s descendants, which she was able to obtain thanks to Wednesday. Upon hearing Laurel’s plan, Principal Weems, who transformed into Tyler to get Laurel’s confession, is murdered by a vial of nightshade, leaving Nevermore without a leader.
Once Joseph is revived, he wreaks havoc by setting fires to Nevermore, and although Wednesday is injured, her connection with Goody heals her. She fights Joseph with a sword, but he destroys it with his own dark magic. However, Bianca comes to the rescue, stabbing Joseph in the back allowing Wednesday to stab him in the heart, destroying him. Laurel tries to shoot Wednesday, but Wednesday’s friend and ally, an outcast among outcasts named Eugene (Moosa Mostafa), releases his swarm of bees on Laurel to protect Wednesday. But with Principal Weems dead, Nevermore engulfed in flames, and Laurel on the loose, there are still plenty of loose strings to address in Season 2.
Season 1 of Wednesday ends with a mysterious cliffhanger.
Although the action settles down at the end of Wednesday Season 1, quite a few things are left up in the air. Tyler can still access his Hyde alter ego as he’s driven away in a straightjacket to Willow Hill Psychiatric Hospital. But most importantly, when Xavier gifts Wednesday with her first cell phone, she receives a mysterious text from a potential stalker. The text reads, “I’m watching you,” accompanied by photos of Wednesday with Tyler and Xavier, along with a gif of a Wednesday avatar getting stabbed in the head. The stalker could be anyone—a former enemy, a fake friend, even Laurel. Regardless, we expect Season 2 to tackle the cliffhanger and solve another spooky ooky mystery.
