‘Wednesday’ Season 2 Officially Begins Filming
Some spoilers below.
Wednesday Addams is not like other girls. Portrayed by Jenna Ortega in Netflix’s Addams Family spin-off series, she’s a goth oddball from a loving family of fellow oddballs, and they don’t care about fitting in (or even seem to notice when they don’t).
After months of buzz and anticipation, Wednesday began streaming on November 23, 2022 and became an instant hit—it even beat Stranger Things’ record for viewership in a single week. With only eight episodes in the first season, viewers were left wondering if there might be another one coming up to complete Wednesday’s story. After all, she does type “The End?” in the last episode.
Here’s what we know about the second season.
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Has Wednesday been renewed for season 2?
Finally, yes. Netflix announced the renewal on Jan. 6, 2023 with a video that promises “more misery is coming” in Wednesday season 2. (The clip is soundtracked by Lady Gaga’s “Bloody Mary,” of course.)
“We can’t wait to dive headfirst into another season and explore the kooky, spooky world of Nevermore,” co-showrunners Miles Millar and Alfred Gough told Tudum.
Gough previously shared in an interview that he and Millar had been discussing the prospect of continuing Wednesday for another season. “Miles and I are talking amongst ourselves about it. There’s definitely more that you can explore in the world of the Addamses,” he said.
That hints at the alternative direction the show could take; potentially, there could be a series for every character in the family. In another interview with Vanity Fair, Millar and Gough explained they didn’t want Wednesday to be seen as a “reboot of the Addams Family.”
The show focuses on “what happened before” with the family, and it was important to them while working with executive producer Tim Burton that the project be something new.
“That’s something that was very important to the show—that it didn’t feel like a remake or a reboot,” Millar said. “It’s something that lives within the Venn diagram of what happened before, but it’s its own thing. It’s not trying to be the movies or the ’60s TV show. That was very important to us and very important to Tim.”
Millar told TV Line that he wanted to explore more of the family if the show were to continue. (After all, season 1 includes a flashback of passionate lovers Morticia and Gomez as teens and the terrifying murder mystery that was a part of their story.) “We felt like we just touched the surface with those characters and the actors are so amazing in those roles,” he said. “Catherine [Zeta-Jones] is, I think, an iconic Morticia. The relationship between Wednesday and Morticia is also essential to the show, and the idea that Wednesday is trying to forge her own path outside the family is important.”
He added that he and the team “definitely want to feature the family as we did this season in a couple of episodes if we were to get a second season.”
What would Wednesday season 2 be about?
The Addams Family as a concept has been around for a long time, so there’s a lot of material to mine from. They began as cartoons created by Charles Addams in 1938 that were published in the New Yorker. From there, the comics became a popular TV show in the ’60s, and eventually were made into movies in the ’90s, which is probably where most of us recognize the characters from—especially Wednesday, who was played in the films by Christina Ricci. Ricci even makes a guest appearance on the show as a call back to her original role, except this time she’s the villain.
The 2022 slice of life series follows Wednesday Addams as she arrives at her new school, Nevermore Academy. She has newfound psychic abilities and supernatural powers, and there are some mysteries at her school and in her town to unravel, including monsters, mayhem, and murder. Nevermore and its amazing set design have been pretty central to the show, and Wednesday did just start classes, so we would probably see a continuation of the Nevermore mysteries and general teen antics of a boarding school.
But the threads the show sets up in the last few moments of the eighth episode include a renewal of Wednesday’s rivalry with the school’s popular Siren, Wednesday receiving threatening anonymous texts from her “first stalker,” and a shot of Tyler transforming into his Hyde persona in the back of a black van. We have a new villain and a continuation of another monster’s story, which could be interesting to explore in a potential second season.
Ortega would even want to see Wednesday heading further down a dark path. “I kind of want her to be darker,” she told Entertainment Tonight, regarding her hopes for a second season. She added, “I think I want it to continue down an antihero stream rather than a typical hero.”
Sure enough, she gave an update during her Variety Actors on Actors segment in June 2023. “It’s still coming together,” she said of season 2, “but we’ve decided we want to lean into the horror more. We’re ditching any romantic love interest, which is really great. We’re going to get bolder, more dark.”
Who will be in the cast?
Jenna Ortega will definitely come back as Wednesday. Her parents Gomez and Morticia Addams, played by Luis Guzmán and Catherine Zeta-Jones, are also confirmed to return. The season 2 cast also consists of: Emma Myers as Enid, Joy Sunday as Bianca, Hunter Doohan as Tyler, Victor Dorobantu as Thing, Moosa Mostafa as Eugene, Isaac Ordonez as Puglsey, Luyanda Unati Lewis-Nyawo as Deputy Santiago, and Georgie Farmer as Ajax.
Christina Ricci and Gwendoline Christie, who appeared in season 1, sadly won’t return for the next season. Christie’s character as Nevermore’s principal meets an untimely end (but could she return as a ghosts?) As for Ricci’s Ms. Thornhill, she is seemingly swarmed by bees later in the season, so that could be the last we see of her.
There are several iconic characters from the Addams world who still have not been cast, including Grandmama and Cousin Itt. And the creators can always add new characters at their discretion, so there are probably some fun announcements and cameos ahead.
On April 16, 2024, Variety made one: The outlet reported that Steve Buscemi will be joining Wednesday season 2’s cast. Official details on his character have not been revealed. Sources told the outlet though that Buscemi will be playing the new principal of Nevermore Academy, following the former principal’s demise.
Netflix confirmed the new series regulars include: Buscemi, Billie Piper, Evie Templeton, Owen Painter (Tiny Beautiful Things), and Noah Taylor (Law & Order: Organized Crime).
Guest stars include original Addams Family star Christopher Lloyd (who played Uncle Fester in the ’90s films), Joanna Lumley (Absolutely Fabulous), Thandiwe Newton, Frances O’Connor (The Missing), Haley Joel Osment, Heather Matarazzo (The Princess Diaries, Scream) and Joonas Suotamo (Solo: A Star Wars Story), Jamie McShane (Bloodline), and, of course, Fred Armisen. (McShane, who plays Sheriff Donovan Galpin, was formerly a series regular but will now appear as a guest star, Deadline reports.)
Deadline also reports a few cast members won’t be returning for season 2: Percy Hynes White, who played Wednesday’s love interest Xavier, and Naomi J Ogawa, who played vampire Yoko Tanaka.
Is season 2 filming yet?
Yes. Netflix announced on May 7, 2024 that production had officially begun in Ireland, with a handful of new cast members.
“We are thrilled that the entire Addams family will be enrolling in Nevermore Academy this season along with a dream cast of icons and new faces,” showrunners Al Gough and Miles Millar said in a statement.
The streamer shared a photo of the ensemble together, as well as a video of Thing handing out scripts to the cast. The footage even teases that season 2, episode 1 is titled “Here We Woe Again” and is once again directed by Tim Burton.
Is Wednesday leaving Netflix?
Nope, that was just speculation. In early January 2023, reports broke wondering whether Wednesday would be pulled from Netflix because the show’s production company, MGM, was purchased by Amazon. After the deal finalized, some questioned if it would result in Wednesday getting pulled from Netflix and moving to Prime Video instead, given the show’s popularity. (Or perhaps Netflix would have to pay to keep Wednesday on its platform.) It was also presumed that this possible issue was the cause for delay in announcing the show’s renewal.
However, Deadline reported weeks earlier in mid-December 2022 that “even though MGM has been restructured into Amazon Studios, under Jen Salke, no one expects that to derail future seasons [of Wednesday].” In fact, MGM Television produces content for a number of other streamers outside of Prime Video, such as The Handmaid's Tale for Hulu, Fargo for FX, and even Vikings: Valhalla for Netflix. It’s possible that such a partnership would continue for Wednesday as MGM starts its new chapter under Amazon.
“[Amazon], truthfully, is in business with everybody and is expected to continue to do that in multiple dimensions,” a source told Deadline. The outlet reported at the time that producers were already looking for new additions to the season 2 writers room and considering filming locations.
Sure enough, when Wednesday’s renewal was announced, the streamer confirmed the show would be “only on Netflix.”
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