Wednesday: Season 1
Based on: the character Wednesday Addams created by cartoonist Charles Addams, first appearing in The New Yorker in 1938
Created by: Alfred Gough & Miles Millar
Starring: Jenna Ortega (Wednesday), Gwendoline Christie (Principal Weems), Riki Lindhome (Dr. Kinbott), Jamie McShane (Sherriff Galpin), Hunter Doohan (Tyler), Percy Hynes White (Xavier), Emma Myers (Enid), Joy Sunday (Bianca), Georgie Farmer (Ajax), Naomi J. Ogawa (Yoko), Moosa Mostafa (Eugene), Christina Ricci (Marilyn/Laurel)
I actually wasn't interested in this show for several weeks after it came out.
I'd heard all the advertising, of course, but neither the character Wednesday nor the Addams family interested me. I remembered it being something of a sitcom comedy with a gothic flair and I was interested in neither sitcom, comedy, or gothic. It was only a month or so after the show had been released, when I was on Christmas holiday with my family, that my cousins urged me to try it. "It's about a school for people who have powers," one of them described to me, which sounded a lot more like X-Men. "Totally your thing!"
That admittedly got my attention, so I decided to give it a try. It wasn't an immediate grab, but once I got a feel for Wednesday herself and her supporting characters like Enid, I quickly enjoyed it quite a lot. I most appreciated Wednesday's confidence-- even though she was different from everyone else, she had no shame, and was overt about her gothic and dark nature even if it made others uncomfortable. I loved the same about Enid, her roommate: her bright, energetic, and excited demeanor didn't deter her from trying to become fast friends with Wednesday. The two worked well together in a beautifully odd, opposites-attract type of way.
I think that was most of the charm of the whole season for me: Wednesday's confidence in navigating social waters. The different types of characters were very interesting; Nevermore (the school) incorporated vampires, gorgons (Medusa's species), sirens, werewolves, and some others. Each species held special abilities and seeing how they all interacted with each other and the social dynamics they created was all very interesting.
I also loved the show's rendition of Thing, the famous disembodied hand. He was there from the first episode and was something of a main, supporting character the whole time. He was remarkably capable for a hand, seamlessly able to communicate with everyone, convey complex messages through sign language, and perform very complex tasks through regular defiance of physics (like generating his own momentum). Thing was also a pleasant source of comedy with the ridiculous things he was able to accomplish and as a source of common sense to balance Wednesday's more extreme plots or theories. It was also a lot of fun to watch Wednesday and Thing banter back and forth with seemingly one-sided wit.
I have no complaints about the series. It would have been nice to know more about the backstory of the world, the species present at Nevermore, and maybe more about Enid's personal life, but that would have been a lot to balance while also introducing Wednesday and her many idiosyncrasies. Plus, I read that season 2 is supposed to bring in more of the Addams family, which will be a welcome improvement. Season 1 already did that a bit, giving the immediate family an episode or two of screen time and even bringing in an extra member unexpectedly. I also read that season 2 is going to ease up on love interests for Wednesday and focus more on horror. I don't think season 1 necessarily overdid it, but that was definitely a strong focus, and arguably out of character--though I think the writers still handled it well. But I think it will be a good thing to shift away from that and more toward horror, which is definitely more in line with Wednesday's character.
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