SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for Season 2 of “Wednesday,” now streaming on Netflix.
After more than a few near-death experiences, Wednesday (Jenna Ortega) came out of Season 2 triumphant — mostly.
By the finale of Season 2, Wednesday had identified her newest foes to be Francoise Galpin (Frances O’Connor) and Isaac Night (Owen Painter), the mother and uncle, respectively, of Season 1 monster Tyler Galpin (Hunter Doohan). Like Tyler, Francoise is a Hyde, and Isaac is the fully regenerated version of Slurp, Pugsley’s (Isaac Ordonez) pet zombie from earlier episodes. Together with Tyler, Francoise and Isaac kidnap Pugsley, planning to use his ability to generate electricity to power a machine to save Francoise. Her monstrous transformations are killing her, and the device Isaac invented will take her powers away and give her her health back.
This isn’t Francoise and Isaac’s first attempt at the procedure. Morticia (Catherine Zeta-Jones) reveals to Wednesday and Hester (Joanna Lumley) that Isaac tried to carry out this same experiment as a student at Nevermore, using Gomez (Luis Guzmán) as the electricity source. (Before hearing this, Wednesday and Hester both thought Gomez had never had powers.) Morticia, however, disrupted the process by chopping off Isaac’s hand, leading the machine to blow up and kill Isaac. Gomez and Morticia buried him, but kept his disembodied hand, which eventually became Thing (Victor Dorobantu).
Wednesday first tries to save Pugsley from Isaac’s clutches by positioning Thing out of sight, ready to shoot. But Isaac catches Thing’s dart, then reattaches Thing to his arm and buries Wednesday alive. Agnes (Evie Templeton) and Enid (Emma Myers) manage to dig her up, but Enid endangers herself in the process. She has just learned that alpha wolves risk remaining in their wolf form forever when they transform under a full moon, but she has no other choice to keep her friend alive. After “wolfing out” and saving Wednesday, she flees.
Wednesday then infiltrates Isaac and Francoise’s operation. They have bonded Pugsley to their machine and, surprisingly, put Tyler into the other end instead of Francoise. Against his will, they aim to rid Tyler of his powers so that that he doesn’t suffer the same fate at Francoise, who says her condition has progressed too far for her to be saved. Wednesday approaches Tyler with an axe, but instead of killing him, she releases him from the machine. He enters his monster form and battles his mother before she falls to her death from Nevermore’s roof. Wednesday then rescues Pugsley as Gomez and Morticia arrive, but before the family can properly reunite, Isaac snatches Wednesday into his telekinetic grip, choking her. Luckily, the family calls out to Thing, who regains his autonomy and turns against the rest of Isaac’s body, pulling out his heart and saving the Addams family.
The resolution to Season 2 is satisfying, but it still brings up more uncertainties than it answers. Here are the most burning questions we have about what may be coming in “Wednesday” Season 3.
Why did Wednesday save Tyler?
When Tyler was strapped to Isaac’s machine, Wednesday had the chance to kill him once and for all. Instead, she freed him. Chaos ensues, with Tyler and Francoise entering their hyde forms and Pugsley still trapped in the machine, so there isn’t time to dwell on her decision. But it’s an interesting one: Before this, Wednesday has shown no capacity to empathize with the circumstances that led Tyler to manipulate her and murder so many others. Yes, she once had a fledgling romance with him, but that was before his lies were revealed, and she’s hated him ever since. So why has she had a change of heart now? And what will the consequences be?
What will happen to Enid?
After witnessing Enid enter her werewolf form without a full moon present, Miss Capri (Billie Piper) explains to her that she might be an alpha. That makes her incredibly powerful, but overall, it’s scary news. If an alpha wolfs out under a full moon, they get stuck in that form forever and are doomed to be hunted and killed by their fellow werewolves. Enid’s primary fear upon hearing the news is that she’ll be alone forever, but there’s a silver lining in that Wednesday promises to come find her if the worst does happen.
When Wednesday is buried alive by Isaac, Enid and Agnes can’t dig up the dirt quickly enough to save her until Enid decides to transform, unable to let her friend die. As a wolf, Enid excavates Wednesday and then sprints off into the night. After saving Pugsley from Isaac, Francoise and Tyler, Wednesday sets off with Fester (Fred Armisen) and Thing to spend her summer searching for Enid. She has a head start: Agnes got photos from wildlife camera that located her near the Canadian border.
But what happens when Wednesday finds Enid? Are we totally sure she’s an alpha? Capri did only say that she “might” be, and we saw Enid wolf out under a full moon and return to normal in Season 1 — but maybe that was different since it was her first time. If she is indeed an alpha, is she truly stuck in her wolf form forever? That seems hard to believe, especially with Emma Myers, who plays Enid’s human form, being such a big part of “Wednesday.” Maybe there’s some ancient outcast text that Wednesday can consult to undo everything and bring her friend back.
Where is Miss Capri taking Tyler?
It was clear from the moment she was introduced that Miss Capri had a big secret. She didn’t turn out to be involved in any of the wrongdoing at Willow Hill, but Wednesday discovers by snooping in her desk that she does have a past with hydes. She once fell in love with one, and he nearly killed her. But there’s more to the story.
In the Season 2 finale, Capri finds Tyler standing at his parents’ grave. With Thornhill (Christina Ricci) and Francoise both dead, he doesn’t have much time left; as Capri told Wednesday earlier in the season, male hydes can’t survive long without a master. But she offers Tyler an alternative to his impending doom, some kind of secret community she can take him to where hydes transcend the need for a master. Suspicions arisen, Tyler asks, “What’s in it for you?” Then Capri reveals that her father was a hyde.
Where are these hiding hydes? And how has Capri worked around their condition to keep them alive? Was she lying to Tyler when she said she didn’t want to be his master, or are her motives really altruistic? Even if she is doing a good deed here, is Tyler ready to accept that or will he take advantage of her kindness?
“Wednesday” co-creator Alfred Gough said in an interview with Variety after the release of Part 1 that “some” of the goodness Tyler showed before he was revealed as the hyde was genuine. So if Capri means what she says, maybe he’ll get the chance to redeem himself and atone for the harm he’s done to Nevermore, Jericho and the Addams family. But he’s also very vulnerable. It wouldn’t be hard for him to turn back onto a dark path.
What’s going on with Hester and Ophelia?
“Wednesday” has been mysterious about the whereabouts of Morticia’s sister, Ophelia, for awhile now. Early in Season 2, Morticia tells Wednesday that Ophelia abused her psychic ability and that it drove her mad. Their mother, Hester, had her committed at Willow Hill, and Wednesday learns from Fester later that she escaped the asylum and hasn’t been seen since.
In the Season 2 finale, we begin to get some answers. To make up for burning Goody Addams’ (Ortega) spellbook and keeping so many secrets, Morticia gives Wednesday a journal that belonged to Ophelia as a gift. When she flips through it, she has her first psychic vision in a long time: a too-brief glimpse at the back of a blonde woman’s head. She recognizes that it’s Ophelia. But what Wednesday doesn’t see is that Ophelia is sitting in a secret room of Hester’s house, writing the words “WEDNESDAY MUST DIE” on the wall in big red letters.
What’s Ophelia’s beef with Wednesday? Does Hester want Wednesday dead too? If so, why? Hester did seem rather eager to have Wednesday come stay with her for the summer, and is far less touchy-feely about family than Morticia is, so there’s a chance she’s luring her in to kill her. At the same time, she does seem to have some modicum of affection for her granddaughter, and she didn’t reappear in Wednesday’s life until being summoned. Hopefully, Wednesday’s grandmother will do something to protect her from whatever long-lost aunt is cooking up.
Who will take over as principal of Nevermore?
Principal Dort (Steve Buscemi) is ousted (and inadvertently killed) for his unethical fundraising tactics in the penultimate episode of Season 2, much to the delight of Larissa Weems (Gwendoline Christie), who witnesses his downfall from beyond the grave as Wednesday’s new spirit guide. “The board will now look back upon the Weems era with fondness,” she gloats, adding, “Nevermore clearly needs a steady hand on the rudder, a leader of impeccable moral character.”
Who fits that description is a mystery, though. It would be great to see Weems return for Season 3, but she departed as Wednesday’s spirit guide in the finale and it doesn’t seem like she’s coming back to life. Meanwhile, none of the teachers in Season 2 appear to be up for the job. Miss Capri is busy with Tyler, and Professor Orloff (Christopher Lloyd) was killed by Isaac. Perhaps Morticia could run the school, since she spent Season 2 as president of the school’s gala fundraising committee and seems eager for an excuse to stay close to Wednesday.
But it’s more likely that the job will go to a new character in Season 3. Weems and Dort both led Nevermore with their own views of where outcasts belong in the world and how they should relate to normies, and both made major mistakes (though Dort’s were obviously worse). It’s time for someone with a new, more nuanced perspective.
Will Wednesday’s powers come back?
It was compelling to watch Wednesday get to the end of her investigation without her psychic ability to lean on for answers. At the same time, since the time she spent studying Goody Addams’ spellbook took place over summer break (a.k.a. in between Seasons 1 and 2), we haven’t gotten to see much of Wednesday at the height of her powers.
As Wednesday’s spirit guide, Weems reminds Wednesday that psychic abilities are ancestral, and that her estrangement from her mother was preventing her from getting her visions back. She and Morticia certainly made progress as they worked together to save Pugsley, with Morticia admitting she’s kept too many secrets and Wednesday empathizing more with her mother’s instinct to protect her. Wednesday is rewarded for that growth with the short vision she has of Ophelia, though she’s a long road from the more detailed visions she used to have.
Still, things with Morticia aren’t warm and fuzzy yet, and more questions arise now that Ophelia has come into play. Ophelia is a family member too, so will her deadly hopes for her niece further tamper with Wednesday’s ability? And even if Wednesday does properly master her ability this time, what will that look like? We’ve heard from Morticia that psychic visions can’t always be taken literally, so there will be complex mysteries to solve regardless.