We’re so close to the Season 3 finale of School Spirits, the Paramount+ hit that’s easily one of the most fascinating, meticulously crafted shows to watch right now, blending fantasy elements with rich emotional impact courtesy of a brilliant ensemble cast. From the evolution of Maddie’s (Peyton List) relationship with Wally (Milo Manheim), Maddie navigating the complexity of experiencing both the living and spirit worlds, and Simon’s (Kristian Ventura) risk in the ghost realm becoming increasingly more real throughout the season, there’s a lot that fans are waiting for in the season finale.
Reflecting on the journey they wanted for the season and the series as a whole, taking inspiration from their own lives, the show’s creators, siblings Megan Trinrud and Nate Trinrud, identified that something they’ve been particulalry interested in exploring with School Spirits is, “the accidental ability to get lost in someone else’s grief or trauma, or just in someone else’s problems.” And that’s certainly evident with Simon, as he, particularly in Season 3, gets to a point of desperation to get out of being so involved in Maddie’s life.
“Our dad, who passed away, actually during production, struggled a lot with addiction and alcoholism, and it became a common thing for us to feel like we were getting lost in what he was going through and what he was dealing with,” Megan Trinrud told Yahoo Canada. “And I think this is what Simon’s going through.”
“It isn’t exactly like that, but it was a very familiar story to us, which is, you want to help someone so deeply and so badly because you care so much about them. But sometimes, when you do that, you lose yourself. And that can be someone who truly needs you. It can be someone who doesn’t necessarily need that kind of help, and you’re sort of putting yourself out there in a way that is detrimental for no reason.”
“It is so important to have these strong friendships in our lives. … Some people are really close to their family, some people aren’t, … some people have their found families, and I think Maddie and Simon are very much that for each other,” Nate Trinrud added. “But there are limits to how much you can actually do to try and save one another. [In this series] we’re playing a lot with what that dynamic is between these two. Seasons 1 and 2, Simon’s working to do everything he can to bring Maddie back. And now the tables have turned, and I think that it can illuminate for the person who suddenly needs to be saved or needs help, the cost it took when they were giving it in the other direction.”
“We love the sci-fi, we love all that, but a lot of this stuff is working for us, at least on a metaphorical level, where we are talking about these kinds of relationships, or the idea of codependency, the idea of getting too lost and trying to save somebody else. … What is the cost when we show up for our friends in big ways? It’s beautiful, and it’s heroic, but it takes something from us too.”
Kristian Ventura as Simon Elroy in School Spirits, Season 3, streaming on Paramount+ (Ed Araquel/Paramount+)
(Ed Araquel/Paramount+)
As Kristian Ventura described in a separate interview, in Season 3 Simon is “selfish” in his desire to return to the living world, which evolves as we approach the end of the season, where Maddie needs to rescue him from the spirit realm.
“Sometimes things take a really long time to regenerate and process,” Ventura said. “When he is playing the sacrificial knight for too long, and you abandon yourself, it’s naturally destructive.”
“But now he’s selfish as hell. Now it’s, get me out of here. Now I don’t want to be around these people. They’re great, but they’re not my kind, and that’s a wild left turn. So I like that we finally get to see someone who is so concerned, he has no choice but to think about getting on his own feet. It’s a nice side to Simon.”
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – JANUARY 28: (L-R) Kristian Ventura, Peyton List and Milo Manheim attend the “School Spirits” special screening event at The Hollywood Roosevelt on January 28, 2025 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Charley Gallay/Getty Images for Paramount+)
(Charley Gallay via Getty Images)’It’s almost like you can’t even trust anyone until you’re in the wilderness with them’
A big moment for School Spirits fans in Season 3 was Simon and Wally finally meeting. Ventura shared that his interpretation of that relationship is connected to the reality that sometimes you don’t really know someone until something “bad” happens.
“In real life, it’s hard to understand who a person is just by having a good lunch with them. You really need to go through the fire,” Ventura said. “I always say, as an actor, I had to part ways from a lot of agents, because you don’t really understand who your representation is until something bad happens, and then you’re on the phone call with them, and they reveal who they are, and then you’re like, oh, I thought you were someone else.”
“And Wally and Simon get to know each other so well because they’re forced by so much pressure to be like, OK, you’re actually … kind of brave. And then Wally’s like, yeah, OK, you’re kind of brave too. I get it. And so they have no choice but to shake hands. And that camaraderie, that brotherhood, could only really be developed through … stakes and problems. … It’s almost like you can’t even trust anyone until you’re in the wilderness with them.”
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – JANUARY 20: (L-R) Nate Trinrud, Megan Trinrud and Oliver Goldstick attend the “School Spirits” fan screening at Vidiots on January 20, 2026 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Jon Kopaloff/Getty Images for Paramount+)
(Jon Kopaloff via Getty Images)Forgiveness and ‘moving on’
Another core element of School Spirits Season 3 is examining “forgiveness,” and, as Nate Trinrud explained, that’s specific to the question: “When people do bad things, even if they can justify them with good intentions, what does it mean to have to forgive?”
“It’s not always clean, and it’s not always neat, and it’s not always easy,” Nate Trinrud said.
“I think another piece of it that turned out to be a really interesting storyline to write is the impact of forgiveness on the person who is doing the forgiving,” Megan Trinrud said. “Even if … they don’t change, or they aren’t willing to … hear what’s gone wrong, is there a power in being able to forgive someone, so that you can let go, so that you can move on? And that you don’t have to hold on to the anger or the resentment anymore. I think that’s a really important thing to examine ourselves, and we definitely were looking at the power of that through the season.”
Just one example of that element of the story is how the spirits interact with Mr. Martin (Josh Zuckerman), after they all felt betrayed by him at the start of the season.
“The ghosts have such a personal vendetta against him that is decades of betrayal that’s so personal that they can’t even see clearly,” Ventura said. “Simon comes into this group and he’s able to say, look, you really want an answer. The answer is in the very guy you hate, and you’re kind of acting like him. … You’re being so cruel that you’re the monster that you hated.”
‘Sandra’s not always healing’
But with inspiration for many elements of the show connected to the relationship the Trinrud siblings had with their father, a point of interest heading into the Season 3 finale is what the future holds for Maddie and her mom, Sandra (Maria Dizzia), now that she’s returned home from rehab.
“The Maddie-Sandra relationship comes a lot from our relationship [with] our father, who we love very much, but who struggled deeply. And I think that one of the things that we were really excited about talking about this year is this idea of reintegration,” Nate Trinrud said. “In Season 1, we learned that [Maddie’s] mom’s drinking kind of killed her, it is what made her available to Janet at the end of Season 1. And then Season 2, Maddie is working a lot on understanding what that means, on processing it, and seeing her mother in a different way.”
“And Sandra’s not always healing. Our experience with addiction is that it is never quite as easy as maybe we often see in TV and film. It’s a real rollercoaster. There are moments of sobriety. You feel like things are going great. It goes away. It comes back. It goes away. And I think what we’re watching Maddie have to do is take all the lessons she learned in Season 1 and 2 and suddenly bring them back to your real life. … How do you operate in this new world as a new person, when nothing else feels different? And I think for Maddie, she is feeling stuck between these two worlds, the metaphor of the show. But also, how does she integrate back into a life she stepped out of when she now is so different, and it really hasn’t changed as much as she’d like, and she feels responsible for both of those worlds, which I think is such a huge weight for her to carry.”