Netflix’s Wednesday has a Morticia problem. It had it in season one, and instead of course-correcting, season two doubles down. In order to frame Jenna Ortega’s Wednesday as the definitive dark, gothic, macabre-minded prodigy, Catherine Zeta-Jones’ Morticia Addams is neutered. What was once the most deliciously twisted role model in the Addams canon is reduced here to a punchline. Where Gomez and Morticia’s mutual adoration used to stand as a radical counterpoint to the loveless marriages that defined American sitcoms, in Wednesday, Morticia is mocked for being soft, sentimental, and—heaven forbid—maternal. She jokes about letting Gomez believe he’s the patriarch, while Wednesday and her grandmother, Hester Frump (Joanna Lumley), sneer at her for daring to want a family and a loving, lustful marriage.
If season one’s sidelining of Morticia could be shrugged off as growing pains, season two makes it harder to ignore. That’s partly because there’s more of the family this time. Pugsley joins Nevermore, Morticia sticks around to chair the fundraiser committee, Gomez tags along wherever the family lands, and Grandma Frump comes for an extended visit. The result is a bigger playground with more players, but one without a clear anchor. Instead of the clumsy love triangle around Wednesday (that has now been shifted to Emma Myers’ Enid) that bogged down season one, this season juggles a busier array of subplots, from family drama to campus politics to supernatural intrigue. Unfortunately, more moving parts don’t equal better storytelling.
The writers seem to have taken criticism of the first season—“too much romance, not enough horror”—to heart, but their solution is simply to pack in more. This season, new alliances are formed and old ones are tested. There are multiple mysteries to be solved. From off-campus serial killer huntings for some summer fun to dealing with her new celebrity status on campus, Wednesday has a lot on her plate including a new principal, the shady Barry Dort (Steve Buscemi hamming it up with joy) and a super-stalker.
Wednesday’s psychic visions falter early on as she discovers Enid’s life might be in jeopardy. Pugsley’s pet zombie lumbers into the frame as a possible threat. Hydes return, multiplied. The siren cult is still stirring trouble for Bianca (Joy Sunday) and Nevermore. Principal Weems (Gwendoline Christie) reappears as a spectral guide. And in case that wasn’t enough, Lady Gaga strolls in for a cameo. There’s another dance sequence this season, to a Lady Gaga song—an obvious attempt to bottle lightning twice after the viral “Bloody Mary” moment from season one. But without Ortega’s delightfully off-kilter choreography, this one lands as pure try-hard.
On paper, this might sound like a feast. On screen, it’s an overstuffed buffet where nothing feels urgent. This may work for the TikTok-trained attention spans of its target demographic—teen viewers raised on the binge economy. But for anyone watching out of nostalgia for the Addams Family’s sharper satire, the whole thing still feels shapeless and worse, boring.
The rare moments when Wednesday slows down and actually lets its characters breathe, instead of piling on plot twists, are when it finally clicks. Case in point: the body-swap episode with Wednesday and Enid. It’s the only chapter so far that truly finds the sweet spot between supernatural chaos and its overarching narrative. The odd-couple friendship at its centre is one of the things that drew audiences in last season. For once, Wednesday and Enid are given real arcs, learning something about themselves and each other. This episode is silly too—a colourful Ortega as Enid, dancing around campus to Blackpink before breaking out in hives due to her allergy to colours is objectively silly fun—but it has some actual structure.
The Addams Family has always been about inversion: a parody of suburban norms, a celebration of strangeness in a world that demands conformity. But by transplanting them into a world where vampires, werewolves, and sirens are commonplace, Wednesday drains the family of their bite somewhat. They’re no longer “creepy and kooky” outliers; they’re just another clique on campus. Re-contextualising the Addamses into a world of supernatural peers levels them down to the ordinary. Morticia and Gomez’s great romance, Pugsley’s penchant for torture, even Wednesday’s nihilism—none of it stands out when everyone else at Nevermore is peculiar.
Season two also falls into the trap of the split. Breaking the season into two parts feels less like a narrative choice and more like a scheduling gimmick, and instead of building momentum, it saps it. Plotlines are stretched thin and cliffhangers do not feel like anything worth worrying about. There’s promise in some of the threads—Ortega and Myers remain an electric pairing that is underutilised and cameo stars like Buscemi and Christie are clearly having fun—but this is still not enough when the storytelling is this scattered.
At its best, Alfred Gough and Miles Millar’s Wednesday can still be a ghoulish delight, thanks to strong casting, sharp performances, and the occasional artistic flourish. But too often, the series undermines its own strengths and teeters closer to being television engineered for distraction rather than immersion.
Debiparna Chakraborty is a film, TV, and culture critic dissecting media at the intersection of gender, politics, and power.
