THE END OF THE F***ING WORLD
WHY S2 MARKS A NEW START FOR THE END OF THE F***ING WORLD…
A return to the Brit comedy-drama with the NSFW name.
Two years ago, The End Of The F***ing World was an unheralded adaptation of a cult mini-comic starring two relative unknowns. Times change: the huge sense of anticipation surrounding Season 2 swiftly becomes clear during Small Screen’s set visit. Co-producers Channel 4 and Netflix have cast a veil of secrecy over proceedings not seen since our last trip to the warring regions of Westeros...
We’re outside a modernist, openplan house in leafy Streatham – a striking and slightly creepy location, familiar to fans of the show as the scene of Clive Koch’s killing last season.“Apparently it’s been used for a few horrific murders,” laughs series creator Charlie Covell (Burn Burn Burn). For the uninitiated (SPOILER ALERT!), S1 followed teenage outsiders Alyssa (Jessica Barden) and James (Alex Lawther) as they ditched school and their disappointing families for a road trip which took a dark turn when James killed Koch (Jonathan Aris) as he attempted to rape Alyssa. Their flight from the law reached a tragic climax as James was shot by a team on a Kentish beach during their doomed bid to
escape across the Channel. The cut to black was reminiscent of The Sopranos, but with a crucial difference: we will find out what happened next...
It’s the final day of filming and there’s a certain nervous energy in the air as Barden performs pirouettes while the crew set up around her. “When she steps in front of the camera it’s like fireworks going off,” says Lucy Forbes (In My Skin), who splits directorial duties with Destiny Ekaragha (Gone Too Far). “There’s an episode where Jess is recounting what happened at Clive’s house,” explains Barden some months later. “We shot the short film [which spawned the series] there when I was 19 [she’s now 27], so it’s really emotional going there, but in a good way.”
ADULT MATERIAL
The story resumes two years later, reveals Covell who, having exhausted the source material, has crafted an original storyline for S2, with the blessing of the comics’ author, Charles Forsman. “It could’ve finished [with S1] if that’s how I had gone, but there was so much story unresolved,” she says. “We went through so many different ideas. At one point I proposed keeping the branding and using entirely new characters, but that was very quickly shut down – by Jess’ agents, mostly! Season 2 is still funny, but it’s also a bit more grown-up and a bit darker. Moving it on two years has let us look at someone on the cusp of adulthood and having to behave differently.”
“Alyssa is very much a woman now,” adds Barden. “And the type of woman I want to be putting on screen – all the good and bad parts. She thinks she’s completely in control of her life, telling herself she’s moved on and that she’s
on top of the world. But you’re never going to get closure on a life-changing incident like that, or the emotional help you need, because everybody remembers things completely differently.”
“How do you move forward after trauma?” asks Covell. “At what point do you take responsibility for your life? Can you keep running forever? The new landscape suits Alyssa’s new frame of mind: not built-up, lots of greenery, it feels like a new beginning. But whether that’s a good or bad thing is for the audience to decide…” The look of the show once again blends British parochialism and gnarly Americana, although the open spaces of Surrey and Kent have been replaced by New Forest pines and the wild Welsh countryside. “Shooting in the forest addresses isolation and feeling small in the world, not knowing where you are or how you belong,” says Forbes.
‘AT WHAT POINT DO YOU TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR LIFE?’ CHARLIE COVELL, SERIES CREATOR
NAOMI WATTAGE
Blur’s Graham Coxon also returns with another melancholy, noirishly introspective score, and an already distinguished cast (Wunmi Mosaku, Gemma Whelan, Steve Oram) is this year boosted by the arrival of Naomi Ackie, soon to be seen in both The Rise Of Skywalker and the Game Of Thrones prequel. Ackie plays Bonnie, “an outsider with a troubled past and a mysterious connection to Alyssa,” according to the show’s makers. Like so much else in the series, the rest remains under wraps, although we won’t have to wait long to find out more: the opening episode is devoted to her story. But could S2 actually be the end of The End Of The F***ing World? Both Covell and Barden are tellingly equivocal. “The show hangs off a moment in the characters’ lives, so you couldn’t go back to that too often,” Barden reasons. “But this is still my dream job and it’s changed my life, so who knows?” Covell agrees. “You can have too much of a good thing,” she says. “It might be interesting to come back to them in 10 years time or something – although we probably wouldn’t be able to afford the actors by then…” Gabriel Tate
THE END OF THE F***KING WORLD S2 STARTS ON CHANNEL 4 IN NOVEMBER