The End of the Fucking World Season 2 review: bold, right and a great conclusion to a dark comedy&#8

Remember the sleeper-hit of 2018?

You, know the one! When a boy meets a girl!

And when the boy wants to kill that girl!

Oh, yeah, The End of the Fucking World

When Culturedemandsgeeks reached the end of Season 1, (of Charles Forsman’s original comic book), we were engrossed, fascinated, addicted and enthralled by the shows ending. Despite all eight episodes offering food for thought on abuse, violence, and love, the show proved a hit for Netflix and the audiences’ quick consumption habits set their sights on what is, after all, a shocking finale — 17-year-old James (Alex Lawther) is presumably gunned down by the police while trying to save the love of his young life, Alyssa (Jessica Barden), from being blamed for their recent crime spree.

And not to be dramatic or anything, but the final moments of The End of the F***ing World season 1 were absolutely devastating.

The ultimate questions at the end were:  Was this the end of “The End of the Fucking World” or just the end of the first season? Were they supposed to find closure and make peace with these eight episodes, or could they hold out hope for James? Was this love story a modern-day Romeo & Juliet? How do you make a follow-up to a hit show, when apparently one of the leads in the show is dead?

Easy…

Go back to basics, and tell a tale from a different characters’ perspective, running parallel to the shows two main characters.

Dark, witty and boasting an initial 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, season one ended with the crack of a single gunshot, aimed at protagonist James, before cutting to black. For two long years since the series aired, we’ve waited on that cliffhanger. But how did Lawther and Barden get here in the first place?

Enter Season 2. Charlie Covell, who wrote the entire first season, returns to expand on the original story, as does Jessica Barden, to further deepen Alyssa’s difficult maturation. Crimes are committed, love is rekindled, and damage is exacted and exhumed.

The season follows Alyssa and James in the aftermath of that scene on the beach. Alyssa and her mom are living with family, and James was recently released from the hospital after recovering from his gunshot wound. They reunite, though, when Alyssa skips out on her wedding, and they go on a journey together that follows the same Bonnie and Clyde theme.

She moves on in both the emotional and the physical sense, relocating to an unnamed town in the woods to live in a cabin with her aunt.

But before we even reunite with Alyssa, the show pulls off its most audacious feat yet: dedicating the entire first episode of the season to Bonnie, played by Naomi Ackie, and follows her backstory from her narrated point of view. She’s a troubled young woman, not unlike the two original leads. The difference is that she purposefully murdered someone and is now set out to kill again.  She gets an episode all to herself at the top of Season 2 and thus sets the plot in motion, and Bonnie generally makes their life (Alyssa and James) a living hell because she was in love with the professor dude they murdered in the first season.

BOOM! Didn’t see that coming!

The final episode starts with James and Alyssa giving their statements to the police after Bonnie’s arrest, and then Alyssa leaves. She gives her aunt a letter, which James interprets as a suicide note.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT:

Embedded within this season is a profound exploration of the trauma that lingers in the wake of sexual assault—one that is wholly sympathetic to the women who don’t even realize that they’re trapped in their own mental cages. “I’m always in that house,” Alyssa confesses. “I’m always in that room. I can’t get out. Maybe I did some things I shouldn’t have, but I didn’t deserve that.” If the first season was about a reckless adolescent rampage, the second is the mournful process of picking up the pieces scattered among the wreckage.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

When Netflix announced the show was getting a second season, Culturedemandsgeeks was skeptical. The first was so perfect, and we were worried (oh, so worried), and the second season would inevitably ruin our love for the first. But the new episodes, which hit the streaming service packed just as much punch as the first eight episodes of season one and gave the show a really nice feeling of closure. But this finale isn’t nearly as crazy as the ending to S1.

Culturedemandsgeeks really want to know: are these kids going to last? Or aren’t they? Is this truly a happy ending depending on our choice? Should Netflix renew or cancel the dark British comedy for a third season?

Please renew.

5/5 STARS