Over the course of its second season, Santa Clarita Diet managed to introduce a number of new wrinkles to its hazy zombie mythology, like the ball spider, as well as the mysterious Order of the Red Ball and their apparent modern-day equivalent. It also traced the zombie outbreak to some bad clams -- some very bad clams with red shells hailing from a lake in Serbia. Much to its credit, though, the series didn't dive headlong into the origins of the zombie virus and the bizarre subculture built up around it. Instead, the season turned up the heat on Sheila and Joel Hammond (Drew Barrymore and Timothy Olyphant), threatening to out the former's condition and see her held responsible for the lives she's taken in order to survive.Teasing a greater understanding of where this particular story's zombies come from, only to place it on the back burner in favor of serving the show's undead family dynamic and interest in self-actualization is a huge risk. But it's one that pays off in the season 2 finale Halibut!' when the final moments take a wild swing that moves the series forward by outing Shiela (and Gary) as members of the undead, only to have their condition (as well as Abby and Eric's... uh, civil disobedience?) be interpreted by Anne as a sign from God.Related: Cargo Trailer: Martin Freeman Fights To Protect His Daughter From ZombiesThe move is a legitimate surprise, as Santa Clarita Diet season 2 was engaged in a number of funny exchanges about moral relativism and the murky gray area in which its characters stood for 10 episodes. But it's even more of a surprise considering how it opens the series up to explore the consequences of Sheila's condition through a drastically different lens, one that ostensibly frees the series from the concern of the truth being discovered and positions it to enter uncharted territory should the show be renewed for season 3.Here's a breakdown of Halibut!' and how it turns the zombie sitcom on its ear.
Anne Opens The Door To The Series' Future
This might be the most important moment in Santa Clarita Diet since Sheila first barfed up a little red ball in the series premiere. Since then, the show has slowly built up Natalie Morales' Anne as the person most likely to bring the Hammonds down. She isn't just a good cop who's skilled with a paintbrush; Anne's perhaps the one truly uncorrupted character on the show. As such, the decision to convince her that Sheila's affliction is a gift from God, not a curse from the depths of a Serbian lake with extremely lax oversight when it comes to seafood exports, repositions the character as the family's greatest ally ” so long as they can maintain the ruse that Sheila's bloodlust is something more than pure animal instinct.
But that also makes Anne's misunderstanding the key to the series moving forward without retreading its steps. It potentially gives Sheila and Joel a way out of their moral conundrum, too. Even if they don't think Sheila was put here to do the Lord's bidding, there's no reason not to adopt that line of thinking, especially after Sheila, in the midst of a zombie blackout, made like Laurence Olivier in The Boys From Brazil and went went full Nazi hunter. So, maybe there is something instinctually good about Sheila now that she's snacking on people and living her best life.
Ultimately, though, the climax to Halibut!' delivered the unexpected, turning an endgame scenario into a new start for the series, provided Netflix moves forward with season 3, of course.
The Hammond Family Gets A Talking Head
Keeping secrets is a great way to make a TV series as dull as drywall. Santa Clarita Diet made the smart choice early on to get several characters in on the gory shenanigans of Sheila's death and zombified rebirth. Outside of husband Joel, the first season brought in daughter Abby (Liv Hewson) and too-smart-for-his-own-good neighbor boy with a crush Eric (Skyler Gisondo). The show also brought in Eric's stepdad, but be wound up on the menu after it turned out he didn't have the family's best interest at heart.
Despite its violence, gore, and TV-MA language, Santa Clarita Diet is really just a twisted family sitcom. And like any good family sitcom, it needs a constant influx of characters with outside perspectives in order to stay focused on the family and keep the humor fresh and funny. This season, the show did that by bringing two unexpected guests into the fold with the aforementioned Anne and Gary (Nathan Fillion).
While letting Anne in on the truth helps push the narrative forward and in a new direction, Gary plays a different role. He's more than just the rotting, disembodied head of a former sexual predator; he's now reached a place of self-actualization wherein his best self ” someone contemplative, funny, and kind ” has been realized. The kicker, of course, is that his physical appearance now resembles the person he used to be, while the man he is on the inside is, for lack of a better term œwhole.
Gary's reversal not only gives Joel someone to confide in and hang out with, and gives the series another talented comedian to deliver its signature dialogue, but it also gives Santa Clarita Diet a character who can help the living see things from the perspective of the undead, the really undead. Gary's physical appearance may be gruesome but it's turned him into the most likable talking head since David Byrne. It stands to reason that without Gary, the Hammonds might not have persuaded Anne as successfully as they did. In the end, Gary is essentially a really handy mascot for the benefits of the zombie lifestyle.
Mythology Takes Backseat But Is Ready To Be Explored
Marsha (Jee Young Han) and Paul (Zachary Knighton) clearly have a lot going on as members of a secret Serbian society (think the Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade) we've dubbed the Order of the Red Ball. Given their actions, they've seemingly been tasked with keeping the zombie virus from spreading ” though nice job on letting thousands of red-shelled clams wind up in Ruby's (Sarah Baker) garage, guys ” which means they'll likely have a major part to play in a prospective third season.
Any future episodes are on course to delve deeper into the mythology the series has cursorily examined during its first two seasons. Unlike The Walking Dead or Night of the Living Dead there is an explanation for the zombie virus, and from what Santa Clarita Diet has shown us already, it's a fairly complicated one that goes back centuries and involves knights with ball-leg creatures on their shields. Marsha and Paul are modern-day equivalent of those knights, apparently, and they have access to the kind of modern-day firepower needed to carry out their duty.
But season 2 didn't go into much detail about Marsha and Paul, the history behind the red-shelled clams, or what the spider-legged red balls are. It was focused instead on getting the Hammond family to a place where it wasn't constantly scrambling to put out fire after fire. Now that Sheila's deterioration has been halted and she's found a way to give purpose to her inhuman cravings, Santa Clarita Diet is poised to go all-in and fill the gaps of its appropriately weird and seemingly byzantine mythology.
The show deserves credit for holding off on providing concrete answers for as long as it has, but if there is a season 3, that would be the perfect time to pull back the curtain, so to speak, and see what's really behind this undead comedy.
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Santa Clarita Diet is currently streaming on Netflix.