Sweet Tooth is a new dystopian Netflix series based on the DC comic book series of the same name, written and drawn by the creator Jeff Lemire that came out in June of 2021. The series is set in Alaska for the majority of the first season. It follows the story of Gus, a ten-year-old human-animal hybrid boy who is not allowed to see the outside world. He was born at the start of a viral pandemic known as the Sick. The disease wiped out the majority of the human race. People were unsure whether the unexplained birth of the hybrid babies that are part animal was the cause or a result of the pandemic, so they began to hunt the children for sport.
Despite the heartbreaking narrative, viewers quickly fell in love with the deer-boy Gus and Wendy (played by Naledi Murray) and were happy to watch every episode of the first season. They enjoyed it so much that fans quickly began calling for another one when they reached the end of the first season. At Geeked Week this year, Netflix confirmed that they had officially finished filming Sweet Tooth season 2.
Let’s look at everything we know about the second season of Netflix’s Sweet Tooth and what we can expect from the continuation of this extraordinary journey, written by Oanh Ly in collaboration with Beth Schwartz.
Warning: Spoilers for the first season of Sweet Tooth ahead!
The Plot
THE STORY SO FAR
In the first season of Sweet Tooth, we learn that It has been ten years after the events that led to the Great Crumble (the collapse of society) and the beginnings of the Sick. We are shown that Dr Aditya Singh is trying to find a cure for the virus to save his infected wife, Rani and introduced to the half deer half-human boy, Gus, and his father.
The two live together in the wilderness, away from humans that would otherwise try to harm Gus. After his father dies from the Sick, Gus decides to look for his mother, who he finds a photo of in a box his father buried under a tree before he died. The word “Colorado” had been written underneath the image. Unfortunately, Gus doesn’t get very far before he runs into a group of poachers alerted to his position by the fire he’d set during the day. They had planned on killing him, but Gus startles them with his ability to speak, and they are killed by Tommy Jepperd, a lone traveller and reformed Last Man (a group of humans who hunt hybrids), who decides to save Gus.
He tries to leave the young boy behind, but Gus follows him insistently, referring to him as “Big Man”. Together, the two begin their perilous adventure to Colorado, where Gus believes his mother is. Big Man is initially unwilling to go, but he eventually accepts that he’s stuck with Gus.
Along the way, they meet a teenager named Bear, the leader of the Animal Army, before it turns against her for protecting Big Man, her gruff protector. She gives them the last known address of Gus’ mother, who is known as Birdie, and accompanies them to a train that will take them to Colorado. The train they hop on is, unfortunately, not a passenger train.
While there, they meet an old friend of Big Man’s and learn about his backstory and who he was before he chose to save Gus. His old friend saves him from a group of Last Men on the train, and Big Man informs Bear that she can stay with them if she wants.
While the three continue on their adventure, others have been struggling to live in the post-apocalyptic world that was left behind and do everything they can to ensure their survival.
Aimee Eden, a former therapist who had barricaded herself in her office during the fallout of the Great Crumble, found herself living in the post-apocalyptic united states. After discovering a pig hybrid baby outside, she was inspired to turn a nearby zoo into her home and later a sanctuary for hybrids.
After she learns that the Last Men have discovered her sanctuary for hybrids, she has the kids pack and escapes through the tunnel while she remains behind and waits for the Last Men to come for her. She fights against the Last Men, but the children she cared for have all been captured.
Dr Singh is a man who discovered the Sick around the same time that the hybrid children were born. He learns that his wife, Rani Singh, has contracted the disease and rushes to the hospital to save her. Ten years later, we see him again treating his still-sick wife with medication occasionally received from Dr Bell, who is working on a cure. Eventually, she tells him that she is dying from terminal cancer and that he will have to continue with her work if he wants to save his wife.
Singh learns that Dr Bell’s work is extremely gruesome, and we, as the audience, learn that she doesn’t actually have cancer but quit because she can no longer stand working on the hybrid children. She gets executed by General Abbot for her refusal to continue her research.
Meanwhile, Singh takes over her work and starts working for the Last Men. He and his wife are invited to a party which they reluctantly attend. Unfortunately, the host turns out to be infected. He is left inside the house while the Last Men set it alight to prevent the spread of the Sick.
After this incident, the Singh’s nosey neighbour visits the house and tells them about her plans to hold a citizen’s vote on mandatory virus testing. She later learns that Rani is infected and plans to expose her, but she is kicked to death by their horse. The couple proceeds to hide her body and cover up her death, but they are later found out, and it is revealed that Rani is Sick.
In retaliation for what they have done, their town traps the couple in their home and sets it alight. Fortunately, there are saved by the Last Men. They convince the Last Men that Singh is working on a cure that does not feature in Dr Bell’s notebook so that the group will spare both their lives. General Abbot forces Singh to work on a cure for the Sick.
Meanwhile, Bear, Big Man and Gus end their long journey, arrive at Birdie’s last known address, and discover that she is no longer there, having left ten years before looking for Gus. Gus turns out to be an experiment that Birdie had conducted. She had passed the hybrid baby on to Gus’ father so she could destroy the lab where she had created Gus.
He is devastated to learn that he doesn’t have birth parents and runs off into the woods angrily. He finds a radio and uses it to contact what he believes is Aimee’s Preserve, unintentionally giving away his location. It is further revealed that Big Man had a hybrid baby back when the Great Crumble began and had abandoned his wife and son but planned to return. Unfortunately, before he could reach them, they were taken by the last men.
Big Man eventually finds Gus and sits with him, but he is shot by the Last Men, who take Gus away. Aimee finds and nurses him back to health, promising they will get their children back. Bear reveals that the pig hybrid that Aimee had found and adopted was her foster sister before the Great Crumble.
Aimee receives a call, and it turns out to be Birdie. She is calling from the Arctic, hiding along with all her research.
WHAT WILL HAPPEN IN NETFLIX’S SWEET TOOTH SEASON 2?
Season 2 will continue the story that ended with Gus meeting Dr Singh, who decides to continue his experiments on the hybrid boy who doesn’t appear the same as the others. It is highly likely that we are going to see Jepperds and Aimee team up together to save not only their kids but every other hybrid child that General Abbot and his men abducted.
People Involved in Sweet Tooth Season 2
Sweet Tooth leans very heavily into its themes of loneliness and isolation. The cast is kept very small so emphasise that. Netflix has slightly expanded and changed the cast to further flesh out the world around the characters, and we could see more of that done in future seasons.
Other cast members who feature in season 2 of Sweet Tooth have not yet been revealed, but fans suspect that the following will be returning to reprise their roles:
Gus is the main character of the Netflix series. As the first hybrid baby, created before the Great Crumble happened, he is one of the essential characters in the story and for the scientists trying to discover a cure for the Sick. Christian Convery plays him.
Tommy Jepperd otherwise referred to as “Big Man” by Gus, is a reformed Last Man who rescued Gus. Before the Great Crumble, he was a pro footballer and a soon-to-be father. Unfortunately, his son was born as a hybrid. The child and his wife were taken away from him before Jepperd could do anything. He has formed a strong bond with Gus over the course of the show and has begun to see him almost as the son he lost. Fans are excited to see what he’ll do to get Gus back.
Big Man is brought to life by Nonso Anozie. After filming season 2, he said, “It’s been a long journey, and it’s been very hard work, but it’s been amazing fun, and I can’t wait to share with you on what happens in season 2.”
Bear was once the leader and founder of a ground of teenagers that protected and saved hybrids known as the Animal Army. They later kicked her out after she wouldn’t execute Jepperds. She turns out to be the foster sister of Aimee Eden’s adopted daughter, and her real name is Rebecca “Becky” Walker. Stefania LaVie Owen does a brilliant job bringing her character to life.
Aimee Eden was the former therapist that started the hybrid Preserve at her local zoo after she found her adopted daughter Wendy. She cares deeply for all the children who come under her protection and will do anything to ensure they are safe.
Dania Ramirez plays her and has said that in season 2, “the stakes are higher, the battles are bigger, the bad guys are meaner.”
Dr Aditya Singh is a doctor searching for a cure for the Sick. Throughout the series, he does everything he can to ensure that his wife’s Sickness is not exposed to the world. Singh even goes so far as to hide the dead body of his neighbour. However, he eventually discovers the truth behind the disease and Gus. Adeel Akhtar does a brilliant job portraying the doctor.
Rani Singh is the infected wife of Dr Singh. Before she got Sick, the two of them had a loving and fulfilling relationship, but now she is constantly at risk of being exposed as she continues to live her life suffering from the disease. Aliza Vellani plays her.
James Brolin is the voice responsible for the narrator telling everyone’s story.
Pubba is the father of Gus, who dies at the beginning of the series. While we won’t see his character alive anytime soon, he has been brought back through flashbacks several times. If that continues, we may see him again. It was revealed that his real name was Richard Fox and that he was a janitor who worked at Fort Smith Labs before he was away in the forest with baby Gus. Will Forte is the one responsible for bringing the character to life.
General Douglas Abbot is the ruthless leader of the Last Men, who is determined to find a cure for the Sick so that humans can return to life as usual. He has his men abduct hybrid children so they can be experimented on as his scientists search desperately for a cure. Neil Sandilands does a great job of portraying the character, and it will be interesting to see what he does further on in the story.
Wendy is the little pig-hybrid girl adopted by Aimee Eden after she found her as a baby. Her adoptive mother refers to her as Pigtails. Together, the two took in different hybrids and began to form a home with them in the Preserve. She had an enhanced sense of smell and was the one who found Bobby.
Birdie is one of the geneticists responsible for creating Gus. She is known as Gertrude and was the one who entrusted Richard with Gus while she took care of all the research in her lab, which she believed could be deadly in the wrong hands. While we haven’t seen her character outside of flashbacks that show us Gus’ beginning, she will become a much more prominent character in the next season of Sweet Tooth. Amy Seimetz does a brilliant job as Birdie.
Besides those returning to their roles, audiences can expect to see a collection of new hybrids and plenty more scenes with the Last Men and them carrying out their mission. It’ll be interesting to see how Gus and the other hybrids escape their current predicament.
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DEVELOPMENT AND PRODUCTION TEAM
The Netflix show was written and developed from the comic series by showrunner Jim Mickle. He served as an executive producer alongside wife and husband team Susan Downey and Robert Downey Jr. (who own the production company Team Downey) and Amanda Burrell and Linda Moran.
Other companies involved in the production of Sweet Tooth include Warner Bros. Television (who currently owns every piece of DC media) and Nightshade. After the series moved from Hulu to Netflix, Evan Moore joined as a producer, and Beth Schwarts joined Mickle as a writer, executive producer and showrunner.
When asked about the show, the original creator stated that he and Mickle wanted the series to have a lighter tone than the original comic series. In addition, they wanted to change the long-running dark dystopian perspective that had become synonymous with the post-apocalyptic genre.
When is the Expected Release Date
Given that the crew has already finished filming in New Zealand, it shouldn’t be long before fans see Netflix’s Sweet Tooth season 2. While we definitely won’t see the following season before the end of 2022, it is very likely that it might come out in mid to late 2023.
Netflix has been known for publishing its TV shows’ and movies’ trailers a couple of months before they are released. While there is no trailer yet, Christian Convery has done a few Q-n-As for DC Fandome about season 2 of Netflix’s Sweet Tooth, so if you’re looking for something to fill the void while you wait for the next season, I recommend checking them out.
Everyone who has seen Sweet Tooth or been involved with the Netflix project is excited about the upcoming season. Let’s hope it continues to be awesome and maybe tells a story of a new beginning for the hybrid children.
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