Easily one of the most entertaining shows on television right now, Wynonna Earp has been a favorite of ours since we first saw the pilot episode at WonderCon earlier this year. I mean how could anyone not love a show like this? It’s filled with strong, female characters and has a unique, supernatural modern Western feel. We couldn’t get enough of it and we were hooked to the TV screen every week.
The first season of Wynonna Earp ended on one heck of a cliffhanger. But it wasn’t just the fate of our beloved characters still hanging in limbo. When the season ended on June 24th we still hadn’t gotten any confirmation that the series would be renewed. Considering the rampant fan appreciation for the series it seemed like a no brainer that Syfy would give it a second season.
When we sat down with the cast at SDCC 2016, though, we still had no official announcement.
Now, granted, the announcement came soon after at the show’s panel later that day and we’re happy to report that Wynonna Earp has been renewed for a second season. Strike that – we’re thrilled! We can’t wait to see what’s next for our favorite, bad ass gunslinger and her friends.
Though they couldn’t tell us much we had a great time sitting down to discuss the show with everyone this year. They had a lot of insight on what makes the show so great and so relatable to the fandom. And though they couldn’t give us anything solid they were more than happy to talk about what they hope will happen in the next season!
One of the breakout characters of the series, small town cop Nicole Haught is not only a fan favorite but she’s also half of one of the show’s beloved #WayHaught ship. Katherine Barrell doesn’t take that honor lightly, either. She discussed with us just how important it is to her that she do the character – and the LGBT community – justice while portraying Nicole.
Barrell never looked at Nicole as just a gay character and she feels that’s important. If she’s just there to be ‘gay’ and her character never evolves beyond that then she doesn’t believe that we’re really moving forward in our portrayal of LGBT characters. When Barrell first took the role she looked at it like this: “I’m playing this awesome cop who just happens to be gay.” That’s how she saw Nicole and that’s how she wants to keep playing her.
That’s how she wants people to see her, too. Barrell sees playing Nicole as a huge responsibility and it’s great to see how she embraces that. Nicole and Waverly’s relationship has been such an incredibly awesome and organic part of the series and Nicole has become a really great character in her own right.
She hasn’t let herself be thrown for a loop as far as the supernatural goes. Barrell feels like she probably made the connection between the supernatural and everything going on in Purgatory – so the revelation that demons were real was more of a validation than a huge shock.
Barrell isn’t that surprised by the show’s success either (a common theme among the cast). She thinks that women really took the show in particular because they really needed a show like this. They were looking for a show with real, strong women. They were looking for a show in which they could see themselves represented and Wynonna Earp offered them that.
Tim Rozon is another another cast member who isn’t at all surprised at how the show has taken off. But he admits he’s a little biased. Tim has been a huge fan of the show from the very beginning. It’s not just because he’s in the show but because he just loves it in general.
See all the Earper gear he’s wearing in the video above? He makes a point to wear things he’s been given by fans because in the end he’s really just one of them. He told us that he loved the show so much that he couldn’t imagine people not liking it.
Of course, Tim’s position on the show may not be entirely safe.
He talked with us about the season finale and the fact that it could have just as easily been Doc at the receiving end of Waverly’s bullet as it could be Wynonna. He pointed out, though, that theres a lot we don’t know about Doc still. And while he may have been wearing a vest the same as Nicole Haught was, he could also have some supernatural powers on his side that we may not know about yet.
There’s just so much potential for the show.
Tim pointed out that there’s a lot of story for them to pull from. While Waverly may be next season’s big bad there are tons of other characters ready to come to life out of the comic book pages and Beau Smith talked with us a little bit about some of the other possible baddies from Wynonna’s comic book history. There is, as he pointed out, twenty years worth of material to draw from.
So what comes next?
Melanie Scrofano couldn’t give us any solid details because she couldn’t confirm at the time that a second season was even coming. But she did let us know what she hopes the future holds for Wynonna. Part of Wynonna’s charm has always been that she’s really kinda just messed up. She isn’t the traditional hero. She’s broken, foul-mouthed, and until she came back to Purgatory she was trying to run away from her problems.
Going into the second season, Scrofano hopes that we see more of that side of Wynonna. She was starting to come into her own towards the end of the first season and then she had to tragically take out one of her own sisters which, as we all know, wasn’t the first time she’s killed a family member. Scrofano wants to see Wynonna get even more messed up and expects her to go to some pretty dark places after the events of the season finale (and whatever comes next with Waverly, presumably).
Of course, no conversation about what the future holds in store for Wynonna could possibly overlook her little love triangle with Doc and Dolls.
Scrofano offered some really great insight into Wynonna’s relationships with her two possible suitors. With Dolls, Scrofano thinks Wynonna is drawn to his inner strength. He always seems so put together and that’s something that she doesn’t really have in her life. She doesn’t believe she has that strength and so she’s drawn to Dolls. Meanwhile, with Doc, she sees a real connection to her family and her past. He’s got years and perspective – but he also knew Wyatt. Doc has this ability to remind her of who she is in a way that no one else in her life can.
Plus, both of them are hot. (And we concur.)
Speaking of Dolls, there’s a lot to learn about him as well. At the end of the last season Shamier Anderson’s character was being taken by the Black Badge Division to some unknown place. Anderson talked a bit about what he hopes to see happen with Dolls going into the next season.
He agrees that there’s still a lot to learn about Dolls. He has no idea what Dolls is, why he needs the injections, or anything else about his mysterious past. (Though, he has a theory and if he had his way he would really like Dolls to be a unicorn.) He feels like there’s a lot of potential in showing some of Dolls’ imprisonment by the Black Badge Division and that seeing Dolls locked up with all the supernatural bad guys he’s previously locked up.
Anderson talked a bit, too, about what makes the series so great.
He thinks that a lot of it goes into the series having such a strong, bad ass female lead and a lot of other strong, female characters. Anderson loves seeing these awesome female characters kick butt and save the day. And he thinks the viewers do, too. He also thinks that a big part of the appreciation for the show comes from the genuine love the cast has for one another.
Another big draw, he thinks, is the diversity of the relationships and characters on the show. Wynonna Earp has the ability to reach out to a diverse group of people. I personally think that Anderson is on to something there. There’s a lot of under-represented groups being portrayed in the series and they aren’t just there filling stereotypical roles. They are being shown as spectacular, well developed, kick-ass characters.
And it’s awesome.
The second season can only promise to be even more awesome. Dominique Provost-Chalkley, in particularly, is very excited to see what comes next. She’s looking forward to seeing what’s really going on with Waverly and she’s felt blessed to have this opportunity to play such an amazing character.
While a lot of us are probably not looking forward to poor Waverly being a bad guy next season, Provost-Chalkley would love to see that happen because it’s just the next step in her awesome journey. And we totally get it.
Waverly has has really come into her own this season and in just thirteen short episodes she’s proven herself to be kind of a bad ass. She’s also had to learn to accept things about herself and she’s had to deal with accepting herself and coming out. Provost-Chalkley wants to play out all of that – good Waverly, bad Waverly, bad-ass Waverly. She’ll take it all.
And so will we!
We can’t wait to see what comes next – especially for Waverly. So much has happened to that poor girl this season and then towards the end she learned she may not even be an Earp. Talk about dropping a whole other bombshell!
At the moment we have no idea when the next season of Wynonna Earp will air.
Most likely the show will return next summer and we’ll get to spend the Summer of 2017 watching Wynonna and the rest kick Revenant butt! Until then, though, check out our full interviews above. And if you’re looking for some more Wynonna action, you can pick up the first trade paperback volume of IDW’s current on-going Wynonna Earp comic series in October. We picked up the first issue at WonderCon and it’s totally worth it!
Until next time, Earpers!
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