Mild spoilers are ahead for The Wilds Season 2, available to binge now with an Amazon Prime subscription.
The Wilds brought something new to the survival thriller genre when it sought to tell the story of a group of women who crash land on a mysterious island a la Lost and must learn how to put away the demons they left at home and work together. Following the big twist ending at the end of Season 1, the girls are not alone and in Season 2, the Amazon Prime series explores a male island, bringing in a whole new set of backstories to tell, and in turn leaves the women without more flashbacks. What does the original cast think about the shakeup?
When CinemaBlend spoke with the cast of The Wilds, each of the members of the female cast had their own take on Season 2, but unanimously they found positives in the change. Let’s start with Erana James, whose character of Toni found a sweet romance on the island with Mia Healey’s Shelby that fans loved. In her words:
I think by not exploring the backstories of the women in this season, it was all just so much more insular with us. The journey that we were all on was obviously really guided by our experience on the island and it felt less like, I don't know, Season 1, we were really learning from our past mistakes and I think Season 2 we're kind of growing into like these new women that we would never have been otherwise. And yeah, it was really beautiful. It was all really tight insular, internal and it was very different to shoot.
Mia Healey added to James' point, which her magnetic co-star completely agreed with. Here’s what Healey said:
It feels like Season 1 was like the session with your therapist and then Season 2 is like when they send you out into the world.
In Season 1, each woman on the island received their own episode, where they explored their lives prior to arriving on the island. Each of them was dealing with their own struggles and traumas ahead of being part of this still mysterious social experiment. Reign Edwards plays Rachel, a competitive diver who is dealing with the fallout of Nora’s death in Season 2. Edwards had this to say:
I think not having [flashbacks] for me personally was a really cool experience. It was definitely different from Season 1, but being able to grow in real time with Rachel was a rewarding process for me, as well as growing and putting the pieces together from Season 1.
The women’s screentime is wholly on the island and in the present as the show also moves to tell the story of a group of young men on another island who had their own set of experiences. Sarah Pidgeon plays Leah, who has been going through it following an intense breakup right before the crash. The actress said this of not having more flashbacks for the women in the show:
I think the cohesion of the girls' island was able to be highlighted this season that much more because there wasn't the sort of jump to backstory. Whatever the girls were going through, they were going through at the same time, whereas to tell that story with the backstory of the girls last season, there was like more individual scenes, which is still very true in Season 2, but I just think the idea of them like working as a group was highlighted more this season.
Having seen the entirety of The Wilds Season 2, there’s some bittersweetness to how it was framed. Part of me wishes the creators took more time with these women and fleshed out their backstories more this season, while another part of me did enjoy the new dynamic created by the male cast. There’s a lot going on in Season 2, and while shorter seasons have been more effective as of late, The Wilds feels like a show that could benefit from a longer season. Shannon Berry, who plays Dot, had this to say:
Through Season 1, we kind of got all the info that we needed for [each characters'] turmoil before coming [to the island]. So luckily, it's not like we needed to find out any more new information, through [flashbacks], but I love shooting backstory stuff so it was very much kind of being kept to the confines of The Wilds was definitely a new experience of being more in the elements.
Finally, Sophia Ali, who recently starred in Uncharted alongside Tom Holland, got more blunt about not only wanting more backstory for her character but more of the cast of The Wilds. In her words:
I do wish that there was more backstory of the men. Like, if they all each had their own episode in theory and obviously I don't want any more taken away from me [laughs] because, you know, I love my job, but I still do wish that just as a viewer, I could see more.
In other words, we’re going to need a Season 3 to get to know both the women and men on the island and see the social experiment of The Wilds rage on. If you haven't watched already, you can find both seasons of The Wilds streaming on Amazon now.
