Death, love, and unbridled tragedy made up the first season of The End of the F***ing World. On Oct. 24, 2017, the Netflix Original made its way onto the screens of many. The series followed teenagers Alyssa and James as they ran away from their home town in hopes of finding a meaning to a life of confusion and misery. Along their journey, they decide to break into a man’s house, later killing this man in an act of self-defense which leads to the real runaway aspect of the series. To sum it up, the series was an emotional rollercoaster that ended in one of the main protagonists, James, getting shot, leaving the end of the show on a cliffhanger. There was no way of knowing if James had died or if he had survived the shot, which was a clean and nice way to wrap up a deranged Netflix series that resembled a modern-day Romeo and Juliet. However, two years later, the show has been given a sequel, and just as the majority of its Netflix counterparts that were given second seasons, it was not enjoyable to watch.

The second season felt like an unnecessary way to drag on a series that gained popularity just for the sake of profit. Though the continuation of a psychologically scarred group of teenagers was executed fairly well, the plot itself was nothing to be excited about. The second season starts off by introducing a new character, Bonnie, who was taught that punishment and love went hand in hand with her unhinged mother. Her mother conditions her to behave with this rule until she fails all of her exams and is sent to work as a college librarian. She soon after meets Professor Clive, James’ victim in the first season, and falls into what is a demented relationship between a naive girl and an abusive man in which she calls love. Blinded by her love, she does not notice that Professor Clive is a serial killer who takes advantage of young girls, ultimately setting her on a track to kill James and Alyssa for taking the life of her loved one.

Bonnie’s character and backstory as a whole did not excite me as much as I had hoped for. I could tell in what direction the writers were trying to bring the story in, but they failed to execute it later down the road. She was another character who had no sense of emotion or personality besides that of wanting to kill James and Alyssa. This choice is completely understandable, however, when given the circumstances such as the death of the man at the motel, she was a completely different person. Bonnie suddenly felt as if what she had been doing was wrong for a split second until realizing that her love for Clive was more important than death itself just a couple of minutes later. Personally, it would have been more interesting to have seen a little more of Bonnie’s vulnerable side and her reaction to what had happened after the situation as well as some sort of internal struggle. This was not given to her character at all until the final 5-10 minutes of episode seven in which she finally corners James and Alyssa and is given the full truth of what went down in Clive’s house. Although still in denial until the very end, she cracks under the weight of Alyssa’s words and accepts the truth to the best of her abilities.

The plot completely revolves around the retelling of the first season from a different perspective with a hint of romance between James and Alyssa when their lives were not being threatened. It seems tacky and the entirety of the second season is not needed to enjoy the first. The final episode of the first season provided a sense of closure to an adventure that so desperately needed an end to what was inevitable. Finding out the James was alive felt like a kick to the gut, a “haha” to everyone who was content with the story ending the way it was. As someone who loved the first season of the series and agreed with the ending, I found this season predictable and uncalled for. It was nothing but a random continuation of what was uniquely and beautifully written show that was very different from the classic young adult films and tv shows