On the 25th of September, Netflix released a miniseries named Wayward, created by non-binary actor Mae Martin. Martin, who also plays the leading man Alex Dempsey. Alex is a soon-to-be-father, a brilliant young officer who struggles with accepting and performing masculinity and in general is supposed to be a cute awkward guy who’s put in this cult-ish town centre as the cop.
We soon learn that the fictional town Tall Pines, is known to be home to the Tall Pines Academy, a rehabilitation school for troubled teens. And that Alex’s wife, Laura (Sarah Godon), who is pregnant at the time, is an alumna. Her return to Tall Pines for security is what sets off most of my danger alarms but it’s also nice to see an accepting small town community where queerness is as natural as the milk they keep in supermarkets.
Skeptical Welcomes
Across the border in Canada, we’re given a peek into future Tall Pine students–Abbie (Sydney Topliffe) and Lelia (Alyvia Alyn Lind). Leila has just lost her sister via a drug-induced accident and Abbie is her ride or die who herself is slipping into drug ab*se as a result of “experimenting” with Leila. Both are textbook definitions of rebel girls of the 90s and 2000s. The interesting aspect of this side of the story was that the writers didn’t shy away from showing us the class dynamics between the two friends. Leila, whose mum herself struggles with mild-alcoholism and is a single mother, while Abbie is probably second or third generation Asian-Canadian immigrant, comes from an upper middle class family. Now my only point of complaint/suggestion is that it would’ve been great to see Abbie deal with racial stereotyping or even her parents struggle to adjust into a white-suburban space but we’re shown none of it as if it didn’t exist in the 2000s.
When Abbie is shipped off/kidnapped to Tall Pines Academy, Leila goes off to rescue her. This is where we also find out Leila is bisexual and is currently into a grooming situation with a 26 year old man while she’s 17. The show is set in the year 2003, so this was lowkey expected. HOWEVER, what I didn’t really like was how it was a point of conflict that Tall Pines later exploits to hamper Abbie and Leila’s friendship rather than addressing what happened to Leila wasn’t right.
Also did I mention how refreshing it was to see a bright, badass, nuanced and bisexual character on my screen after a very long time?
Platonic Love vs Romantic Love
The writers were careful with Leila and Abbie’s love vs Leila and Ello’s (Elizabeth Adams) affection, in the sense that they maintained Leila and Abbie as each other’s soulmates but never igniting anything romantic between the two. It’s the 2000s and while they were teased/bullied to get together already, they remained friends. We see how Leila gets when she’s interested in someone romantic through her Tall Pines roommate Ello. She’s giggly, she’s way more physically affectionate and softer with her. It could’ve been something, but Ello ended up as just a plot-further character instead.
I would have been fine without the slow-burn romance between Abbie and Rory (a guy) (John Daniel) but I did want Ello and Leila to continue their puppy-love in a hellish cult. Ello was someone Leila needed in terms of navigating the cult safely, because until Ello’s death Leila remained immune to Evelyns’(Toni Collette) brain washing attempts.
While Rory’s fate seems unknown, I would’ve preferred if it was Ello instead; Ello was a better fit in the duo’s attempt to escape Tall Pines than Rory.
Inspirations and Continuition
The show was able to explore the cult aspect of the show really well. It’s not shown as a good vs evil, the show truly understands how cults function and just how they’re able to bring on so many vulnerable folks all at once.
Going as far to alter the psyche of even “ex-cult” members through their lifetime. The gradual decline of Laura, slipping into her old self, gathering and stealing affected folks into a new safe haven right where Evelyn began, was completely an unpredictable move.
What was even more surprising was how the show kept me on my toes till the very last second, there was no way I could’ve predicted the ending, but the signs were there all along.
It goes to show that whenever a member of a minority group or an isolated person even feels what a community could feel like–we’re ready to forgo all other moralities just for that sense of belonging. Cults like Tall Pines don’t just promise security, they promise freedom from what you’re tired of and into something they let you think you chose.
What took their vision further ahead was the idea of how a lot of spaces that claim to “fix” or welcome vulnerable folks as safe havens are often trapped into a larger system of abuse where security is a weapon used to demand blind faith.Tall Pines Academy also uses language to catch a lot of the prey to their mission. With their website and pamphlets claiming to “solve the teenage problem” or telling children to sever their connections to parents because of the “wounds they inflict” instead of solving them. It’s interesting timing to see a show like this at a time like this. Where we learn how cults propagate their ideals and missions to the vulnerable, which is often the same used by influencers, wellness industries or even other organisations that claim to solve a systemic problem on an individual scale.
And while this ending was supposed to be the conclusion of this story, I’m excited to see if Netflix would be interested in returning the show for a new season just as the cast has expressed!
