Fans of the hit Netflix series Dead to Me are used to creator Liz Feldman’s surprising twists and turns, but even we didn’t see this coming: Netflix announced on July 6, 2020, that the dark comedy starring Christina Applegate and Linda Cardellini has been renewed for a third (yay!) but last (no!) season.
me when my boss has to end the zoom meeting early due to poor internet connection pic.twitter.com/YITDdUI2fI
— Dead To Me (@deadtome) May 27, 2020
After making that sad announcement, Feldman told everyone that he had made a long-term deal with Netflix to work together on more projects.
We could not be more excited to expand our relationship with Liz and continue to work with her on Dead to Me and future series to come,
Jane Wiseman, Netflix’s vice president of comedy series, said in a statement.
Feldman also sent out a statement in which he wrote that
“Dead to Me is exactly the show I wanted to make,” and “it’s been an incredible gift.”
She goes on to say,
telling a story sprung from grief and loss has stretched me as an artist and healed me as a human. I’ll be forever indebted to my partners in crime, my friends for life, Christina and Linda, and our brilliantly talented writers, cast, and crew. I am beyond grateful to Netflix for supporting Dead to Me from day one, and I’m thrilled to continue our collaboration.
As soon as the news came out, Christina Applegate went on Twitter to tell the world what she thought by writing,
I will miss these ladies. But we felt this was the best way to tie up the story of these women. Thank you to all the fans. We will be getting back to work when it is safe to do so. Much love.
The second season (spoilers ahead!) was about widow Jen (Applegate) coming to terms with Judy’s (Cardellini) ex-husband Steve’s (James Marsden) death after she hit him over the head. It started on May 8, 2020, with a lot of praise from critics. This season was mostly about how Jen moved on with her life after Steve died. Ben, Steve’s twin brother, ended the season with a bang when, while drunk, he crashed his car into Jen and Judy. This led to a lot of interesting fan theories. The event left people wanting more. Feldman told Glamour in an interview that when she wrote the shocking ending to the story, she did so with the intention of making the plot even more interesting.
I would love to keep making the show. I’d love to keep working with the writers, with Christina and Linda, and with our amazing crew,
she said.
So you intentionally make [a finale] so there are more questions than answers.
Feldman also told Glamour in an interview that she had no plans to make a “seven-season show,” saying that Netflix doesn’t usually do that kind of thing. However, she also said,
for now, especially at the end of season two, it just begs you to give more story.
There’s a chance that the pandemic will have some effect on how the next season goes.
I have a direction that I’d like to take season three,
Feldman said in May 2020,
but we have to be sensitive that things change and so can ideas. When I first started thinking about how I wanted to do season three, we weren’t in a pandemic. We weren’t in this incredibly trying, traumatic collective experience. As a storyteller, I want to be respectful of our audience as a whole. The show isn’t meant to just be a dark tone about lies and mysteries. I want it to be an escape. I want it to make people feel good also.
Feldman, on the other hand, was always careful not to stay too long. She knew there were only so many stories that could be told about Jen and Judy in dangerous situations before they became annoying to the listener.
It’s going to strain credulity at a certain point if four more seasons of terrible things befall these characters,” she told Glamour, adding that the heart of the show has always been “about two women getting through the worst things in life together.
All of those dangling threads excite me,
Feldman said about season three.
But what excites me more than anything is just being able to write more of this complicated, twisty friendship between Jen and Judy. It’s a show about these two friends who are inextricably drawn to each other, perhaps for the wrong reasons, but in the end, their friendship just feels right.
In August 2021, well-known actress Christina Applegate told the public that she had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. As a response to the claims, Netflix and CBS Studios sent a joint statement to The Hollywood Reporter. In it, they said,
We love and support Christina and respect her privacy as she takes the time and space she needs in this moment.
The article also says that the show’s filming has been “paused temporarily.”
me after finishing the entire season in one day pic.twitter.com/TYouTudqCt
— Dead To Me (@deadtome) May 9, 2020
