“I don’t think women should apologize for wanting a promotion or wanting to get noticed or acknowledged.” -Emily Andras
After watching the latest — and crazy! — episode of Syfy’s Wynonna Earp, titled “Gonna Getcha Good,” we at OMFGTV could not wait to discuss the developments with series’ showrunner Emily Andras. The sophomore season’s third installment was filled with new villains, amazing Nicole developments, and a little bit of cheerleading — and Emily had a lot to say about it all.
A new villain was introduced this episode, but he is very different from the other villains in this show. Tucker Gardner (Caleb Ellsworth-Clark) isn’t a Revenant from Hell, and he’s not a demon that accidentally slipped into the Ghost River Triangle. Instead he is a teenaged entitled, privileged white boy. “He’s just a human,’ Andras tells us. “Sometimes there’s just bad boys, we all know them.”
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She points out that in the Wynonna Earp universe, not all non-humans are bad, look at Dolls (Shamier Anderson)! “Men are the worst! I would say, given the current events, we’re seeing a lot of that.” Emily even goes on to say “Entitled dudes are practically the worst! Give me a good old-fashioned tentacle demon over some of those dudes.” This is the kind of fuel that inspires many of Wynonna Earp’s strongest themes and stories.
Waverly’s (Dominique Provost-Chalkley) cheerleading scene is going to be an iconic scene, for more reasons than you may realize. Emily wanted to use that scene to reframe old tropes that often get used. “In a typical show 20 years ago, this scene would be very much like Waverly servicing the male gaze.” But that’s not how it goes down on Wynonna Earp, instead she is dancing for her girlfriend and it is very respectful and tasteful. “I just like that we can maybe reframe these tropes as our own, and turn them on their head and make them empowering instead of demeaning.”
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Emily could not stop from ranting and raving about how incredible Dominique was in this episode, claiming she cheered for at least 4 hours straight and “she had to take all the Advil the next day.” Dominique was so committed that she even choreographed the cheer herself! “We sent her a bunch of videos of the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders, and once again, Dominique just going above and beyond and deserving of all the accolades in the entire world.”
Episode 203 introduces a new type of demon, one that grants wishes and collects organs from its victims. According to Emily, the process of creating this demon was different than most of their other creatures, mostly because they found the mask they wanted to use first, then designed the story around it. “Sometimes we have the story first and then decide what the creature’s going to look like. But I thought the mask was so evocative.” They also had to try to make the creature even scarier because he was going to be seen in full daylight and not just at night.
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Another standout moment from the episode is the scene between Nicole (Katherine Barrell) and Nedley (Greg Lawson). In the scene, Nedley opens up to Nicole about how Purgatory works, and lets her know he wants her to take over as Sheriff when he retires. “I think this scene with Nedley is one of my favorite scenes of the year.” Andras continues explaining why she loves this Nicole storyline so much. “I really love this Nicole storyline because it’s not about her romance, or her being gay. It’s about her career and her desire and her ambition.”
Nicole is very career driven, and that is something many women can relate to, but some are also afraid to be so assertive and successful. Nicole is a great role model for any women who works in a mans world, because she doesn’t take any shit and asks for what she wants. “I don’t think women should apologize for wanting a promotion or wanting to get noticed or acknowledged. I think that’s the Wynonna Earp way, and that’s really important.”
Wynonna Earp airs Fridays at 10pm on Syfy.