Santa Clarita Diet is an American horror-comedy web television series created by Victor Fresco for the streaming services Netflix , starring Timothy Olyphant and Drew Barrymore . [1] Fresco reserves as the showrunner, and is an executive producer Alongside Barrymore, Olyphant, Aaron Kaplan, Tracy Katsky, Chris Miller and Ember Truesdell. [2] [3]
The single-camera series premiered on February 3, 2017 and consists of 10 episodes. [4] The first season has a number of graphic scenes. On March 29, 2017, it was announced that Netflix renewed the series for a second season, which will premiere in 2018. [5]
Plot
Married couple Sheila and Joel are real estate agents in Santa Clarita, California . [6] Sheila goes through a transformation – becoming a zombie who feeds on human flesh. [1] [7]
Cast
- Timothy Olyphant as Joel Hammond, Sheila’s husband and Abby’s father
- Drew Barrymore as Sheila Hammond, Joel’s wife and Abby’s mother
- Liv Hewson as Abby Hammond, Sheila and Joel’s daughter
- Skyler Gisondo as Eric Bemis, the Hammonds’ neighbor, Lisa’s son and Dan’s stepson
Recurring
- Ricardo Chavira as Dan Palmer, sheriff’s deputy and the Hammonds’ neighbor
- Mary Elizabeth Ellis as Lisa Palmer, Dan’s wife and Eric’s mother
- Richard T. Jones as Rick, a Santa Monica police officer, the Hammond’s neighbor, and Joel’s friend
- Joy Osmanski as Alondra, Rick’s Wife
- Natalie Morales as Anne Garcia, a sheriff’s deputy and co-worker of Dan’s
- Thomas Lennon as Novak, Abby’s main school
- Grace Zabriskie as Mrs. Bakavic, Novak’s grandmother
- DeObia Oparei as Loki Hayes, a convicted felon
- Portia de Rossi as Cora Wolf, a scientist focused on the undead
Guest
- Nathan Fillion as Gary West, a realtor and the Hammonds’ co-worker
- Andy Richter as Carl Coby, the Hammonds’ boss
- Patton Oswalt as Dr. Hasmedi, a virologist
- Ryan Hansen as Bob Jonas, Lisa Palmer’s lover
- Derek Waters as Anton, a conspiracy theorist
- Ravi Patel as Ryan, a convention goer
Production
The Zombie angle also allowed Fresco to explore the concept of Narcissism stating that “the undead are the ultimate narcissists.” What they want when they want to and they do not care about other people’s needs ” [8]
For the setting Fresco drew from his own experience growing up in San Fernando Valley . Santa Clarita was chosen because of its unusual middle class . [8] The Hammond’s proffession of realtors was because “it gets them out into the world” as well as the “forced friendliness” inherent to the profession. [8]
Episodes
| No. | title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | “So Then a Bat or a Monkey” | Ruben Fleischer | Victor Fresco | February 3, 2017 |
| Joel and Sheila Hammond are realtors leading a normal suburban life with their daughter Abby. Sheila begins to violently throw up to her. Joel takes Sheila to the emergency department but it’s slow and they go home. Sheila is acting oddly including an increased libido. Sheila shows the family that she has no heartbeat and her blood is thick. They then talk to Lisa’s her Eric who informs them Sheila is dead and undead, thus driven by her Id. Sheila is okay with her new state. Eric tells them Sheila must always be fed, and if she degrades they may have to kill her. Later, Sheila and Abby Sheila goes to party with her neighbors. Sheila and Joel’s co-worker, Gary, Show up and entices Joel finds them. They leave and Sheila thinks her new behavior might be who she really is. Sheila is at home when Gary comes into her life and she is unfaithful if she refuses. Sheila starts to lick his fingers, suddenly biting two of them off and begins to devour Gary in the backyard. Joel comes home, and walks into the backyard to see Sheila eating Gary. She tells Joel she wants to make this work as Joel looks on in astonishment and horror. Suddenly biting two of them off and begins to devour Gary in the backyard. Joel comes home, and walks into the backyard to see Sheila eating Gary. She tells Joel she wants to make this work as Joel looks on in astonishment and horror. Suddenly biting two of them off and begins to devour Gary in the backyard. Joel comes home, and walks into the backyard to see Sheila eating Gary. She tells Joel she wants to make this work as Joel looks on in astonishment and horror. | ||||
| 2 | “We Can not Kill People!” | Ruben Fleischer | Victor Fresco | February 3, 2017 |
| They bury Gary’s remains in the desert. Abby and Eric follow them discovering Sheila killed Gary. While covering up the murder Dan sees Joel spraying his grass in the middle of the night and gets suspicious. Joel consults a virologist but he thinks Joel is crazy. Dan comes to inspect the grass and Joel tells him they have ants. Abby ditches school with Eric. Joel tries to get Sheila to eat meat but she says she is gary she does not want anything but humans. Joel suggests that maybe it’s the freshness that matters. Sheila continues to act impulsively including killing a rooster. Sheila tells Joel she could not eat the rooster. Joel reiterates that they can not kill people. Joel and Sheila to try and find an alternative food source at the morgue but Sheila can not stand the cadaver flesh. Sheila’s hunger in growing so Joel tells her she is going to kill people so she can eat. They have been together since high school and he is not going to leave her now. Abby comes and sleeps in their bed because she is worried about the changes. | ||||
| 3 | “We Can Kill People” | Marc Buckland | Clay Graham | February 3, 2017 |
| Joel and Sheila discuss balancing killing people and being parents. Abby is grumpy with them for being overbearing. They make a plan to find a bad person to kill. Dan talks to them about never having a sloppy kill referring to the ants. They get supplies for killing people. Joel smokes pot in the bathroom to calm down. Eric and Abby have lunch while ditching school where Abby’s friend leaves with her older boyfriend but he breaks up with her. Joel and Sheila talk to Rick, their other neighbor who is also a cop, looking for where to find people to kill. Sheila and Joel overhear the teenagers talking about how bad the ex-boyfriend was and decided to kill him. Once Joel talk to him he decides to let her go to Sheila’s annoyance. The teenagers teargas the ex-boyfriend’s house retrieving her friend sweater. Sheila kills the driver of the other car. They put him in the freezer in their storage unit hoping he will not be missed. They go to family dinner and all three of them tell the others how wonderful everything is. | ||||
| 4 | “The Farting Sex Tourist” | Ken Kwapis | Michael A. Ross | February 3, 2017 |
| Sheila makes a smoothie from the body in storage then goes walking with her neighbors. Sheila suggests the woman should live life to the fullest. Sheila tells her that her new attitude is due to her new high protein diet. Joel goes to paranormal stores researching zombies. He finds two prints from Serbia that show someone vomiting up a red ball and then eating someone. Rick talks to the couple about their new car and then Dan interrupts bringing them more ant spray. Abby’s school calls them in and Principal Novak tells them Abby is missing school. They insist everything is normal. Sheila gets upset with Novak and she wants him to suspend Abby. Sheila tells Abby she should drop out causing Joel to confront Sheila about her behavior concluding he is not sure their family can survive it. Sheila talks to Eric who tells her the undead have no impulse control and she can not change. Meanwhile Joel talks to Abby and they steal Rick’s motorcycle before they jump over freaking out about Sheila. Joel realizes Novak is Serbian. Dan sprays Joel’s yard for ants and finds Gary’s finger. | ||||
| 5 | “Man Eat Man” | Marc Buckland | Chadd Gindin | February 3, 2017 |
| Abby goes to the storage unit and finds the dead man in the freezer. Joel talks to Novak’s Grandmother for help translating the prints. She tells him it’s an old story about zombies from a book that might have a cure. Sheila is reluctant about a cure at first and she likes the side effects of being a zombie but finally agrees she wants a cure. Joel finds a possible source for the book, Anton. Abby tells Eric about the dead guy she found. Eric tells Abby he found out his mom is having an affair. Joel asks Rick to run a check for Anton. Dan blackmails Joel into killing a guy named Loki. Joel tells Sheila that Dan knows about Gary. Sheila wants to kill Loki for food and is willing to go alone. Abby complains to Eric about her parent’s lying and he tries to kiss her. Sheila and Joel try to kill Loki and fail. Sheila is worried she bit Loki. Abby notices her on her. Loki is on the floor of a hotel room surrounded by vomit like sheila was before. | ||||
| 6 | “Attention to Detail” | Craig Zisk | Leila Cohan-Miccio | February 3, 2017 |
| Joel and Sheila stake out Loki and debate the possibility that he was turned into a zombie. With no solution they go to a party at Dan’s house and Joel has to lie to Dan about Loki. Sheila realizes she has a pen with her contact information at Loki’s house. Abby and Eric have a hard time recovering from the kiss. Dan wants Joel to kill another guy who gets a bad guy when Sheila goes to kill him she turns out to be the guy Lisa is having an affair with and she does not kill him. Abby and Eric plant a flash bang in Dan’s rose garden to freak him out. In the process they find a stash of money concluding Dan is a dirty cop. Joel runs into Loki’s friends and is held hostage. They knock him out but he is OK and he finds the pen. Joel and Sheila decide they are going to do everything together moving forward. Joel confronts Dan telling him he will not be killing people for him anymore. They get into a fight and Joel kills him with a shovel. | ||||
| 7 | “Strange or Just Inconsiderate?” | Lynn Shelton | Ben Smith | February 3, 2017 |
| Joel and Sheila bring Dan’s body to their house and they make a plan to dispose of him. Sheila begins to worry about Joel, who is obsessed with retaining the family’s “normality.” Rick finds Anton for Joel. Abby finds Dan’s body in the tub and confronts her parents about lying to her. Abby tells Eric that Dan is dead and he is fine with it. Abby and Eric have a plan to help cover up Dan’s murder by revealing he is a dirty cop to the other cops. With the sheriff’s department all over the neighborhood following Dan’s disappearance, Sheila undertakes to completely avoid the evidence. Joel decides to take the remaining body parts out of the house in a cooler. The cops find Dan’s stash and with it Gary’s finger. Rick tells Joel that Gary’s disappearance is being blamed on Dan. | ||||
| 8 | “How Much Vomit?” | Steve Pink | Aaron Brownstein & Simon Ganz | February 3, 2017 |
| Sheila keeps the fact that her toe has fallen off from Joel. As the police find more about Dan’s corrupt activities, Joel and Sheila hear that Loki is still alive and appears to have turned undead as well. They find him doing an acoustic performance at a local club, and he becomes obsessed with Sheila, forcing him to kill him when he tries to murder Joel. As Joel is coming to terms with Sheila’s toe having fallen off, they are both shocked to notice that her right eye is now hanging out of her head. | ||||
| 9 | “The Book!” | Tamra Davis | Sarah Walker | February 3, 2017 |
| Joel and Eric is a family member of the Paranormal Family. She is a member of the Paranormal Community. Anton Jo accents Joel of being a government agent, and when confronted later, admits he is a fraud and does not have the book-however Joel is approached by another expectant, who puts him in touch with the book’s real owner, Dr. Cora Wolf. Meanwhile, Sheila tries to bond with Abby, as the two try to get her money back from the brother of the deceased chop shop owner. | ||||
| 10 | “Baka, Bile and Baseball Bats” | Dean Parisot | Clay Graham | February 3, 2017 |
| Dr. Cora Wolf moves in with the Hammonds to work on a cure for the virus, which has only been tested on rats. Wolf tells Sheila that as her condition progresses, she will become uncontrollably violent and could harm her family and others. With Eric’s assistance, Wolf synthesizes the cure, only requiring the final ingredient: the bile of a pure-born Serbian. Joel and Sheila visit Principal Novak’s “baka” and attempt to get her to vomit by getting her drunk, however Novak calls the police and Joel is arrested and committed to a mental institution. Sheila gets Abby to chain her up in the basement, to prevent her harming anyone. She takes a call from a real estate customer, telling them that she hopes either she or her husband “will be free next week”. | ||||
Critical reception
Santa Clarita Diet is the best choice. On Rotten Tomatoes the season has an approval rating of 71% based on 51 reviews, with an average rating of 7.9 / 10. The Santa Clarita Diet has an excellent cast, frequent laughs, and an engaging premise – but the level of gore might not be everyone’s taste. ” [9] On Metacritic , the season has a score of 67 out of 100, based on 30 reviews, indicating “favorable reviews”. [10]
Advertising controversy
In February 2017, for the show in Germany, where Netflix promoted the show with posters depicting a human finger sliced up like a currywurst , a popular German fast food dish. After receiving more than 50 complaints that the advertising was glorifying violence and inducing fear, especially in children, the German Advertising Council, a self-regulatory institution, forwarded the complaints to the company. Netflix then decided to end the campaign and remove all posters. [11]
References
- ^ Jump up to:a b Nellie Andreeva. “Drew Barrymore & Timothy Olyphant To Star In ‘Santa Clarita Diet’ Netflix Series” . Deadline .
- Jump up^ Lesley Goldberg. “Drew Barrymore, Timothy Olyphant to Star in Netflix Comedy Series ‘Santa Clarita Diet ‘ ” . Hollywood Reporter .
- Jump up^ Abrams, Natalie (November 28, 2016). “Netflix sets premiere for Drew Barrymore comedy Santa Clarita Diet – Exclusive” . Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved November 28, 2016 .
- Jump up^ Elizabeth Wagmeister. “Drew Barrymore & Timothy Olyphant to Star in Netflix Comedy Series ‘Santa Clarita Diet ‘ ” . Variety .
- Jump up^ Nellie Andreeva. “Drew Barrymore Comedy ‘Santa Clarita Diet’ Renewed For Season 2 By Netflix” . Deadline .
- Jump up^ Respers, Lisa (February 2, 2017). ” ‘ Santa Clarita Diet’ brings attention to city” . CNN Entertainment .
- Jump up^ Harnick, Chris (January 17, 2017). “Drew Barrymore is TV’s Newest Zombie (Goal, Do not Call Her a Zombie)” . E! Online . Retrieved January 22, 2017 .
- ^ Jump up to:a b c Bacle, Ariana. “Santa Clarita Diet creator calls new zombie comedy ‘a romantic piece ‘ ” . Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved 26 June 2017 .
- Jump up^ “Santa Clarita Diet: Season 1 (2017)” . Rotten Tomatoes . Retrieved February 12, 2017 .
- Jump up^ “Santa Clarita Diet: season 1 reviews” . Metacritic . Retrieved February 12, 2017 .
- Jump up^ Plaga, Corinne (20 February 2017). “” Angstauslösend “Netflix muss Werbeplakate für TV-Serie” Santa Clarita Diet “abhängen” (in German). Mitteldeutsche Zeitung . Retrieved 20 February 2017 .