‘Sweet Tooth’ Season 3 Review

The big picture

• sweet tooth
  it's a hybrid of concepts that shouldn't work, but surprisingly does, focusing on humans resisting change.
• Characters like Bear and a glut of new faces in Season 3 distract from Gus' core journey.
• The final episode fittingly concludes the series, showing its hopeful and loving nature while honoring the source material.

For three seasons, sweet tooth has followed Gus (Christian Convery), a child who is a hybrid between animals and humans: he looks like a small child, but also has large antlers sticking out of his head. Since its inception, sweet tooth itself, however, has felt like a hybrid of things that shouldn't work. For example, this was a show about a pandemic that premiered on Netflix while we were dealing with our own world-changing pandemic. The show, developed by Jim Micklealso took Jeff Lemiredecidedly dark graphic novel series and gave it a much lighter focus, the rare apocalyptic series to prioritize wide-eyed hope.

This is also a show full of adorable animal hybrid kids (Bobby, a groundhog hybrid, might be the cutest thing you've ever seen in your life), who are hunted by humans who fear they'll be replaced by this new evolution . How is season 3 doing sweet tooth in the end, this conflict of hybrids as the next step in our progression and humans losing control of their position in the world, this conflict takes center stage in an occasionally bumpy, but ultimately satisfying end to Sweet Tooth's journey.

“Sweet Tooth” Season 3 sends Gus to Alaska to find his mother

Season 3 begins with our core group reunited after the events of last season, including Gus, Tommy Jepperd (Nonso Anozie), Support (Stefania LaVie Owen), and Wendy (Naledi Murray) go to Alaska to find Gus's mother, Birdie (Amy Seimetz). Birdie has been trying to find where the sick came from, looking for a cure and their origin. When Gus and his team head out to find Birdie, they encounter Dr. Singh (Adeel Akhtar), who wants to help Gus reach his destination after having a vision. They are also hunted by Helen Zhang (Rosalind Chao), who has become the “last warlord” in this new world and wants to start human births again, as his daughter Rosie helps him in his hunt (Kelly Marie Tran), and their child/wolf hybrids. As Gus and the gang head to Alaska to get answers and find their mother, the humans who follow him want to undo what caused the hybrids to be born and return the world to the way they remember it.

More than any other season, sweet tooth Season 3 is very much about fighting change of humans who just want things to go back to the way they were before. While this mainly comes down to the season's new main villain, Zhang, the series is much more open about this topic than it has been in the past. Early on, Gus and his crew encounter a family trying to hide the fact that one of the children is a hybrid, having them bind their chests to hide their wings. For many of the remaining humans, there is a very strong focus on how things were versus how they are now and trying to make the world great again. Especially for Gus and his allies, there's a question of whether it's worth saving the humans if they try to kill and harm innocent hybrid children.

Christian Convery is excellent in the final season of “Sweet Tooth”.

That question is perfectly encapsulated by Gus' journey in Season 3. It's an especially big season for Convery, who literally has the whole world on his shoulders at times. Through Convery's performance, we're watching a boy who had to grow up too soon evolve into a storyteller and a leader who must decide what's best for the world he's been born into and which for the most part doesn't the flight. Gus has almost always had someone by his side to help him on his journey, but one of his best episodes this season, “Beyond the Sea,” mostly isolates him and forces him to figure out what's best for to his group and those who have been. Lost. It's a beautiful episode of self-realization that makes Gus an essential part of what this world will become and need. Convery excels at bringing this evolution of Gus to lifeas he grows into an adult who realizes his importance to the world and how best to help the world move forward.

Last season, sweet tooth struggled when separating these characters, with the middle section often feeling a bit too stretched and like it was spinning its wheels, resulting in an eight-episode season that could have been cut in half. Season 3 has a similar problem, which also leads to more focus on supporting characters than necessary. This is especially true when Bear and Wendy go on their own adventures away from the main group. Unlike many of the main characters, the former is a specific creation for the show, however sweet tooth He has often struggled to make Bear as compelling as the rest of the main cast. This problem remains in this final season, and unfortunately teaming her up with Wendy doesn't do much to fix it.

The final episode of Sweet Tooth resolves the problems of season 3

In the same way, sweet toothThe final season also introduces a slew of new characters that tend to slow down Gus' main journey rather than elevate it in any major way. We meet the community Birdie has been living with in Alaska, including her friend Siana (Dear Gee), Siana's hybrid daughter Nika (Ayazkhan Dalabaeva), and many other members of this small town. But most of these characters are just a means to an end to the larger story, mostly fighting enemies to get Gus to his destination without us getting a chance to learn too much about them.

This problem also arises when it comes to Zhang and his family. While we've known Zhang before since Season 2 positioned her as the finale's big bad, this season also has the unfortunate problem of introducing her crew and family. Besides Zhang's pregnant daughter and her team of anti-hybrid workers, the biggest addition this season comes in Kelly Marie Tran's Rosie. More than almost any other character we see, Rosie is torn between a future where her wolf children can thrive or her mother's wishes to end all hybrid life. Rosie is an intriguing character caught between two difficult decisionsbut we won't delve into that conflict until later in the season.

But the end of this last season is where sweet tooth it all comes together in a charming and appropriate way. This entire series has been told as a story by our unknown narrator (James Brolin), with the season opening with him saying, “All stories come to an end,” and, as with any great story, sweet tooth nails his finish. For all the mythology and history this season throws into the mix to try to explain the hybrid situation the world has found itself in, this has always been the story of a boy and a “grown man” Jeppard. Particularly in the final episode, “This is a story.” sweet tooth it perfectly compensates for this bond so that the journey is worth it for the final destination. Like much of the show, Mickle (who wrote and directed the final episode) strikes the right mix of paying homage to Lemire's comics while finding the perfect tone for this more positive take on the source material.

sweet tooth It hasn't necessarily been the smoothest ride, with the wonderful first season followed by a more unpleasant-than-expected second season, and with many of these issues still consistent in the final season. But overall and with a conclusion that makes up for this story in a delightful way and a perfect performance from Convery, sweet tooth is the rare apocalyptic story full of hope and love.

sweet tooth Season 3 is now available to stream on Netflix in the US

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